live | All About Worship

UNITED’s Live In Miami – Album Review

Posted on Feb 15th, 2012

I’ve lived my life to the soundtrack of Hillsong United. I applied acne medication and sported my Old Navy tech vest to the likes of “King of Majesty”, “More Than Life” and “To The Ends of The Earth”. I gained my freshman 15 (more like freshman 20) with the accompaniment of tracks like “The Stand”, “From the Inside Out” and “Salvation Is Here”.

I calmed my wedding jitters with “Found”, waited for our son’s arrival to The I Heart Revolution, and prayed for God to save my city with “Tear Down the Walls”. It is this kind of history, emotion and meaning attached to every song that ultimately make room in my heart, and millions more, for Aftermath: Live from Miami.

Just one look at the track listing, and it’s evident that this album is going to deliver every ounce of the passion, excitement and raw hunger for God synonymous with Hillsong UNITED.

To over-simplify, I’d break this album into a few categories:

1) All-time classics that feel a bit like “bonus tracks” on the project: “Mighty to Save”, “Hosanna”, “The Stand”, “All I Need is You”, “Take it All” and “From the Inside Out” – How can you not love these!

2) High-Octane praise, louder and more energetic than ever before: “Go”, “Nova”, “Freedom is Here/Shout Unto God” and “Yours Forever”. Again proving that UNITED is unrivaled in their ability to glorify Jesus while jumping up and down.

3) Intimate moments, showcasing the softer side of the team: “Bones”, “Oh You Bring”, and “Like an Avalanche”. So creative and compelling… songs that belong in a prayer playlist for sure.

4) Epic, “stadium” moments with all eyes on Jesus… The title track, fittingly performed by its creator Joel Houston, was even more powerful than the studio version. “Take Heart” was close behind. But, surprisingly enough, I can’t stop listening to the song that’s been on about 8 Hillsong albums over the past 5 years. Nothing like joining with thousands upon thousands, “With Everything” before God!

In summary, if you loved the studio version of Aftermath, and you’re one of the multitudes of Hillsong UNITED fans across the globe, then you’ll have this on repeat from now until their next highly anticipated release. It’s long, in all the right places, live in all the right ways and loud in the fullest, most vivid sense of the word.

I give this album 4 out of 5 stars.

-Joe Cameneti, Jr.
(review copy provided by the label)

Dancing Wildly – Reflections from Worship Central Live

Posted on Apr 4th, 2011

Last week I had the privilege to be in the congregation for the recording of the Worship Central movement’s first live album. Featuring household names such as Tim Hughes, Ben Cantelon and speaker Mike Pilavachi, the evening promised to be a good one. Here are my reflections on the event….

Worship Central’s vision is to “encounter God, equip the worshipper, and empower the local church”. If you take these principles and apply them to Thursday night’s event, the aims were met, exceeded, and positively blown away.

1 Corinthians 14:24-25 describes an atmosphere where an unbeliever comes into a worshipping congregation, encounters the Glory of God through His undeniable presence, the secrets of their heart are laid bare and really the only option is to bow down, crying “God is really among you”! There were times during this event where you could almost touch the thickness of the Lord’s presence.

There is something quite amazing about 2000 worshippers gathering together to experience God’s presence. Everyone turns up with expectancy, and the Lord shows up every time. Mike Pilavachi described worship, during his talk on the night, as being akin to the atmosphere at a Jewish wedding – singing, dancing, celebration – an event where you’re either dancing, or standing on the sides watching.

If the dancing is that infectious, your guard drops and you find yourself caught up in it, whether you had planned it that way or not. This is quite a good summation of the event as a whole, though I went to the event with friends and family, from start to finish my attentions were focused purely upon the Lord, His voice, and His presence. He was in charge of the evening, the night was His.

From a musical perspective, the set contained much of Tim’s new Love Shines Through album, with songs such as ‘Counting On Your Name’, ‘All Glory’ and ‘At Your Name’ going down particularly well. Many of the arrangements of songs were very similar to the album tracks, although there were some slightly more experimental sections, notably the re-working of Ben’s ‘Not Ashamed’ into a more electronic offering, with rapped verses and an anthemic chorus.

Vocally, songs were led with gusto, both Tim and Ben have excellent ranges, great control, and clear projection. There were no shortage of instrumental gifting on the stage either – at one time I counted 3 acoustic guitarists, 3 electric guitarists, a bass, 2 keyboards, drums, percussion and around 5 vocalists, contributing to a full, rousing sound mix.

