The Top 12 Albums of 2012

I have finally decided on my Top 12 Albums of 2012!  Sorry for the delay but life happened in a very big way this new year and the blogging has kind of been moved to the back burner.  With out any further adieu, for your listening pleasure, may I present to you my Top 12 Albums of 2012!

12. Christy Nockels- Into the Glorious

Christy's vocal are stronger and more passionate than they've ever been!  I only wish there were more upbeat songs like "Ever Lifting" to balance out the abundance of acoustic ballads. Its clear though that this is Christy where she is most happy and confident.

iPod Pics: Ever Lifting, Healing is in Your Hands, Sing Along, Into the Glorious, For Your Splendor

11. Jimmy Needham- Clear the Stage

From the popping opening collaboration with Lecrae ("I Will Find You") to the stark, honest, and passionate closing title track (which was a personal anthem for me this year), Clear the Stage is the most confidant and compelling album of Jimmy Needham's career!

iPod Picks: Clear the Stage, I Will Find You, If I Ever Needed Grace, Stay, My Victory

10. Mark Schultz- All Things Possible

A welcome return to form for CCM's resident storyteller who is finally just as comfortable sharing his personal stories as he is telling other's tales.  "I Will Love You Still" could possibly be his best composition yet!

iPod Picks: I Will Love You Still, I Gave Up, One Day, More to You Than This, All Things Possible

9.Mercy Me- The Hurth & The Healer

While this album may not have the next "I Can Only Imagine" or "Word of God Speak", Mercy Me has finally created an album that is cohesive and complete from beginning to end with no filler, no clunkers, and plenty of home run hits.

iPod Picks: You Are I Am, The Hurt & The Healer, To WHom It May Concern, Don't Give Up On Me, The First Time

8. Group 1 Crew- Fearless

While this album had to grow on me a bit (especially due to the sonic and member changes), I have come to really appreciate the melodies, lyrics, and heart of this project.  While a couple of songs could have been left off the final product ("Night of My Life", "Freq Dat") Fearless is a bold and focused effort that has more hooks than a tackle box and just so happened to have lyrics that hit me right between the eyes when I needed it the most.

iPod Picks: He Said, Stepping Out, Fearless, The Difference, His Kind of Love, Forsaken

7. Jonathan Thulin- The White Room

Jonathan Thulin is one of the most exciting and underrated voices in CCM right now.  The White Room is a well planned peace of pop-art (sorry Lady Gaga, he beat you to it) that is catchy, boundary pushing and thought provoking at the same time.  But what JT has always been about is the singing and he brings it on this record! 

iPod Picks: Bombs Away (w/ Rachael Lampa), Coat of Arms, Masquerade, The Dead Come to Life (W/ Charmaine), Love/War 

6. David Dunn- For the Life of Me

I honestly love every song on this record! (even the cheeky album closer "Not Soon" which I can very much relate to) Christ focused and catchy, For the Life of Me hits all the right notes.  A major label needs to snatch this guy up stat because he's going places!  A solid album from start to finish.

iPod: Heart Stops, Ready To Be Myself, Sing Loud, Fighting, Heart Isn't Whole

5. Bebo Norman- Lights of Distant Cities

You can always count on Bebo to say the things you wish you could have thought to say.  Lights of Distant Cities once again finds Bebo wrestling with his own failures in light of the holiness of God.  It is refreshing to hear such unabashed honesty in a world full of airbrushed beauties and "positive hits". 

iPod Picks: A World Gone Dark, The Broken, Daylight Breaking, Outside Her Window Was The World, Just a Glimpse

4. Tenth Avenue North- The Struggle

A concept album at its core, The Struggle wades through deep spiritual truths and emotional waters with spiritual perspective and stark honesty. 

iPod Picks: Losing, Worn, The Struggle, Hostage of Peace, Strangers Here, Shadows

3. Britt Nicole- Gold

A party record at its core, Gold finally takes Britt Nicole into the sonic territory she should have been in all along.  Perfectly balancing dance tracks and mid-tempo ballads, this is an album that is Christian by lyrical content only as the music for the most part is way too cool for CCM radio.  Here's to hoping Britt's new-found mainstream recognition provokes CCM to play more than just her ballads!

