Music Review: Let Your Glory Fall by Phillips, Craig, and Dean

Stars: 5 out of 5
Pros: Great new tracks and fresh takes on modern worship classics
Cons: None
The Bottom Line:
More worship music
With trio's upward focus
Turns your eyes to God




A Second Great Worship CD from Philips, Craig, and Dean

I'm not a huge follower of the modern worship movement.  But when artists I like release worship projects, I pick them up.  Sometimes, I've even picked up worship CDs by artists I only marginally follow.  Such is the case with Let Your Glory Fall, the second of three great worship releases by Phillips, Craig, and Dean.

Now, contrary to popular belief (based solely on their name) this group is a trio.  Randy Phillips, Shawn Craig, and Dan Dean are friends and on pastoral staff at three different churches.  They've also been singing as a trio for quite some time.  While I normally like their music is small doses, I've found these worship CDs well worth owning.

Their first worship CD, Let My Words Be Few, combined modern praise songs with original tracks and their adult contemporary sound.  It all blended together quite well.  Borrowing from the "if it ain't broke, don't fix it" school of thought, this release is more of the same.  And that's not a bad thing at all.

Each of the men has contributed an original track for this disc.  Dan's track, "My Praise" starts off the disc.  It was co-written by Dave Clark and Don Koch.  It's a great upbeat way to open things.  As is often the case, the verses are sung as a solo but the chorus involves their expertly blended harmony.  The song speaks of our longing to praise God as purely as nature does despite our weaknesses.

"Only You" was written by Randy Phillips.  This mid tempo song is one of the slower tracks on the disc.  The chorus declares that only God is worth of our worship while the verses take their cues from scripture and ask "Who is Like the Lord our God?"

Shawn Craig's contribution is "What Kind of Love is This."  This song starts with a long keyboard intro and is pretty heavy on the keyboard even once the guitar and drums come in.  The lyrics marvel at the unfathomable love God has shown us by sending Jesus to die for us.

The other seven tracks on the disc are all covers of currently popular praise songs.  Since the disc was originally released in 2003, some of them are overexposed at this point.  On the other hand, some of them I am still only familiar with from this disc.  (As I said, I am not current on modern worship music.)

"Here I Am to Worship" is definitely one of the better known songs on this disc.  Phillips, Craig, and Dean put their stamp on it by increasing the tempo ever so slightly.  As much as I love the song, I often feel it drags a little bit, especially by the time we've reached the bridge, so I like their version.

The first time I heard it, I fell in love with "The Wonderful Cross," a modern day version of the classic hymn "When I Survey the Wonderful Cross."  Basically, the verses are the original hymn with a new, upbeat chorus and a slightly modified melody.  The keyboard on this song gives it a very majestic and almost ominous feel on the verses while the chorus has a very modern, guitar heavy feel.  The two combine quite well.

The disc closes with Stuart Townend's modern hymn "How Deep the Father's Love for Us."  The simple keyboard that opens this song is wonderful as are the strings that come in on later verses.  Again, they increase the tempo slightly.  It helps keep my attention focused on the amazing words.

The disc itself gets its title from a Matt Redman song.  "Lord Let Your Glory Fall" prays for God's glory to come anew like it did during Old Testament times.  The chorus is a little simple for me, "You are good, You are good/And Your love endures," but I do enjoy the song overall because of the excellent verses.

With three original songs and a few that are off the beaten path, Let Your Glory Fall really does belong in any serious modern worship library.  Okay, so one or two songs may be overly familiar.  You are still getting so much unfamiliar material it is worth tracking down.

CD Length: 44:08

Tracks:

1. My Praise

2. Every Day

3. Here I Am to Worship

4. Lord Let Your Glory Fall

5. Hallelujah (Your Love is Amazing)

6. Only You

7. The Wonderful Cross

8. Fall Down

9. What Kind of Love is This

10. How Deep the Father's Love for Us