I didn't originally include this song on the list because I didn't hear it until I was in high school in 1992. But after careful consideration, I realized I needed to throw this in the mix as an Honorable Mention.
Rez (or Rez Band, or Resurrection Band) was one of the forerunners of hard rock and heavy metal in the Christian scene. Glenn & Wendi Kaiser & company, some of the cornerstone founding members of the ministry known as Jesus People USA, knew that music ministry would be more effective in reaching more people with the Gospel than merely preaching the Gospel. Because of the neighborhoods they came from were littered with all sorts of trouble—rampant drug use, sex trade, human trafficking, gang violence—their music was often hard and gritty, as were their lyrics.
Innocent Blood was perhaps the most pointed of the decade, capping off the 1980s with an album that felt dark and sinister at times, even though there were rays of sunshine in songs like the band's cover of The Who's "Bargain" and the harmonica-driven blues stomper "Great God in Heaven". But even the cover of the album—a picture of a young girl from their neighborhood who had been abducted and used in a kiddie porn ring—revealed the darkness that we would all have to deal with in some way in our lives. For them, it was standing at their front door.
As much as I love Innocent Blood as a whole, the song from Rez that I feel is the most important, and therefore greatest, song from the 1980s is the haunting blues/power ballad "Shadows".
When I first heard "Shadows" on a compilation album, the Star Song label's Ultimate Metal, it floored me. This could have been a true story, or it might have been a fabricated one, it didn't matter. The events surrounding Johnny, a young man who killed himself while under the influence of narcotics, felt like a true-to-life crime drama that could have happened in my own neighborhood. The perspective of a Johnny's friend being so impacted by his death that he reaches out to God out of desperation and fear that he might do the same could not feel more real.
"Goodbye, Kathy, and goodbye, Mom
There's voices in my head
Angel dust and tortured dreams
Say I'd be better dead"
This isn't your typical rock song, and it's not one that most people would have touted as a Christian song. When Rez released Between Heaven 'n Hell, they were being picked up for airplay on MTV with their single "Love Comes Down", and they were being marketed into more non-church venues. As a result, the songwriting on the album was toned down in the amount of Christianese being used, and some critics bashed the band for this. But when you have such strong tunes like "Love", "Shadows", and "Zuid Afrikan" gracing your album, you can just point the critics to the power of the songs and let them speak for themselves.
"Shadows" lurks into your brain, shining the light on what happens to the mind of a young person who's contemplating suicide, and what the death of a young person does to the people around them. Glenn Kaiser's vocals on this song scorch the earth beneath the listener as the story unfolds, and it may be one of his finest vocal performances on record. The guitar work on here is strong, solid, and soulful, and the addition of keys helps to flesh out the haunting feel the story in the lyrics describes.
God, are you there?
Can you hear me now?
Show me how to hope
Lost in the dark on a dead-end road
Please save me from myself
"Shadows" represented the type of song that wasn't seen much in Christian music circles—a treatise on the dark realities of death and destruction that can permeate even the most safe corners of our world. This song came out right at the beginning of a craze of movies, music, and television shows dealing with the tragedy of teenage suicide.
While this song links the suicide of the subject with drug use, the haunting idea is that all of us can succumb to the darkness that wants to take us down, into the depths of our soul, and we're all afraid on some level that we'll find nothing good to live for. Satan uses this lie to try and convince us to think that yes, the bad things are bad enough to end it all.
Things will never get better.
Things couldn't possibly be any worse.
There is no hope to be found.
I have nothing left to live for.
Nobody would care if I was no longer here.
This is the only way.
I want you to know—you, the person reading this . . . yeah, you—that there is ALWAYS a way out of the darkness. Reach out to someone, anyone, that will give you even five minutes so that you can share with them what's going on. Don't be afraid of what they'll think of you, because we all go to that dark place every once in a while, and they'll understand where you're coming from.
If you don't know someone you can speak to personally, or if you know someone who is contemplating suicide, and you don't know how to talk to them, you can speak to someone at the National Suicide Prevention Hotline at 1-800-273-8255. They're available 24 hours a day.