iPod Pics: Breakthrough, All This Time, Ready or Not, Amazing Life, Stand, Still That Girl

2. Brandon Heath- Blue Mountain

I almost had a tie for my #1 album of the year as I couldn't decide if I loved Brandon Heath's Blue Mountain or Audrey Assad's Heart more. In the end , I had to go track by track and it turns out that while both Blue Mountain and Heart leave me equally satisfied, track for track, I enjoy Audrey's ever so slightly more. This does not in any way diminish Brandon's accomplishment with Blue Mountain though as this album is a critical masterpiece. "The Harvester" and "He Paid It All" are easily the two best compositions of Heath's career while "In The Dust" and "Dyin' Day" pick up right where his last album, Leaving Eden, conceptually left off and enter territory that would make the late Johnny Cash smile.  This is an album that gets better and better with each listen and is not to be missed!

iPod Picks: The Harvester, He Paid It All, In The Dust, Dyin' Day, Hands of the Healer, Jesus in Disguise

1. Audrey Assad- Heart

Unlike every album before this one on the list, I rarely skip a song on Heart. Since its release last February, I have consistently returned to this album when I tire of other music.  Audrey Assad's Heart is like a cool glass of water on a hot summer day. Gone are the trendy synthesizers that made her debut The House You're Building radio friendly and gone are the overt literary allusions that critics so dearly loved.  Audrey has always been able to turn a clever phrase but on Heart she throws aside the gimmicks and whit and opts instead for honesty and a good melody. Really, that's all we need. This collection of songs pushes Audrey's vocals to new places and adds musical and instrumental textures not typically heard in 21st Century music. The overarching theme of this record is the blurring of the lines of secular and sacred and allowing our relationship with Christ to permeate every area of our lives.  This is a welcome and important reminder in our compartmentalized world.  Heart may not be the coolest album of 2012 but it is most definitely the best.  

iPod Picks (all of them really but I will pick 5... or 6 or 7): Even The Winter, Slow, Blessed Are The Ones, Lament, O My Soul, No Turning Back, Won Me Over

Honorable Mention:

Albums that were good but didn't quite make my top 12... 

- David Crowder Band- Give Us Rest (A Requiem Mass in The Key of C [The Happiest of All Keys])

To be honest I haven't listened to this album since March, mainly due to the fact that it is SO LONG but there is no denying the genius or artistry found on DCB's swan song record.  This album, from a critic's perspective probably belongs in my top 3 but for some reason, I just couldn't get into it.  Maybe it will be one of those albums that I pick up a year from now and fall in love with but for now it'll have to settle for unlucky #13.  Goodbye David Crowder * Band- you will be missed.

iPod Picks: After All (Holy), Because He Lives, O Great God Give Us Rest, The Sequences, O My God

- For King And Country- Crave

Rebecca St James' little brothers put on one of the best live shows I've seen in years at Rock the Universe this past September and it made me revisit their album which I had originally thought was only an above average effort.  After seeing them live and realizing that all the bells and whistles were actual instruments and not studio wizardry made me appreciate Crave so much more and caused me to conclude that these guys have more talent in their pinky than pretty much any other new artist to release an album in CCM in 2012.  While the album as a whole wasn't as consistent as it should have been and the lyrics were a bit lethargic at times, FKAC are off to a promising start and I can't wait to hear what they do next!

iPod Picks: The Proof of Your Love, Missing, Love's To Blame, The Middle of Your Heart, Busted Heart

- Matthew West- Into the Light

Matthew West's last album The Story of Your Life was my #1 album of 2010 pretty much based on the lyrics and concept of the album alone.  Truth be told, while each song was great individually, the album as a whole did not hold up as well as I would have liked and I preferred mixing the songs into playlists over listening to it straight through.  Into the Light is more musically diverse than The Story of Your Life but I think song for song, Story was better. The opening three tracks are standard Matt West radio fare and the back half of the record drags a bit with a few too many mid-tempo songs but the middle section (from "Do Something" to "Unchangeable") is just brilliant. Here's to hoping West takes a few more melodic and musical risks similar to those tracks on his next record because lyrically he's on to something very powerful- he just needs the soundtrack to back it up.

iPod Picks: Moved By Mercy, Do Something, We Are the Broken, Restored, The Power of a Prayer, Unchangeable