Heavy rifts, epic voices, electric guitar hammering that will rock your socks off, Christian rock has been popular since the days of "hair bands" in the 70s and 80s. Although there may have been other monumental Christian bands, Petra is one that stood out from the rest and paved the way for other faith-inspired music to gain in popularity. Around this time, there were many other groups with similar music styles that began forming. When people finally globally accepted the terms "hard rock" and "Christian Music", it opened the flood gates for various music genres like hip-hop through DC Talk (more on them to-come on another blog).
Petra, "All Fired Up" (1982)
Of course there are other great bands during this decade as well, White Heart, Styper, Audio Adreneline, and News Boys all began forming in the 1980s. You can't mention Petra without recognizing Styper. At the time, they were comparable to Metallica, Def Leapard, Whitesnake, Scorpions but with a Christian spin on it. They could be heard on the Trinity Broadcast Network, which was a huge outlet for Christians to compete with air time especially when certain radio stations and networks wouldn't air "religious" music.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2iPZ0cNtqIQ&index=24&list=PL3554CAE591775485
Over half of the bands I mentioned have been around over 30 years and are still making music to this day. Styper released the album, "Fallen" in 2015 and Petra a few years back. Once again they helped pave the way for other genres because they compared to similar mainstream, secular artists which wasn't a far-stretch for consumers to recognize talent. Even today, Christian music has branched out to metal, ska, hip-hop, heavy rap, folk, any just about every other genre you can think of. I'll be featuring various bands in future blogs, so stay tuned, share your thoughts and YOUR favorite bands, and check back!
Christopher J. Rosario, Writer, Entertainer, Freethinker, San Antonio, TX
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