Today, Explained - Your pop music is influenced by God

Episode Date: December 19, 2025

Popular music went more Christian this year, but religion has had a long history of influencing secular sounds. This episode was produced by Hady Mawajdeh, edited by Amina Al-Sadi, fact-checked by Laura Bullard, engineered by Patrick Boyd and David Tatasciore, and hosted by Astead Herndon. Worshipers during the 2023 "It's Time" tour in Atlanta, GA. Photo by Paras Griffin/Getty Images. Listen to Today, Explained ad-free by becoming a Vox Member: vox.com/members. New Vox members get $20 off their membership right now. Transcript at ⁠vox.com/today-explained-podcast.⁠ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

So here's a little secret. When I'm feeling particularly anxious or a little scared, I have an emergency playlist of gospel songs that almost always makes me feel better. Like this one. Or this one. If you think your God is in time. Christian music, particularly the old school stuff my parents used to listen to,

has always made me feel hope, feel inspired, feel calm. But now, it seems more and more people, not just pastor's kids like me, are turning the Christian tracks for that same reason. Worship songs had a big year in 2025, with Christian artists going viral on TikTok and rising on the Billboard charts. What's behind all of this?

Besides God, of course. That's coming up on Today Explain from Box. If you're tired of database limitations and architectures that break when you scale, then it's time to think outside rows and columns. MongoDB is the database built for developers, by developers. It's acid-compliant, enterprise-ready, and fluent in AI. That's why so many of the Fortune 500 trust MongoDB with their most critical workloads. Ready to think outside rows and columns?

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Visit darktrace.com forward slash defenders for more information. This is Today Explained. Elias Light is a music reporter for the Wall Street Journal. He's been writing about the rise of Christian music this year. Billboard ran a piece back in May about how there were two Christian artists on the Hot 100 simultaneously, which hadn't happened in a really long time. And also there's a kind of a separate data company called Luminate, and they publish twice a year reports on kind of listening behavior

and tracking how different genres are doing. And in two consecutive reports, they sort of flagged that Christian music was growing really fast. So that kind of got me intrigued that maybe it was something to dive into. How popular has Christian music gotten? What was the data that was really drawing you went? Yeah, so I think there were two kind of key points. One is there were these two songs that were both on the Hot 100. one by Forrest Frank.

Then the other by this guy, Brandon Lake. And the other was just the speed at which it was growing. It's still like a relatively small genre compared to pop or hip hop, but it's been expanding really quickly. and it's not that far away now from electronic dance music in the U.S., which is what, you know, kind of what we think of as one of the big traditional genres. That data point is interesting. You mentioned a couple of the artists who were on the Hot 100 list,

and I've actually heard a couple of those songs because it seemed as if it was breaking through into, like, larger pop culture. But I want to clarify, like, what we're talking about when we mean Christian music. Like, you know, I grew up in a church where I think I was more, like, gospel style. it feels like we're talking more evangelical Christian artists, more pop Christian artists. Yeah, definitely. So like when Luminate talks about sort of tracking the growth of the space overall, they kind of lump all the Christian faith-based stuff together. So it's both the gospel and the contemporary Christian music, which is what they kind of call the other wing of that

space. But my article focused more on the latter just because that's where right now you've seen kind of these big artists make kind of mainstream gains like a Forrest Frank, like a Brandon Lake. Mm-hmm. And is this a certain sound? Like, how overtly religious are we talking about these songs being? Is it, like, lyrics that are just generally inspiring? Or is it clear from both lyric to artists that this is Christian music?

Yeah. So, I mean, it varies a lot. But I think a lot of what you're seeing in this new wave is they, you know, they don't really want their stuff to be, like, pigeonholed as worship music that's only for church. You know, like Forrest Frank talked about this. He used to make secular music. He started making Christian music. He felt like there was no Christian music that worked well outside of a church environment.

