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Stacie Orrico The latest support for my little theory that Christian music is at least one year behind the mainstream music scene is Genuine from Stacie Orrico. Sometimes this lag produces solid bands like Third Day or Five Iron Frenzy, but every once in a while some producers go too far. The current rate of drop-down is certainly lesser than the early 90's, when dc Talk was still sounding like Heavy D while Nirvana was defining what would be the sound for an entire generation. Sometimes you wish CCM just wouldn't follow all the secular trends, like death metal, or in this case, the latest wave of soulless, mind-numbing, pop from boy bands galore, Britney Spears, and Christina Aguilera. Unfortunately, there's already a Christian boy band (see Plus One), and CCM just couldn't go without a teenage sex symbol. Enter Stacie Orrico. The first sign that something is wrong is the 'come hither' stare on the front cover of the CD. Reading the booklet, we find out that Orrico is 14 years old. Well, if she copies the same musical mold as Aguilera, why not have a Christianized version of other parts? It only makes me sad because Forefront Records tries to deny what they've done in her bio page on their website: "In an age when teen pop rules the music world it's easy to forget that being a teenager is more than just having killer abs, choreographing some hip dance moves and exuding a coy sexuality." This is exactly what they say on the website. But let's move on to the music. In her defense, Orrico wrote or co-wrote three of the songs on Genuine. This is something she'll always have over Spears and Aguilera. For that, I have to hand it to her. I hope that her songwriting progresses past bubblegum pop, and that the CCM industry will keep her around if that happens. The sound of the album itself is nothing spectacular. You could take the dance beats behind it and put any words from Spears and Aguilera's latest works, and everything would fit. I'd try it, but I'm just too scared to see my hypothesis proved right. The lone bright spot on the album is 'Dear Friend,' one of Orrico's originals. Orrico seems to be singing to the person that many students these days are becoming. It's haunting, and I pray that there are more people out there like Orrico that take these words to heart and reach out to these friends that are truly hurting. The world needs to see the love of Christ, and for that, I definitely cannot fault Orrico for bringing that out. It just makes me sad that the other songwriters on this album, people who are near legends in the industry, wrote crap for the rest of it. I'm sorry, but it's the truth. (Adam L.) |
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