With a whopping 51 songs, including five rare bonus tracks, the compilation is a three-disc set of the first three Relient K albums, RELIENT K, THE ANATOMY OF THE TONGUE IN CHEEK (GOLD EDITION/RIAA certified gold), and TWO LEFTS DON’T MAKE A RIGHT BUT THREE DO (GOLD EDITION/RIAA certified gold), and includes hits like “My Girlfriend,” “Sadie Hawkins Dance,” “Chap Stick, Chapped Lips and Things Like Chemistry” and more. On top of all that, the iTunes® version includes three music videos (”My Girlfriend,” “Chap Stick, Chapped Lips and Things Like Chemistry,” “Pressing On”).Gotee is also offering an exclusive pre-order through musichristian.com.

The concert was a part of the band’s “An Evening With Switchfoot” tour, but it differed from most of the other shows. For most of the tour, the band took the bold move of playing their new release Hello Hurricane from beginning to end and an encore of older tunes. On this date and a few others, though, Switchfoot played a more traditional – and shorter – set that simply highlighted the new album.

Opening for Switchfoot on certain tour dates was Paper Tongues, a new seven-member band from Charlotte. They had plenty of support from their hometown crowd, even though most of the songs in the set hadn’t been released yet. Only four of the tunes appear on their EP, Ride to California. It seems as though each member of the septet contributes his own sound to their musical mix, creating a blend of classic and modern rock, funk, rap and soul. Lead singer Aswan North’s raw energy was contagious, drawing the crowd’s eyes and their cheers throughout the performance.

The energy in the room was dialed up even more when Switchfoot took the stage, standing underneath plastic seagulls suspended from the ceiling to match the cover of Hello Hurricane. The band launched into “Needle and Haystack Life” from the new album, following it up with their latest single, “Mess of Me.”
Lead singer Jon Foreman slowly made his way through the crowd while singing “This Is Your Life,” finally climbing onto a platform next to the sound booth. He stayed there as “Happy Is A Yuppy Word” began to play and merged seamlessly into the grinding “Free.” When Foreman arrived back on the stage at the end of the song, he walked over to a large drum and began beating it with mallets, bringing his arms higher over his head with each forceful swing. Keyboardist Jerome Fontamillas stepped out from his keyboard to bang rhythmically on another drum, and together they created a powerful ending to the song.

There were some slower tunes in the set, of course, and Foreman took time to introduce them. Before performing “Your Love Is A Song,” he said that it was a song about grace, a concept he still has trouble grasping. He introduced “24” by recalling a story about trying – and failing – to impress a girl while on a skateboard. As the crowd laughed and sympathized, he said, “I then began to think about how many voices I’ve got going on in my own head telling me different things.” When one fan shouted out some words of encouragement, the singer replied, “Thanks, man. Wait, you guys heard that, too, right?”

The band’s lighthearted interaction with the audience balanced well with the depth of some of their songs. Switchfoot performed a crowd-pleasing mash-up of their hit “Gone” and “Crazy In Love” by Beyonce, with a little bit of “Umbrella” by Rihanna thrown in, that worked surprisingly well. During “Bullet Soul,” Foreman invited a young man from the audience named Adam to play the guitar with them. Not only did he play competently along with the chorus, he nailed the guitar solo and impressed the band.

At the end of Switchoot’s hit single “Meant to Live,” Foreman turned the microphone toward the audience, getting them to sing “we were meant to live” as the band quietly exited the stage. After some wild cheering, the inevitable encore began with “Hello Hurricane,” a triumphant declaration of love’s victory in the face of life’s raging storms. Finally, Switchfoot closed out the night with another hit, “Dare You To Move,” beginning it as a soft acoustic tune. The audience took over the first chorus as the music cut out almost entirely, before the whole band joined in again and finished it out with passion.

While onstage, Foreman mentioned that he had been very ill earlier that day. It was revealed after the show that he still wasn’t feeling well, but it didn’t show through at all, whether he was joking with the audience or giving a heartfelt performance. The new album’s anthemic title track rang true as he sang, “Hello hurricane / You’re not enough / Hello hurricane / you can’t silence my love / I’ve got doors and windows boarded up / All your dead end fury is not enough / You can’t silence my love.”

Photos courtesy of Karissa Minn.

On Becoming, Carroll’s trademark sound is soulful, going deeper to issues of faith. “Hollywood and New York manufacture images of pop icons that the rest of us honestly do not relate to,” says Carroll. “I instinctively knew that if I went that route with my music, that I would be forced to compromise and become something I’m not.”

That desire led to a recording contract with Oklahoma based indie Warr & Peace Records and Carroll is embracing her role as America’s everywoman. “I’ve wrestled with weight and depression all of my life,” she says. “And I’m not ashamed to say those things in part have made me who I am and are what binds me to my fans as they push through the same types of hurts. My faith in God and the love and support of friends and family has helped give me hope in the most trying of circumstances.”

A preacher’s daughter, Carroll began singing and playing piano around age 9 and was writing songs by age 11. She first came into the public spotlight as a contestant on American Idol, making it past the first round to earn a trip to Chicago in its fifth season. Most recently Carroll played a four-day concert series in maximum-security prisons to encourage female inmates and is hitting the road for a series of dates across the South, including stops in Arkansas, Louisiana and New Jersey.

