So, do worship albums sound better in a studio setting, or in front of a live audience?

That's the question I've been asking myself as I've listened to On the Road to Beautiful, the new disc from Charlie Hall. Charlie has been a regular fixture at Passion's worship events in recent years, and of course on their recordings, and he's apparently got an extensive back catalogue of songs that he's written for the purposes of corporate worship and personal reflection. Fitting comfortably into the pop/rock mold that characterizes much of today's "modern worship" music, Charlie's music seems to bridge the gap between well-known worship leaders like Matt Redman and Chris Tomlin and more of a singer/songwriter approach. This might sacrifice a little bit in the area of songs that are easy to learn and sing along to, but ultimately it lends more of a personal feel to his work.

I can't say much about Charlie's previous recordings, since this disc is only his second release for a major label (the reportedly mellow Porch and Altar was the first), and unlike several of his peers, he hasn't written any songs that I can recall singing in church within the last few years. All I know is what I'm hearing on Beautiful, and for the most part, that amounts to middle-of-the-road, guitar-driven pop/rock music, with a fairly generous sprinkling of piano on top. Despite that, the mix can sometimes be rather generic, and that shifts the focus toward the lyrics, which thankfully have a little more depth to them than your average record that advertises itself as a "worship album". Perhaps it's more appropriate to call this an album of worship, prayer and testimony - Charlie does a decent job of blurring the lines instead of sticking to simple, repetitive choruses. From a critical perspective, it may not be the most exciting thing in the world, but I'll hand it to Charlie - he's got heart, and that helps to offset any notion that this album is just a bunch of wall-to-wall clichés. The guy's simply singing about his journey to know God more deeply; he's not trying to be the next hip thing that all the teenagers or soccer moms will immediately latch on to.

I Will Overcome
And I know that my heart is hurting
And I know that my soul it aches...
A lovely, rolling piano cadence gets the album started, and soon a steady drumbeat and electric guitar join in, creating a midtempo, Coldplay sort of vibe. The piano actually gets quite a bit of airtime on this album, and it's a welcome break from the usual acoustic guitar strumming that dominates most contemporary worship albums - it helps to accentuate a few of his songs. Charlie opts for a gentle start here, giving us a simple, triumphant song of personal faith. (I think it's actually a redo of one of his older songs.) The melody gets a bit repetitive, especially during the chorus, and overall the song isn't as captivating as its intro would lead you to believe, but it's a pleasant enough beginning.

My Drink (I Remember You)
See the blaze that burns in me when I see You
And You look at me, O Lord...
This starts off with what I like to call "Zelda sounds" - you know, the type of artificial strings that you'd hear in a video game. This soon gives way to a muted acoustic verse with electronic underpinnings, which in turn leads to a fairly catchy chorus using the metaphor of communion to describe the person of Jesus. Something about the brashness of the chorus and Charlie's slightly more aggressive vocals give this track a bit of a youth-groupy sound, though Charlie's music as a whole is probably more likely to resonate with college students. I guess it's the obvious single of the record. There's an interesting drum pattern during the song's bridge, but ultimately the lyrics are a little too simplistic for my tastes - "You are my drink/You are my feast/You are my love/My soul's own King."

On the Road to Beautiful
My heart is set on a pilgrimage
To heavens own bright King
So in faltering or victory, I will always sing...
The mood settles back down here for a more heartfelt ballad, once again based around the piano. This actually sounds like the kind of tune you'd close an album with to give the listener a quiet moment of reflection after a string of good rocking songs. I like that the song - and the album, for that matter, focuses on a "pilgrimage" that leads through difficult trials and moments of personal favor through which God's glory is shown. Overall there's a good ambience here, and that accentuates Charlie's personal testimony rather nicely.

Chasing
Now a child of my King, leaving old I am made new...
There are a number of songs on this album where it seems like Charlie is trying to be upbeat, but the tempo lags just enough to dampen the overall effect of the song, resulting in a lot of ho-hum mid-tempo stuff. I hate to say that, because even in these lukewarm numbers, Charlie's vocals are earnest and passionate and you know he's 100% into what he's doing… but yeah, this is one of those tracks that just kind of rattles along and doesn't do much for me. It's a fairly basic "I love You 'cause You loved me first" type of songs, with a rolling drum cadence that gets carried through most of the song and a fairly subdued electric guitar strumming away in the background. Sometimes it feels like they were afraid to mix the guitars too far up on this record… and yet the drums are crystal clear, front and center. That leaves mostly rhythm and piano to drive a lot of the songs, and that only works when the rhythm is interesting or the piano isn't drowned out by too many other instruments.

