#87 Catholic Playlist Show

Catholic Playlist #87The Catholic Playlist show is a showcase of some of the best and very newest music released today by Catholic artists. We have a new featured artist this week – Hope and Justin – and we have cool mix of new and previously unplayed music in the playlist, with songs from Katy Blythe, PJ Anderson, Dante Schmitz, Connor Flanagan, Alverlis, Greg & Lizzy and Of The Tower. We have two songs from Josh Blakesley Band in the playlist too, including the first song “Revive Us” from their latest album “Even In This”.

Hope and JustinOur featured new artist this week is Hope & Justin. Hope and Justin have been playing music together since the first night they met, which was over 10 years ago now, but they are still at it and are joined by what they say are “incredibly talented friends”. They describe their music as homegrown music with lots of soul: everything you loved about 70’s folk and bluegrass with a modern vibe. In 2013 they released their second album titled “Eastern Bound”, and they’ve been rewarded for their hard work and talent, having been selected as “New Folk Finalists” in the Texas Kerrville Folk Festival, semi-finalists in the International Songwriting Competition (chosen among 20,000 contestants), and awarded “Best Folk Song” in the West Coast Songwriter’s Competition. Hope & Justin are making their Catholic Playlist debut with “St Michael’s VW” from their latest album “Eastern Bound”.

And making a return to our blog posts here for each show, here are links in iTunes of all the songs in this week’s playlist.

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Category: Playlist Shows

Please note: I reserve the right to delete comments that are offensive or off-topic.

  • Jim Carroll

    I’m just curious: I’m a regular listener to a local Christian (Protestant) music station. I know from past experience with other stations the difficulty of getting these stations to play music by Catholic artists (except Matt Maher, of course), because they don’t want to have anything to do with “Mary worship music”. Any ideas on how to break through this barrier to get these artists wider distribution?

    • Jim – so very sorry for taking so long to respond to your insightful question. I think it will take a grassroots effort to effect wider distribution of this music. The mission of this program is to discover, share and promote the efforts of these artists as wide as possible in order to gain them more exposure. When this show started, I knew less than 10 artists. Today, we have more than 100 that we routinely play. More Catholic radio stations are picking us up, but we have a long way to go. As this program and others begin to reach more and more people, the hope is that these artists begin to draw the attention of the CCM industry. Matt Maher has been able to ‘crossover’, and I have no doubt that there are many more who deserve similar notoriety.

      I also think the time is coming for Catholic radio stations that can offer an alternative format to the current talk dominated format. I would NOT switch over any current talk stations – they serve a very important need to inform and teach. But many markets need and could support a second station that features a mostly music format with an evangelistic intent.