Unholy alliance ... Marilyn Manson and Ozzy Osbourne at the Immortal Rock awards in LA. Photograph: Branimir Kvartuc/AP
It's often said that the devil has all the best tunes, and to prove it, people always toss around statistics showing that traditionally devilish musical genres - rock, rap, R&B - hugely outsell angelic ones such as Christian rock. But here's a figure that will perk Cliff Richard up no end: according to the Recording Industry Association of America, only two major genres are now selling more in the US than they did 10 years ago. One is hip-hop (up from 9% of all album sales in 1996 to 13% in 2005); the other is religious (from 4.3% to 5.3%) Everything else, from rock to country to R&B, has fallen.
Hip-hop's rise is probably attributable to the advent of super-sellers like Eminem, Jay-Z and 50 Cent, but the increase in religious music (Christian rock and gospel, mainly) is harder to pin on one artist, or even a group of artists. It has more to do with a flowering of post-millennial Christian youth culture, manifested in Christian nightclubs, tattoo parlours and skateboarding fellowships.
The music itself has come a long way from the 80s, when a band called Stryper tried to make Christian heavy metal groovy, but made the mistake of attempting it in striped trousers, which became a source of mockery to all but committed fans.
They've been supplanted by groups like California angst-metallers POD (Payable on Death), whose name references the crucifixion, and New Orleans' Mute Math - both profess to be Christian, but manage to be credible with it. (Intriguingly, Mute Math have now recanted, and are suing their label for promoting them as a Christian band, claiming it has "damaged the brand"; their lawyer says: "We wanted mainstream credibility, and then to have it sold back into the Christian market if it were successful in the mainstream."
It was a movement waiting to happen, given that there was a nation full of Christian teens refusing to be palmed off with the wholesome approximations of pop culture their parents had to live with when they were young. While some very devout kids are turning up their noses at the likes of POB, believing that unless a band is actively evangelical they're as ungodly as Ozzy "Prince of Darkness" Osbourne himself, it's an area that's booming.
Booming in America, that is. Over here, being openly Christian works against a band, and those who are, like Athlete, tend not to discuss it. The feeling here is that Christian rock is musically below-par, and only bought by people who value the message rather than the actual music. Is that a fair perception, Vultures? Share it all here.
