'Beautiful News' by Matt Redman

'Beautiful News' is the 8th album by Matt Redman, coming an incredible 13 years after his debut. A lot had changed in this time. Redman had moved on from Soul Survivor, the festival that was for many years his natural home, and surrendered his status as the UKs great young worship songwriter to Tim Hughes. By the time of 'Beautiful News', he was more like a Kendrick to his generation, and I imagine he'll remain so - always there, continuously producing new stuff, but never quite having the impact he once did.

I'm not sure where we got this from. I think it was a present bought for Tessa, and I vaguely remember having trouble getting it to play on my mp3 player properly. By the time I'd got the problem resolved, the moment had passed, so I listened today with a fresh perspective.

As an album, 'Beautiful News' is mature, well produced, and never less than decent. That said, there's little on it get excited about. It falls into the all-too-unsatisfying category of overt-worship albums full of songs that wouldn't really work congregationally. As a result, it's hard to know what to do with it. Only 'You Never Let Go' stands out as a song that would work in churches, though personal experience tells me it's a struggle to actually sing - too high in the chorus, and too low in the voice if you transpose it.

So, all-in-all, it's pretty good, but I can't see myself listening to it again in a hurry.