Sara Groves - Tell Me What You Know

Styles: Vocal
Year: 2007
File: MP3@320K/s
Time: 46:50
Size: 108,4 MB
Art: Front

(3:42)  1. Song for My Sons
(4:50)  2. In The Girl There's a Room
(3:19)  3. Say a Prayer
(4:27)  4. Love Is Still a Worthy Cause
(4:12)  5. When the Saints
(5:39)  6. Honesty
(3:59)  7. Abstraction
(4:18)  8. I Saw What I Saw
(3:49)  9. It Might Be Hope
(5:06) 10. The Long Defeat
(3:23) 11. You Are Wonderful

One cannot approach Tell Me What You Know, Sara Groves' sixth album, expecting a lot of surprises. Sure, Groves is a perennial favorite among Christian music critics and audiophiles, but her high marks aren't necessarily a result of innovation or avant-garde career moves as much as of a strong, rock-solid track record of equally strong, rock-solid songwriting about Christian living and faith. Despite being a pop artist at heart, a lot of her depth is lost on more mainstream, radio-weaned Christian audiences, mainly because she dwells in the more sophisticated, triple-A side of pop, not the commercial, big-time pop/rock of, say, a Casting Crowns or a Chris Tomlin. Still, Groves is very comfortable at what she does, so much so that Tell Me What You Know could appear as if it was cut from the same mold as her celebrated The Other Side of Something and Add to the Beauty projects. Of course, Groves realizes how easily this brand of piano-based adult pop comes to her, so she tries to distance herself from her core strengths by way of offbeat, alternative pop never more evident than in the poignant "Song for My Sons" and the eccentric mini-masterpiece "In the Girl There's a Room." After that, though, she quickly retreats to what she does best namely, bouncy, quirky pop pieces ("Love Is Still a Worthy Cause"), tender folk dialogs ("Say a Prayer"), and pensive, piano-based balladry ("I Saw What I Saw"), all of which, while not mind-blowingly novel, are indeed moving, thought-provoking numbers, performed with finesse and inspired by Groves' newfound passion for reaching out to the least of these. In this regard, Tell Me What You Know deserves a mention, if not for its overall uniqueness, then for continuing to solidify Groves as one of the most important, consistent Christian singer/songwriters of the new millennium. ~ Andree Farias https://www.allmusic.com/album/tell-me-what-you-know-mw0000582810

Tell Me What You Know

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Sara Groves - Add to the Beauty

Styles: Vocal
Year: 2005
File: MP3@320K/s
Time: 56:01
Size: 129,7 MB
Art: Front

(5:44)  1. When It Was Over
(4:34)  2. Just Showed Up for My Own Life
(5:13)  3. You Are the Sun
(5:35)  4. It's Going to Be Alright
(4:10)  5. Add to the Beauty
(5:09)  6. Rewrite This Tragedy
(3:43)  7. Something Changed
(4:00)  8. How Can I Tell
(1:25)  9. To the Moon
(4:55) 10. Kingdom Comes
(3:47) 11. Why It Matters
(3:48) 12. Loving a Person
(3:54) 13. When It Was Over - Reprise

Some Christian pop music subordinates music to message, taking cookie-cutter chord progressions and cheap emotional gimmicks and pressing them into pastoral service. It's music that has much more to do with preaching than with communicating, and that is intended strictly for an audience of the already-converted. Then there's the Christian pop music that seems embarrassed by its doctrinal content, hiding it in double-talk about love that could as easily be physical as spiritual. There's a place for both kinds of music, it seems, but much more satisfying is the music that neither apologizes for its witness nor underestimates the importance of the tunes and arrangements and grooves. That kind of music is much rarer, and it's the kind that Sara Groves has become adept at producing. On her latest album she continues to sing like a wonderful combination of Dar Williams and Dolores O'Riordan, and her songs continue to be a revelatory blend of bell-toned pop guitars, judiciously applied strings, sturdy rock & roll grooves, and hook-laden melodies. 

Subtle and artful elements include the oboes and drum loops on "When It Was Over," the gorgeously understated slide guitar solo on "Loving a Person," and the combination of gospel-tinged backing vocals and Beatles-worthy chord progression on the gently remonstrative "How Can I Tell." If you already know you hate Christian pop music, then nothing here will change your mind. But if you just wish it were more consistently transcendent, then this album will give you cause for hope. ~ Rick Anderson https://www.allmusic.com/album/add-to-the-beauty-mw0000405500

Add to the Beauty

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