Waking Up
And in my weakness, Lord, I know You will sustain me
Oh restrain me God, please...
More of those Zelda strings… Charlie seems to like opening his songs with them. This is another medium-paced tune, fairly easy to confuse with "Chasing" at first, though it starts to pick up steam later with some resonating keyboard notes and some overdubbed vocals that start off quietly in the background but eventually overtake the song. There's a very sunny aura to the whole thing - it's not excessively chipper, but it's optimistic in the face of waking up and facing a hard day. Charlie wants to dedicate the day to God in prayer and ponder the mercy that is new each morning, rather than just awkwardly stumbling through his day without a second thought like a lot of us do. He's got a decent sense of how to build momentum here, and how well he uses that sense ends up being what makes or breaks a lot of this album's tracks.

Beautiful of Heaven
So set my mind upon You wholly
Peel my fingers from the earthly...
I really like this song. It might just be one of the best new worship songs I've heard this year. Starting softly with an acoustic guitar and gently brushed, syncopated percussion, the song manages to keep an interesting melody throughout, while Charlie begs God to give him new bravery and motivation. "Inject boldness in my confession," he prays. He wants to be pried away from all of the earthly distractions. I guess the whole "slow build" approach works really well for songs of this nature, because they have a captivating and emotional effect on the listener/worshiper. By the time the bridge rolls around, the drums have reverted to a steady, insistent beat and Charlie's pulling off some interesting chord changes. Then the chorus comes back for its final time around, and a host of younger voices joins in, singing along to the main guitar line instead of the actual lyrics. The song finally quiets down again, with Charlie singing the final lyrics - "Until I'm lost in the King of kings/Take my life, my offering" in a hushed tone, the instruments dropping out one by one until all that's left is a piano echoing off into the distance. It's all very tough to explain, but it makes this song a definite standout on this album.

Swimming from the Shipwreck
We had followed Him for days
People walked when He turned to say
"Sink into My life, drink from My cup
Take no one over Me in love..."
You can tell from the title that Charlie's trying a little harder to write more than just the average worship song here. Charlie takes an easily understandable metaphor for escaping from a selfish lifestyle here, and turns it into a decently upbeat rock song with some fairly tasty guitar licks, and a good balance between the acoustic and electric guitar. Once again, the drums are a driving force helping to keep things interesting, and the chorus is of the variety that gets lodged in your memory, which is a good place for a song with words like "Simplify my life by letting go" to be. The song loses direction a bit when it adds some synthesized keyboard stuff and "Woo hoo hoo" background vocals near the end before effortlessly fading out, but it's still a good effort.

All the Earth
Praise the Father who from heaven came to me
By the Savior in His mercy set me free...
I know this song well because it also showed up on the live recording of Passion's OneDay '03 event, which released the same day as this album. It's got a jaunty piano intro that reminds me of Train, and there's a definite upbeat and celebrative tone to it, though it loses quite a bit of direction with its rather monotonous verses, which seem to stick to a single chord and refuse to let go. Much like one of Delirious?'s early songs, there's a simple sense of joy and abandonment here, but the songwriting doesn't seem rather focused - it feels like two or three song ideas are competing with each other, and the song's title comes from its bridge. At any rate, the song seems kind of long, running to almost five minutes when it seems like the tempo would have lent itself better to a concise three-minute tune.

Priceless Treasure
You are my gain in death or in life
My quest is to know You, my God, my delight...
This song has a graceful, 3/4 rhythm to it, and a simple but poetic quality that makes it sound somewhat like a hymn. It's much like something I'd expect to find on one of Fernando Ortega's albums. Though the instrumentation is the same drums/piano/guitar that permeates the rest of the album, there's something about it that gives it a bit of a Celtic feel - maybe it just reminds me of the worship song "In Christ Alone", which has been recorded recently by the Newsboys and Margaret Becker, among others. There's a pleasant background vocal here that adds a lot to the simple chorus - I can't tell where it's a guy or girl, but it makes me thing that Charlie should attempt a duet on the next album.

