Disclaimer: Integrity sends me stuff for free so I’ll tell you what I think about it. Don’t tell them no one reads this blog.

Let me preface this, in all fairness, by saying your musical tastes and preferences may be vastly different from mine. Most people’s are, I assume, as that’s the only reason for all the bad music out there.

Which is not to say Invisible Things is “bad,” but it’s not my style. I found it, honestly, a little boring.

I dig Joel, though. He’s a Worship Leader at The Meeting House in Canada, and I love it when a recording artist is actually serving in a local church somewhere. He’s not new to the music scene either. This is his second album; the first, On The Blue, won a Covenant Award. He’s also performed and recorded with Capstone, Six Days and Hewit. He toured North America and the UK with Capstone and got to open for bands like Audio Adrenaline and Delirious. Consensus would say he’s a talented young artist.

I did sit and listen attentively to the whole album, but it just wasn’t gripping. Most of the music is soft and a lot of it is ethereal. If it were on in a restaurant or store, you probably wouldn’t notice it at all. The vocals are very gentle throughout the album, and the lyrics are simple and basic.

Depending on what kind of music your congregation uses for worship you may or may not be able to adapt some of these songs for your weekend worship services. Most of them use a lot of sound effects, so if you’ve got keyboards and guitar pedals it’s do-able.

If softer, light-rock/pop stuff is your style you might really dig Invisible Things. If you read some of the John Mark McMillan lyrics from last week and didn’t like it, maybe simpler verses are your style and you’ll love Joel’s writing. If you liked his first album (I haven’t heard it so I can’t really make a comparison), then it seems you’ll like this one too.

Has anyone heard On The Blue, or heard of Joel Auge before today? What’s your take?