The Good Shepherd Review
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By now, most of Tulsa knows that one of its favorite and most promising bands, The Hero Factor, has ...By now, most of Tulsa knows that one of its favorite and most promising bands, The Hero Factor, has been experiencing a relatively quiet period over the past nine months, only playing a handful of shows. Most of the band has still been visible during that time, working on other projects: Matt Fisher with his solo project, Vandevander, and cover band The Meerkats, both with bassist Eric Arndt and drummer Nathan Price, as well as his Songmakers Night at The Colony.
Arndt has been working on his own project, The Refund Division, with the potential of releasing some of his own tunes on us later this year, and keyboardist Chad Copelin has stayed busy as one of Central Oklahoma's choice producers, working out of Black Watch Studios in Norman. The one who has appeared to be curiously silent, however, has been vocalist Ben Kilgore.
As we all know, however, things aren't always as they appear. Kilgore has indeed been busy and singing quite a bit, only in a different venue. As worship leader at Guts Church (9120 East Broken Arrow Expressway), Kilgore's hours have changed a bit with services held at 8:30am, 10:30am and 6pm on Sundays and 8pm on Wednesdays.
As creative as Ben is, it was only a matter of time before he ended up back in the studio during this "quiet period," and he quietly released a new solo EP just before the end of the year. In keeping with his role at Guts, The Good Shepherd is a disc of modern worship music, with an emphasis on modern. The disc marries his modern pop sensibilities with faith and worship.
Considering the fact that Kilgore's voice is so closely identified with one of our city's most beloved bands, it's hard to not describe the disc as sounding like a Christian Hero factor, but in truth, it might me better to think along the lines of what a more overtly Christian U2 or more spiritual Coldplay might put forth.
As one might expect by the disc's title, the subject matter on the disc's five songs revolves loosely around the 23rd Psalm, just not as directly as U2's "40." Most specifically, the title track, "The Good Shepherd," and "You Are the Hope" follow scriptural references, while the rest of the disc expands on that in a more worship-oriented context.
Of course, Guts doesn't believe all worship music has to be mellow Jesus music and neither does Kilgore, so there are also a couple of more upbeat tunes like "Soul Rejoice," which most closely resembles the Hero Factor sound and "Live to Worship You," which builds around a more dance oriented beat.
Overall, The Good Shepherd is a more than pleasant surprise that proves that not all good Christian music has been cornered by the Christian labels yet. It's been a long time since I've heard a Christian release of this quality come out of Tulsa's local music scene, so let's hope this is the disc that kicks a door open and reveals more of the spiritual side of our music community.
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