God gave Rock and Roll to you

In a very funny episode of “King of the Hill,” Hank Hill becomes alarmed because his pudgy, awkward son, Bobby, has fallen under the influence of a tattooed youth pastor, who also plays in a Christian rock band. Near the end of the episode, Hank hauls Bobby away from the church, telling the youth pastor, “Can’t you see? You’re not making Christianity better — you’re just making rock and roll worse.”

It was a funny line because, way too often, it was true — much of the Christian rock of the 80s and 90s fell into weak attempts to mimic secular rock bands, only with cheesy, way-too-literal lyrics. Hank is speaking the truth — a lot of these artists were “making rock and roll worse.”

And yet, playing right now from my Amazon Echo is Classic Christian Rock Radio, a streaming online station composed of pre-2000 Christian rock. Some of it dates back to 1980–84, when I was a student at Famous Televangelist University, including five semesters working at the campus radio station. This is nostalgia music for me.

I will say, in my own defense and in the defense of the genre, that Hank may have painted with too broad a brush. I would hold out both the musical creativity and lyrical subtlety of of my all-time favorite band, Daniel Amos, as comparable to…