He wanted to make music for the gym that was Christian. Music for beach parties, stuff like that. Okay, so this Forrest Frank, what does he actually sound like and describe to me the hits? Yeah, so I think so much of what we've seen in the last 10 years of pop or whatever has been kind of borrowing the drums, especially. from Atlanta hip hop. So it's kind of like this trap pop sound, you know, like very busy high hats with like some nice keyboards. It used to be in this electronic pop duo called Surfaces. Back during COVID and like the early days of COVID when people started going viral like crazy on TikTok,

Surfaces had one of the first really big viral pandemic hits. And he talked about sort of in interviews, he would try to like smuggle Christian ideas into the lyrics while he was with surfaces. But eventually he started writing his own explicitly Christian music. When I'm overwhelmed within, from the way to fall my sin, I need a friend to call my own. I need a house to call my own when I'm broken down inside. And, yeah, so he's had a ton of success. He's done over a billion streams just this year alone. Wow.

And that is kind of his thing, is like it is very pop-friendly in sound. If you listen closely, you are going to be like, oh, this guy's, you know, he's talking about his love for God and stuff like that. But if you just kind of are scrolling through social media and you happen to find his music in a dance challenge, you may not even notice that it's, it could be glass animals. or some other kind of pop group. Yeah, I mean, that's really what I was taking away when I was listening to it. In some ways, you know, it was explicitly kind of Christian lyrics. It wasn't hiding the kind of message of it.

But the sound of it felt kind of TikTok-y, I would say. Like, how much are we talking about a rise in Christian music generally versus how much is this driven by these emerging social platforms and specifically TikTok? Yeah, I mean, I think one of the things that's so, fascinating about kind of the modern music industry and we've seen this with k-pop we've seen this with latin music we've seen this with country is the industry used to be super siloed right and there were kind of these walls drawn between genres rock fans listen to rock rap fans listen to rap there wasn't a lot

of mingling right but now that we live in this age of streaming and social media there's just so much more accessibility everyone listens to everything and we've seen a number of genres really benefit from that and grow. And like, again, I mentioned country and K-pop and Latin. Those are kind of like the big three, but also I think some of those same factors are helping Christian music. It's just, it's accessible in a new way that it wasn't, you know, 10, 15, 20 years ago. You can kind of stumble across it and then be like, oh, I kind of like this song. Yeah. And, you know, I am thinking so much about like the TikTok of it all too, because, you know, maybe the verse of the song is explicitly Christian. But the chorus, you know, particularly as I was listening to this Forrest Frank

song today, is just a general inspiring message about having a good day. And if I'm scrolling for 30 seconds, it's not like explicitly clear to me that that good day is because of the Messiah, as the rest of the song would tell me. Yeah. No, absolutely. It's, I mean, TikTok is like probably the most powerful music promotion platform in history because it can get you addicted to something with just like seven seconds, right? Mm-hmm. You know, you're article mentions these artists bypassing traditional Christian music gatekeepers. I guess, you know, one of the things we were thinking about is how much of this do we think relates to kind of the future of even radio or major labels kind of controlling access

to the genre's audience. Is some of this a story also about those changing gatekeepers? Yeah, absolutely. I mean, and that's not just even a Christian music thing. There's sort of a much wider question right now of what is the value of a major label. Radio hardly moves the needle anymore. These labels still have a lot of money, but basically artists can get so popular without them. And, you know, at least for now, you still see most big artists are affiliated with kind of these major labels in some way, but they're able to get much better deals than they ever could because they can go so far on their own. So yeah, any music gatekeepers right now in any genre are facing this kind of existential question, which is kind of what value can we still bring to the table.

Do you think this is a kind of flash in the pan? How do we know if these moments, you know, as we look ahead, is this a trend for 2025 or do we have any hints on this as a trend that's going to grow or sustain moving forward? Yeah, for sure. I mean, you know, I can't predict if it's going to continue going at the same rate. If I could, I would be a wealthier man. But I think, again, in terms of sort of like the larger shifts that have happened that allow this growth, right, in terms of accessibility via streaming and social media,

Those themes seem here to stay, right? So in general, like, again, like you sort of said, genres that were once considered very niche, there's always the potential now. A hit can come from anywhere, right? That's Elias Light. He reports on music for the Wall Street Journal. Coming up, the music doesn't necessarily have to be Christian to give you a religious experience.

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It's a music podcast. I'm also a music professor. Yes, and the perfect person to talk to because we just had a conversation with the Wall Street Journal's Elias Light about how Christian artists have embraced a wider variety of sounds this year and have really broken through via all and pop charts or just culturally in 2025.

