Album: Stockholm Syndrome
Artist: Derek Webb
Label: www.derekwebb.com, INO Records
Sounds like: Portishead, Radiohead, Depeche Mode

In solo mode, part-time Caedmon’s Call singer Derek Webb has always been a prophetic, Bob Dylan-type figure (with folk-rock music to match) but now he’s made his Kid A, a restlessly-inventive collection of songs bent into all sorts of strange electronic shapes.

That would be reason enough to make a stir but Webb is in the midst of controversy in the US over the deliberately-provocative inclusion of a swear word on the album, prompting his Christian record label to drop the offending song (the uncensored version is available online).

The controversy is borrowed from well-known youth evangelist Tony Campolo, who has recently criticised fellow Christians for being more offended by swearing than world poverty. Indignant critics tut-tut over Webb’s use of the offending word (at the risk of reinforcing Webb and Campolo’s point), while fans applaud his increasingly confrontational stance. As usual, Webb doesn’t hold back in firing at Christians who don’t live out their faith and who allow their beliefs to be twisted into a mirror of the ways of the world (hence the album title). And, as usual, he cooks up ironic sound bites that epitomise the attitude he criticises—“I don’t want the Son, I want a jury of peers,”

“I don’t want the Father, want a vending machine.” That song—”The Spirit vs the kick drum”—mixes hyperactive live drums and weird synths a la Radiohead’s “The national anthem,” while other songs reference the 80s (“What you give up” sounds like Devo). “Black eye”

has the stop-start organ and rattling rhythms of Portishead while “Jena and Jimmy” is muscly early-90s dancefloor. It’s a complex album, lyrically and musically, both subtle and subtle-as-a-brick, which encourages depth in our thinking and boldness in our faith, and where, more than ever, Webb says, “Take me or leave me.”

Nicks rating: 4/5