Rainey Blogs on Some Days

Growing up in Southern Illinois meant you had to listen to Country Music. At least that’s what it meant for me, especially since my home spanned three generations and our summer vacations were usually spent in Nashville, Tennessee. But I didn ’t much care for Country music. I remember my first 45s that I purchased at Featherstun ’s, an appliance store that sold records. I bought Jim Croces ’ "Bad, Bad, Leroy Brown" and Billy Preston’s "Will It Go Round in Circles." A white artist and a black artist. Kind of like our town: black and white. As time went on, though, I grew to prefer Soul and Disco music over Rock or Country. As an only child, I spent hours in my room, by myself, exploring music. Kiss. Peter Frampton . Sweet. The Brothers Johnson. Village People. The Bar- Kays . Con Funk Shun. Bootsy ’s Rubber Band. Johnny "Guitar" Watson. I watched American Bandstand and Soul Train on Saturdays. My friends were leaning toward Rock music like Aerosmith , but...

This is a satire piece that I wrote to express my feelings toward many of the songs we sing in church today: they are long, but short on lyrical content. Similar to what I remember about disco. During the 1970s, many people were saved out of disco to become Christian believers. Few would have thought that people could ever be saved into disco. Times have changed, though, and no Christian worship industry executive, pastor or theologian could have predicted the meteoric rise of a new type of worship music churches are currently using throughout the U.S.: Disco Worship. Disco Worship Fast Approaching Pop Worship in Popularity According to spokesperson Sergio Vandermaas of CRLI (Christian Royalties and Licensing Incorporated), the company that tracks worship song popularity and pays royalties to artists, CRLI has added several Disco Worship songs to their top song playlist and may even add a new Disco Worship category to their other category—Pop Worship—for tracking song usage. “Over t...