Now, we wanted to come to you just to get a better understanding of why this happened and what specifically what music we're talking about. When we think about Christian music, is it a style? Is it a vibe? Like, how would you describe, said genre in general?

Christian music is a giant umbrella term that I feel like encompasses all religious music and music that even, like, bleeds over into the secular world, some stuff that happens on the Hot 100. But it's going to include gospel, Christian contemporary music, worship music, all different kinds of subgenres, including your traditional hymnals. You know, they're all going to exist in this umbrella of Christian music. What are the key, like, facets when we think about Christian music?

My head goes to that kind of call and response, like, you know, kind of easy to pick up the lyrics, easy for you to kind of find community with your neighbor in the song. Like, is that what we mean? I think the vast majority of modern Christian music draws heavily from the black church. So things like call and response, you know, that comes from a song like Wade in the Water, where you have a church leader or caller who's going to sing a line, and then the community is going to sing a line back in response. And that is used all over the place in Christian music,

as well as secular music, single ladies by Beyonce is a call and response track. I guess I haven't put that together, but you're right. All the single ladies, if you say it back. All the single ladies. Yeah, yeah, yeah. As you're mentioning, this isn't limited to something like gospel or Christian music. Some of these forms, be it call or response or others, have shown up in secular music also. Oh, yeah.

If you think about the sonic signifiers of gospel music, beyond call and response, things like vocal ornamentation. those big, beautiful, melasmatic runs that you hear in Whitney Houston. That comes from church music. If you think about the beautiful harmonic progressions that you get in gospel, all of those sort of chromatic leading chords, your... Those sort of crunchy in-between chords, I mean, that's a, you hear that kind of thing on Love on Top. Yeah, you hear it in Stevie Wonder, Love is a Needed Love Today. Good morning or evening, friends. Here's your friendly announcer.

It all comes from Thomas Dorsey, who is sort of like the godfather of gospel music. He was born in 1890. Chercropper, family played blues and jazz, totally secular music, and then brought that sound into the world of gospel. When you reach that golden city. All of those sonic signifiers are what make gospel music, and they are ubiquitous in music across the board. Are we still hearing those type of chords or influences in modern music as in last couple years? it's still huge. I mean, I think about Justin Bieber came out with his album, Swag, this year. Yeah. He's got a song featuring the artist and producer Dijon called Devotion. And it has all of those big vocal ornamentations. It has the gospel chorus. Like, the idea of the chorus, the moment we all sing together spans from those traditions.

And so when Dijon and Justin are singing about their devotion, in which case, it's, you know, sort of bleeding over into devotional love. As much it is maybe about devotion of a higher being, we get those same kinds of qualities and you're going to hear the sounds of gospel and contemporary music everywhere. And, you know, one of the things you have focused on is this slow build that seems associated with gospel music, but we now see in music, secular music, broadly. I wanted to just dig a little deeper on that. You've said that it's a song structure that's ubiquitous in Christian music. But as we learned on our first half of the show, it's not just why.

sound anymore. So how would you describe this slow build, and where do we see it in music broadly? The slow build, I think the oortex of the slow build, if not Diane Warren ballads, would be Fix You by Coldplay. And it's one of the most influential songs actually in Christian worship music. It's a song that begins with a quiet organ, so kind of hinting at the church, just Chris Martin singing in a very pensive quiet, almost whispered. vocal, singing about trying to overcome a difficult situation. When you get what

you want, but not what you need. And then has this moment of like things are going to get better. The production builds, you get these swelling strings, and by the time you get to the end of the song, things just completely explode.

Except for the very final moment. I will try to fix you. The idea is, yeah, it's just like ever-building crescendo, and I think that that song form mirrors the experience of a religious experience. It's like, I'm going to get on my knees and pray and have a moment to myself and try to look towards the divine for answers. You can just picture being in a giant cathedral and all of a sudden the light changes. The light shines down through the stained glass and you're having this holy moment something bigger than yourself.

And that's what that song form does. You know, I like that because it does, as you mentioned, kind of mimic the rhythm of a church service. You know, you're going through moments of reflection, then a kind of like culminating whether sermon or particularly in gospel experiences, a louder portion of the service. And then it does return to the kind of reflection at the end. The other song that popped in my head, now that we're talking about things building is, like, Little Wayne's Let the Beat Build, which I think is like a Kanye gospel track, too. Like, that's a song that also, like, takes those little steps. I don't know if he thought he was making a gospel anthem. I can see how the slow build formula is a successful one.

