"I was amazed that a song so blatantly mentioning Jesus ("I Can Only Imagine") was played on my local secular radio station," says Weber, "I was even more amazed to hear non-Christian people singing along. With divine intervention, MercyMe has really impacted American culture with their music."
Casting Crowns represents yet another face of the new generation of Christian artists and its self-titled CD is the fastest selling debut Christian artist in recent years. At the center of Casting Crowns is Mark Hall, a youth pastor, who, until a year ago, was writing music primarily for the kids in his youth groups. Casting Crowns grew out of two of Hall's stops along his youth ministry path, first while leading a youth group in Daytona Beach, FL., then transplanting and growing when Hall moved to a new position in Atlanta.
Discovered and signed in early 2003 by Mark Miller, of country music's Sawyer Brown, to be the debut artist for Beach Street Records, an imprint Miller founded and leads for Provident Label Group, Casting Crowns found themselves in the enviable position of making their first major label record with Christian music icon Steven Curtis Chapman as co-producer, Chapman's first time producing another artists' work. Hall's presentation of straightforward and challenging Christ-centered lyrics found a home at Christian radio which embraced hard-hitting #1 charting songs like "If We Are the Body", "Who Am I" and "Voice of Truth" and played a considerable role in the band's success.
"I want to shake people up and help them see that Jesus is not a religion, and God is not a book," Hall has said. Hall was honored with the Dove Award for Songwriter of the Year in 2004, a first for a new artist.
"Kingdom Bound Christian music festival's founder Fred Caserta told me Casting Crowns was 'the real deal'", says Weber. "I know when Fred says that, the band must be great, and the response they got at North America's third largest Christian music festival (Kingdom Bound), proved how great they are."
Switchfoot, MercyMe and Casting Crowns are all bands worth checking out in 2005, in case you haven't already bought one of their CDs.