Kingdom Building Ministries is an evangelical Christian organization that partners with churches, universities, and denominations to challenge and motivate people to make a difference in other’s lives and in God’s kingdom. Robertson wrote You Are God’s Plan A to further the message and mission of KBM, that ordinary people are capable of making extraordinary differences in the world around them.

The book is now available for purchase.

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What was the story behind the title of your new album Of Men and Angels?
It comes from a Bible verse that says, “If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal.” It goes on to talk about different gifts we can give, but makes the point that nothing matters if we’re not sincerely loving people. That was really weighing on my heart during the period of song writing for this album. I also just liked the way it sounds… kind of an epic sounding name. It fit too with what I wanted for the album’s art work. I wanted a guy (who ended up being me) standing on one side of a wall, bummed out and focused on the issues of life, and an angel on the other side pushing the force of those issues away from the guy. To kind of say that when things are bad they most likely could be 10 times worse.

What was your ultimate goal with this particular album?
With every record I try to push myself to do better. I always strive to write great songs that are honest, that did something for me and ultimately do something for others. Songs that help people through tough times. The songs on this album are very honest and deal with life struggles. It was a rough year for me, a rough season of life. My faith helped me through those tough times and I saw victory in supernatural ways. It’s really interesting because the album came out yesterday and things took a drastic turn. Having been through the tough times makes things like the album being number one on iTunes, taste just that much sweeter. I’m thankful for life and music. Especially since 2009 was tough for a lot of people, many people lost jobs… I’m fortunate to get to play music, and I’m aware how it’s like walking a tightrope.

You have said that your faith is central to your life, yet your band hasn’t been labeled a “Christian band.” Is it fair to say that instead of writing “Christian” songs, you write songs that are informed by your faith?
We have never been considered a Christian band in the business sense of the phrase. There isn’t anything wrong with that, but I felt I was supposed to be doing music non-exclusively. Following Christ is the biggest part of my life and that faith warms and colors my music. But, I also write about things like a Japanese exchange student. It’s essentially about life. We’ve steered away from the Christian band label because I think that’s what we’re supposed to be doing. I mean, my financial situation may have been more sound if I had gone the other route, but I rather be doing what I believe I’m supposed to be doing and struggle a bit more than not do what I believe I’m supposed to and be well-off financially.

You are quite the talented guy; you play multiple instruments, sing, write, and produce. But, one thing that impresses us is your involvement with the Invisible Children project and the fact that you’ve created your own clothing line where 25% of the profit is given to charities. What prompted you to get involved in these two projects?
Being involved in projects like these is something that has always been important to me, and comes from core values of my life. I believe we’re called to get involved. I’m fortunate I get to say some things into a microphone for a living, and I take joy in that. But, there is also this World out there that is beautiful. Beautiful, but a pretty messed up place. There are things going on that people know about, and then there are some things they don’t know anything about, but these things are all big and important. I never had a passion for starting a clothing line, but I saw it as a chance to make a difference. It’s essentially a fashion clothing line that gives money—pretty much all the profit—to charities. The way we do that is that we’ve partnered with nine different charities. The buyer gets to pick the charity they want to support. With Invisible Children, here were these guys around my age who went to make this film and discovered this horrible thing that was going on [kids in Uganda are being kidnapped and forced into the Uganda army against their will]. How could I not get involved in something like that?

It is always encouraging when an artist doesn’t just talk about doing good, but actually does something to make a difference. Take a moment to check out Avary’s clothing line Call It Captivate or Invisible Children. Previews of Of Men and Angels can be heard at iTunes or http://www.myspace.com/therocketsummer.

Tickets range in price from $25-75 and can be purchased at Ticketmaster.com and all Ticketmaster locations, as well as through The Ryman box office: 800-745-3000 or ryman.com.

Help Haiti February 27th – HelpHaitiLive.com from Compassion International on Vimeo.

“Next week marks the beginning of an exciting new tour as we’ll be hitting the road with one of our longtime favorite Christian bands, Sanctus Real,” says Seth Mosley, lead singer, Me In Motion. “We love their message, their music, their hearts and are extremely excited to share the stage with them. We’ll be playing a new song, ‘Seek Justice, Love Mercy,’ from our upcoming self-titled CD and it’s our first time to play the tune live. We are extremely excited to share it with the fans and we believe that now is a critical time for this message to be heard loud and clear. We feel quite certain that no audience will leave unchanged, but called to live out their faith in a radical new way.”

Me In Motion, which is comprised of Seth Mosley, Tim Wilson (bass/background vocals) and Brian Dexter (drums/background vocals), was formed by Mosley after working two years in a recording studio following high school graduation. After realizing he didn’t want to “sit in one place all the time,” was when he brought Wilson and Dexter on board to begin the musical journey as Me In Motion. The talent of the group immediately brought them attention which led to 140 tour dates in 2008 and Me In Motion reached 165-dates in 2009. But more than playing Brit-influenced rock, it’s the message that Me In Motion wants to impact with their audiences.

“Our focus as a band from day one has been to encourage our fans to be unafraid and unashamed to show the world what they believe. This song talks about going into the darkest places and carrying the light of Jesus to extinguish the darkness. Matthew 5:14 says, ‘You are the light of the world. A city on a hill cannot be hidden.’ Blending in and hiding in the shadows is not an option.” – Adam Agee