Well, you know, I don't love mentioning him because he always wants so much attention, but Kanye has taken that religious turn in his music as well. But what's interesting about Coldplay is that I think of them as actually sort of like religious music for secular. people, that the experience is that community gathering, that feeling of being a part of something bigger, that song form, and it turns out that they are incredibly influential in the world of worship music. And worship music is sort of modern, evangelical music. It has that same song form. It's kind of like soft rock adjacent.

It's got to have at some point when those electric guitars go, da-da-da-da-da-dun. Everything builds and explodes, and then the final moment of, you know, solemn prayer. Face to face Oh, how the world forever changed For God is with us And so there are so many groups like

Hill Song or Maverick City music who are borrowing from those Coldplay play Why do we think it's taken to a 2025 for like even this Christian contemporary to have its kind of a mainstream turn

if we're thinking about artists like, you know, Forrest Frank or others? Yeah, Forrest Frank, Your Way is Better, was a big hit this year. Very different style song than Alex Warren's Ordinary. Miles Smith had a great track called Stargazing, another one of those great epic building songs. Hey! Take my heart, don't break it. Love me to my mom.

Why is it happening now? I don't know. Is it because of the right-word turn in the world where, you know, typically popular music has been very dominant with progressive and secular values? And we're seeing more songs both of religious conservatism and political conservatism finding their way on the charts that might reflect larger swings of political persuasion. I also think that really what we're seeing is that streaming, having matured and become the main way that we listen to music, shows how people are actually listening. What do you mean? Well, it used to be, if you look at billboard charts from before the 1990s, it was reported radio plays and music shops saying what they sold. We didn't know what people actually were listening to at home.

Now, with streaming, we can actually count every single play, and we know that people are listening to. things that perhaps don't fit the dominant narrative that you might have heard on MTV. And when we look at Billboard today, it's all over the place. There doesn't seem to be a dominant narrative in Christian music, let alone in secular music. You have Luther, one of the biggest tracks of the year, Siza and Kendrick Lamar. up against a track like Apata. Kissy face, kissy face, sent to your phone, but I'm trying to kiss your lips for real.

Red hearts, red hearts. A throwback, kind of like 1980s bop with crossover Bruno Mars with Rose from Black Pink K-pop group. Like, the charts aren't any one thing. The charts are all the diversity of what everyone is listening to. Do we have any signs then about what might be,

on tap for 2026? Can we expect Alex Warren style power ballads? Can we expect this kind of moment of inspirational Christian music to continue? Or is there something else afoot that you see in the trend lines that you can tell us to, you know, might be on the charts come 2026? Here's the thing. Christian music has always been huge. It doesn't get a lot of mainstream media attention. And so it might seem smaller than the actual listening audience is. Now that we're seeing what people are listening to his streaming, it's very clear that there is great demand for songs like ordinary by Alex Warren. When you have that big of a breakout hit of something, which is a little bit left field, we're not expecting it. What you get are follow-ons. It's like when

Billy Elish came out, you got a hundred mini Billy Eiliches the next year. I think we're going to hear a lot of Alex Warren soundelikes in the following year. I think there is a desire from music that provides a connection to a higher calling, that at least gives us a reprieve from the otherwise constant barrage of challenging news. And so I think we're going to hear a lot more of this kind of sound in the coming year. That is songwriter and music professor Charlie Hardin. You can hear him on his own podcast. podcast, Switch Storm Pop. Today's episode was produced by Hadi Mawaddy, edited by Amina Alsadi, fact-checked by Laura Bullard,

engineered by Patrick Boyd and David Tattershore. The rest of the team includes Avishai Artsy, Miles Bryant, Peter Balinan-Rosen, Danielle Hewitt, Kelly Wessinger, Ariana Asperu, Noel King, and Sean Ramoswar. Our deputy EP is Jolie Myers, and our executive producer is Miranda Kennedy. We use music by Breakmaster Cylinder. I'm a Stead Herndon. Today, Explain, is distributed by WNYC. The show is part of the Vox Media Podcast Network.

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