The Rising Shout
We are marked here by Your power
We are ready for this hour
And the walls are coming down
Yes, the walls are coming down...
A single, sustained note leads out of the previous track and into this song, which Charlie co-wrote with Matt Redman. As you could probably guess, the song has an air of "revival" to it since that seems to be one of Matt's favorite topics. Honestly, I think I would've expected something a little more powerful from such a collaboration, though - Charlie reminds stuck in mid-tempo mode, though, and that keeps the song's chorus from being an effective vehicle to communicate the pouring out of power that he wants us to experience through it. Another choir joins in here, but this time the effect isn't as "angelic" as it was in "Beautiful of Heaven". The synths in the background are a nice touch, though - they don't seem out of place.

Holy Heart
Search my heart, O God, and see in me
All offenses, God, that there may be...
One final devotional appears here in the form of a gentle ballad. This is probably the hardest track on the album to get into - the rhythm kind of plods along, and while I always appreciate Charlie's attempts to not be totally predictable with his melodies, it feels like he's hitting a few notes here that just aren't fitting into the song, especially at the end of the chorus when he sings "A heart that hears You, fears You, sees you as You are". The note he hits on the word "sees" just sounds off-key to me. I like a lot of artists that pull off unorthodox chord changes, so I honestly can't figure out why it bugs me so much here. Lyrically, it doesn't seem to reach as deep as some of the other tunes on the album either, it's a simple "Purify me" sort of song.

Sending
Channel our passions into pleasing Your heart
Come consecrate us, come and set us apart...
Now here's something I wasn't expecting - the album ends with one of Charlie's most rocking songs. He pulls the "Zelda" trick at the beginning, giving the intro an oddly whimsical tone, is soon overtaken by the passionate request, "Send us with fire to go love the world". The entire song is a very honest prayer written using "we" instead of "I", so it actually ends up being the most likely song for forward-thinking worship teams to pick up - as long as they don't mind playing a song with a little bite to it on a Sunday morning, that is. The guitars, while certainly not amped up to raucous levels, are alive and well on this song, and the drums bang away as Charlie passionately cries, "You're our greatest desire/Jesus, Your name is our greatest song". Of course, ending the album with this song (which trails off somewhat abruptly, leading me to expect a hidden track or something) means that the chorus will be stuck in my head for hours afterward - but that's not a bad thing. (This track also appeared on the OneDay '03 album - I just hadn't realized it was the same song until listening to Charlie's album and then going back and listening to OneDay again. That happens when I take in too much new material at once!)

Since I'm working with a pre-release and I can't find lyrics anywhere online, I regret that I can't examine Charlie's words more closely and get a feel for the specific message of this album, but I know that what he's done here required more effort than just taking 12 worship songs that he liked and hammering them out in the studio the way a lot of other worship bands do. The overall sound may not be distinctive in the music world overall, but Charlie's managing to carve out a niche for himself in the modern worship genre, and I think that's a good start. Despite quite a few words and phrases that I've heard in many songs before, there isn't a point where this album strikes me as anything but genuine - this trait also spilled over to the Passion CD, and both albums are discs that didn't excite me terribly at first, but have been a good tool for spiritual nourishment as I've listened to them repeatedly (there also might be a few songs that I'd consider using for my own small group worship times, if the tablature section of Charlie's website ever gets activated). To that end, I can definitely say that I'd recommend On the Road to Beautiful, even if there are a few bumps and breakdowns that occur along that road.

ALBUM WORTH:
I Will Overcome $.50
My Drink (I Remember You) $1
On the Road to Beautiful $1.50
Chasing $0
Waking Up $1
Beautiful of Heaven $2
Swimming from the Shipwreck $1.50
All the Earth $.50
Priceless Treasure $1.50
The Rising Shout $1
Holy Heart $0
Sending $2
TOTAL: $12.50

Website: http://www.charliehall.com

Recommended: Yes

Great Music to Play While: Reading or Studying