Album Review - Jeremy Camp's We Cry Out!

You know it's not good sign when you're listening to an album and then you find yourself skipping tracks.

Unfortunately, that's what I ended up doing quite a bit on this, Jeremy Camp's We Cry Out.

As I mentioned in my initial impressions, this album ends up being, by turns, both bland and engaging.

The bland bits are songs like Mighty to Save, Everlasting God and Overcome - covers of originals that just don't work for me. There are just so many other better versions and covers of these tracks out there that somehow, it feels to me like Camp's just including these songs in the album because he likes them.

There's nothing really wrong with that, I suppose. But the arrangements aren't superb, and to some extent I feel that he tries a bit too hard to infuse a worshipful atmosphere into them, like he does at the end of Mighty to Save.

Not all his covers are sub-par though. I liked his take on Matt Redman's You Never Let Go and Tim Hughes' Jesus Saves.

However, the real standout tracks on the album are the ones he penned himself, like the congregation-friendly You Are The Lord and the final two tracks, Unrestrained and King Jesus - tracks which show that a good worship song is naturally worshipful, you don't have to do anything to make it more so.

So here's my final verdict:

Jeremy Camp's We Cry Out is not a bad album - if for some reason you've never heard some of the covers before, you'd probably give this album a higher rating.

However, for those of us who have, he doesn't quite reach the height or depth that previous artists have set for these songs, which is disappointing, given that he writes great songs which are both worshipful and relevant.

I shall end this review off on a brighter note - take a listen to one of the better tracks, the mid-album You Are The Lord.




Think this album deserved better? Leave a comment and let us know what you think!