Of all the points of arguments regarding Christian rock I've come across in my nearly ten years as a collector, quasi-journalist of, and basic fanboy of Christian rock and metal, this is the statement that always seems to get me riled up to the point of needing to step back, take a few cleansing breaths, and prayerfully seek some sort of answer without getting sarcastically indignant and coming off as tearing down (which is way too easy with all debates), and not getting through this logically.
Let me begin by saying, to a certain extent, I do find some point of agreement to the above statement. The Christian music industry is not different from the regular mainstream music industry in that we tried to crank out of slew of carbon copy bands of whatever style is hot with the "young people" that one wonders if there isn't some type of financial motivation behind it. However, this is merely speculation on my part, so I'll drop that issue right now. And since Dead deals mostly with the underground extreme music scene, let me move the focus on the Christian band in that area:
First off, I have yet to find a band, Christian or otherwise, where the members don't have to work a regular job to support their families and/or the band itself. Most Christian bands don't even have a ministry or church backing them financially, so they're literally at times paying out of their pocket to finance the band. Even the money made from residuals (album sales, ticket sales, t-shirts, stickers, whatnot) isn't enough to make a decent living for those who don't have that major record label contract and are widely touring. Most, if not all, of the bands featured on Dead are considered "indie", meaning they either self-produce their CDs and tapes, or they're on a very small, not widely distributed label. Only a handful of Christian metal bands over the past two decades have landed a major label deal and have toured world-wide that way. One factor is that metal, regardless of surges in popularity now and then (1988-1991 was the biggest I've seen so far), is an underground phenomenon. Many, many secular metal, death metal, grindcore, hardcore, etc. acts have formed and flourished with little or no mainstream radio promotion, relying mainly on word-of-mouth by the fanbase. The music industry, by definition, is an industry. There are very little sales in the extreme forms of metal, so maybe a handful of bands break through to see mainstream success. This scenario is even more bleak when we're talking about Christian metal. Not only do we have a musical equivalent of an acquired taste, they also have the tag "Christian metal" that may work against them. Now, before you jet over to your e-mail account to protest what I just said (and by that, I mean "typed"), think about it. Personally, before I was saved, if you would've handed me a tape and said it was Christian metal, I probably would have automatically said (or at least thought) it sucked without even listening to it, if I ever did listen to it. Even after I was saved and discovered bands like Living Sacrifice, Mortification and Vengeance Rising, my young Christian zeal in proving to those unsaved Satanist heathen metalheads that Christian metal was just as cool as their "evil" stuff (ramming the fact down their throat with the proverbial plunger every chance I took) closed their minds to the lyrical message, thus deeming the music as "lousy" (that's the G-rated version of what most said) when just moments before they were stating how much they loved the stuff when they were clueless as to the spiritual content therein. Same thing with the music industry; the mainstream labels are a bit skittish to touch these Christian bands, because of fear of the Christian tag will mean no sales, and the Christian labels, more often than not, steer clear of some of the most talented extreme metal bands for the bands sporting the hot sound for that month.
Getting off that sidetrack and back at the issue at hand (it was "they're only in it for the money", remember?)...there is very little financial gain for those in Christian metal bands, especially when starting out. Those wishing to get into some kind of metal band, be it for ministry, artistic purposes or both (preferably both) would be wise to heed Jesus' words of counting the cost found in Luke 14:28-32, and let the Holy Spirit guide you.
The second point I want to give for the "they're just doing it for the money" argument (remember I'm saying this to the argument and not singling anyone or any group out...I once supported this argument myself) is, so what? While it's true the Bible warns about the love of money (I Timothy 6:10), it also says in the same Bible that "if a man will not work, he will not eat." (II Thessalonians 3:10, NIV) Who out there wouldn't want to make a living doing what they love? What I find hard to understand is how Christians can own and operate businesses, getting the same amount of income as a non-Christian who would own the same kind of business, and yet the Christian musician is expected to be paid less that what non-Christian musicians command. About the highest price I paid for a ticket to a Christian metal show was $15 dollars, for approximately three hours and five bands. I would be lucky to check out Godsmack, Metallica and a whole host of non-Christian metal bands for under $30, and quite frankly, I feel that many Christian metal bands have those bands left in the dust. These bands are just trying to make a living doing something they love.
So, in closing, I would have to once again say the old clinched adage: "Look before you leap." Although this installment of the series may have seemed like one big venting period for this author (and when I start referring to myself like that, it's time to close things up), I did want to shed some light onto what many bands go through when it comes down to the money point. And, as always, any questions, comments or perhaps some topic ideas pertaining to this article series can be sent to me via e-mail...
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