And if need be, you can talk to me.
livingonthebackburner@gmail.com
There Is No Box.
Zach
Rez (or Rez Band, or Resurrection Band) was one of the forerunners of hard rock and heavy metal in the Christian scene. Glenn & Wendi Kaiser & company, some of the cornerstone founding members of the ministry known as Jesus People USA, knew that music ministry would be more effective in reaching more people with the Gospel than merely preaching the Gospel. Because of the neighborhoods they came from were littered with all sorts of trouble—rampant drug use, sex trade, human trafficking, gang violence—their music was often hard and gritty, as were their lyrics.
Innocent Blood was perhaps the most pointed of the decade, capping off the 1980s with an album that felt dark and sinister at times, even though there were rays of sunshine in songs like the band's cover of The Who's "Bargain" and the harmonica-driven blues stomper "Great God in Heaven". But even the cover of the album—a picture of a young girl from their neighborhood who had been abducted and used in a kiddie porn ring—revealed the darkness that we would all have to deal with in some way in our lives. For them, it was standing at their front door.
As much as I love Innocent Blood as a whole, the song from Rez that I feel is the most important, and therefore greatest, song from the 1980s is the haunting blues/power ballad "Shadows".
When I first heard "Shadows" on a compilation album, the Star Song label's Ultimate Metal, it floored me. This could have been a true story, or it might have been a fabricated one, it didn't matter. The events surrounding Johnny, a young man who killed himself while under the influence of narcotics, felt like a true-to-life crime drama that could have happened in my own neighborhood. The perspective of a Johnny's friend being so impacted by his death that he reaches out to God out of desperation and fear that he might do the same could not feel more real.
"Goodbye, Kathy, and goodbye, Mom
There's voices in my head
Angel dust and tortured dreams
Say I'd be better dead"
This isn't your typical rock song, and it's not one that most people would have touted as a Christian song. When Rez released Between Heaven 'n Hell, they were being picked up for airplay on MTV with their single "Love Comes Down", and they were being marketed into more non-church venues. As a result, the songwriting on the album was toned down in the amount of Christianese being used, and some critics bashed the band for this. But when you have such strong tunes like "Love", "Shadows", and "Zuid Afrikan" gracing your album, you can just point the critics to the power of the songs and let them speak for themselves.
"Shadows" lurks into your brain, shining the light on what happens to the mind of a young person who's contemplating suicide, and what the death of a young person does to the people around them. Glenn Kaiser's vocals on this song scorch the earth beneath the listener as the story unfolds, and it may be one of his finest vocal performances on record. The guitar work on here is strong, solid, and soulful, and the addition of keys helps to flesh out the haunting feel the story in the lyrics describes.
God, are you there?
Can you hear me now?
Show me how to hope
Lost in the dark on a dead-end road
Please save me from myself
"Shadows" represented the type of song that wasn't seen much in Christian music circles—a treatise on the dark realities of death and destruction that can permeate even the most safe corners of our world. This song came out right at the beginning of a craze of movies, music, and television shows dealing with the tragedy of teenage suicide.
While this song links the suicide of the subject with drug use, the haunting idea is that all of us can succumb to the darkness that wants to take us down, into the depths of our soul, and we're all afraid on some level that we'll find nothing good to live for. Satan uses this lie to try and convince us to think that yes, the bad things are bad enough to end it all.
Things will never get better.
Things couldn't possibly be any worse.
There is no hope to be found.
I have nothing left to live for.
Nobody would care if I was no longer here.
This is the only way.
I want you to know—you, the person reading this . . . yeah, you—that there is ALWAYS a way out of the darkness. Reach out to someone, anyone, that will give you even five minutes so that you can share with them what's going on. Don't be afraid of what they'll think of you, because we all go to that dark place every once in a while, and they'll understand where you're coming from.
If you don't know someone you can speak to personally, or if you know someone who is contemplating suicide, and you don't know how to talk to them, you can speak to someone at the National Suicide Prevention Hotline at 1-800-273-8255. They're available 24 hours a day.
And if need be, you can talk to me.
livingonthebackburner@gmail.com
There Is No Box.
Zach
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