It is in equipping the church where Worship Central’s greatest calling lies, in my opinion. This was demonstrated within their very setup on the night, with experienced worship leaders encouraging the, perhaps less well-known (though no less effective or gifted), up and coming worship leaders.

Coming from a Vineyard church, where the ethos is very much laid out upon giving away the gifts we have been given by the Lord, I find this very encouraging as a model. Expect to hear much more from Al Gordon, Luke Hellebronth and Nikki Fletcher in the coming years, as these passionate, anointed worship leaders and songwriters have a great deal to offer the church as a whole.

As a final reflection, you’ll remember that in 2 Samuel 6, David’s worship becomes ‘undignified’ – dancing wildly in the presence of the Lord. Not wanting to leave these acts consigned merely to text, Tim Hughes decided to recreate this manner of worship on the night:

reflections by Ed Rotheram

Great I Am by Jared Anderson – New Life Worship (video)

Posted on Apr 3rd, 2011

Check out this new music video from New Life Worship and Integrity Music. This is a new song by our friend, Jared Anderson.

Bethel Live “Be Lifted High” – CD Review & Free Download

Posted on Feb 14th, 2011

On February 15^th, Bethel Live releases its all new, full-length recording Be Lifted High on Kingsway as a CD/DVD combo. I had the chance to listen to this live worship recording recently, and I can honestly say it is one of the best worship albums I’ve had the chance to listen to in a long time! Especially on the first six songs, there is such a sense of continued uplifting worship, I just broke out in worship, sitting right there in the coffee shop wearing my headphones. I’m so excited to share these songs with our congregation, and use them in our own worship experiences. There are so many great, usable songs for corporate worship!

Recorded live at Bethel Church in Redding, CA, this album features worship leaders Brian and Jenn Johnson, Jeremy Riddle, William Matthews, Amanda Falk and Steffany Frizzell. Be Lifted High includes 13 songs recorded live over a series of Bethel Church worship services and features the passionate, genuine and spontaneous worship of the church. The DVD also includes personal stories from the artists of how worship has changed their lives, including Brian Johnson sharing in detail for the first time the story of how the power of praise freed him from years of spiritual torment. Bethel Music, formed as an organic extension of Bethel Church, represents the worship of the church.

Here are just some of the songs that stood out to me:

“You Are Good” (Brian Johnson and Jeremy Riddle)

This is an upbeat song of praise that really caught my attention. I can easily see using this song as an opening to a worship service!

“One Thing Remains” (Brian Johnson, Jeremy Riddle, Christa Black Gifford)

To me, one sign of a great song for congregational worship is that when you hear it for the first time, you feel like you already know it, and that’s the case with this song. The marriage between the words, the rhythm and melody is so seamless that I could sing along the first time I heard it, and the music wasn’t a barrier to my worship. Great song!

“Furious” (Jeremy Riddle)

The lyrics to this Jeremy Riddle song speak of the intensity of God’s love for us “His love is fierce, His love is strong, it is furious”. The intensity of the rhythms in this song match the intensity of the lyrics, moving this song along at a “furious” pace.

“Be Lifted High” (Brian Johnson, Christa Black Gifford, Tim Hughes, Jeremy Riddle)

“God I Look To You” (Jenn Johnson and Ian McIntosh)

I have to say, though, that my favorite track on the album is this song – “God I Look To You”. It’s such a simple song, as are several on this album, but it’s such a powerful song! The verse is a prayer for vision and wisdom, the chorus is a declaration of love to the Lord, and then the bridge is a soaring anthem for the church to sing – “Hallelujah, our God reigns!” Those words linked with that melody should find its way into churches everywhere to be sung by the Church! My favorite part of the whole project!

This project is definitely worth checking out! It has been on repeat in my office all week! For more information about this album, go to www.bethelmusic.com, where you can also download the chord charts for all the songs on this album.

Barry Westman

(The Free Download has now expired.)

Live Q&A w/ Darrell Evans AND Podcast Recording

Posted on May 30th, 2009

This coming Monday (6/1) at 9pm Central, we will be recording the two episodes for the month of June.

The first episode will be hosted by Darrell Evans. He will be sharing some thoughts on worship as well as taking questions from the live audience. The second episode will be hosted by Wisdom and Ben.

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