Not Christian Rock: Difference between revisions

* Hirax, an American [[Thrash Metal]] band, has been called Christian for songs like "Demon's Evil Forces" where their singer plays God, so to speak with the lines "You will go down, down to the demons, and when you get there, you'll be in Hell" and "You must believe in me my son, I am the Lord God, the Holy One"... They have since denied direct involvement in the Christian music scene, though some of their members are indeed Christian.

* Bono of [[U2]] is a Christian, and many of his lyrics have Christian subtext. However, they're usually more of the "[[Jesus Was Way Cool]]" kind that one would expect given his views on social justice, rather than songs about the power of faith and other such things that are often found in Christian music.

* "Kyrie" by Mr. Mister. (''Kyrie eleison'' is Greek for "Lord, have mercy," and is still chanted by most Roman Catholics at Mass.)

* "Show Me The Way" by [[Styx]].

** And then Bauhaus [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zspU9LWZWFM covered it] and made it sound like a funeral dirge.

** It's been a UK number one hit for another two acts: Doctor And The Medics (vaguely pagan/druidic context) and Gareth Gates and The Kumars (vaguely Hindu context).

* Here's a tricky one--[[Lordi]]'s "Devil Is a Loser", in which the singer discusses the stupidity and end results of selling one's soul to the Devil. On the one hand it might just be the singer's claim that ''he'' is more powerful than the Devil (being as the singer is Mr. Lordi), on the other hand it might have some subtext relating to the Christianity of several of the band members.

* Power Metal godfathers Helloween, despite their name, have tons of songs praising God ("Save Us" being the most notable example).

** The same goes for "Savior," which is about his dad, even if it sounds a bit more like it's about [[Superman]].

* The [[Neutral Milk Hotel]] song "The King of Carrot Flowers Part 2" contains the repeated opening line of "I love you, Jesus Christ" (although you never find anything obviously religious in any other [[Neutral Milk Hotel]] songs, and they are certainly not what you'd call "Christian rock"). Some fans interpreted it as a joke on Christians or simply just sarcasm on Jeff Mangum's (the songwriter's) part, but when asked about it, he simply explained that it had previously been written for a friend of his, then the meaning of the song changed for him so he rewrote it about Jesus (apparently really meaning it).

* All the members of pop-punk band [[Paramore]] are Christian, although only a few songs have explicitly religious lyrics.

* A lot of [[Nick Cave]] songs have theological themes, as they do allusions to everything else under the sun. Cave is a Christian, and his father was an Anglican minister, though it in no way prevents him from performing amazingly scary-ass songs when the situation calls for it.

** And way back on his first album he wrote "Looking Down The Cross" which was about as Christian as you could get. He still had the apocalyptic tone in the second half of the song, though. It may not have been as much a 'conversion' as a public admission of his faith.

** ''Endgame'''s title track can be interpreted to be all about the Mark of the Beast.

* John Darnielle of [[The Mountain Goats]] is a lapsed Catholic and now occasional churchgoer, but spiritual and religious themes crop up continually in his work, most notably on ''The Life of the World to Come'' on which every song was named after, and inspired by or related to, a verse from the Bible.

** This is particularly funny for regular readers of [[Decibel Magazine]], as one of his "South Pole Dispatch" columns is about him being denied entry into heaven because of a [[Mercyful Fate]] tattoo he has.