We’ve teamed up with our friends over at One Man In The Middle to bring you regular, unbiased and honest reviews of music albums and EPs from Christian artists and musicians here in the UK and worldwide. This week we have The Eternal Son by Rivers & Robots with an overall review score of 9.0 out of 10.
Album Information:
Rivers & Robots started as a solo project of Jonathan Ogden from Manchester, with the aim of releasing worship songs with a creative sound, often based directly on Bible passages, and produced mostly at home with a laptop, keyboard and guitar. The name came from the mixture of acoustic and electronic instruments used in recording.
In 2012, David Hailes, Kelani Koyejo and Nathan Stirling joined the band to help start playing the songs live and eventually going on to record albums together as a full band. Since then, the band have had the opportunity to lead worship and do mission trips in many different cities around the UK, Europe and Asia.
The band now live as missionaries, and spend their time leading worship in churches, clubs and at festivals, hosting monthly worship nights in gig venues around Manchester and running a non-profit organisation called Set Sail, aiming to raise up creative worship and art in the UK.
Review:
Rivers and Robots are an Indie Worship band that utilise both acoustic and digitally created sounds to bring a blend of modern uplifting worship. Based out of Manchester they see themselves as full-time missionaries taking the worship and the joy of God to gig venues and festivals all over the UK and beyond. The Eternal Son is the fourth album since Rivers and Robots came into existence and the second as a full band. In order to get this album sounding it’s best the guys set up a Kickstarter crowd-funding campaign which has allowed them to get this professionally recorded, mixed and mastered. Taking this route has definitely allowed Rivers and Robots to release something that is crystal clear and professional. It has also allowed them a release on vinyl which you can pick up from their Bandcamp page.
The overriding theme is the eternal nature of God as someone utterly reliable and dependable, as opposed to everything else in this world. This is set up from the very beginning of the album which starts of looking towards the believers future in Heaven. The imagery is straight out of the Bible referencing a city made of pure gold, and the bridegroom and bride, no need for the Sun. This is a simple longing for that day and it is a beautiful song of what we can look forward too. A much richer promise than sitting on a cloud playing a harp!
The music on this album is largely acoustic with lots of vocal blending and plucked guitars. That doesn’t mean that there isn’t the opportunity for some more bass heavy rock-infused tracks. Some tracks combine both of these elements nicely, such as “Fullness of God” which starts exactly as described before the drums and bass kick in. Largely there is a very mellow vibe to this album. Even in the more musically busy numbers the vocals seem unhurried and fairly laid back.
I remember I used to look at sleeve notes (before digital music became so prevalent) and worship leaders would often list a verse that inspired them. They took the thought, reworded and rewrote this in clever words so much so that sometimes it was hard to see the relation between the end product and the portion of Scripture that it had come from. This cannot be said for Rivers and Robots, I don’t know if they have verses in the liner notes, but so many of their tracks have lines taken directly from the Bible. Saying that sounds a bit like it’s a cut and paste job, but there is a lot of skill in the way that they have brought descriptive passages of scripture to life. Learning these songs are a great way to worship God from His word.
Vocally these guys have a lovely tone, working together with a certain amount of harmony between them complimenting each other. One a few tracks there are moments where the vocal is filling in the gaps between the verses. One example of this in “Who Is Like Our God” which plays with the vocal styles from long drawn out vocal notes, switching to some very staccato lyrics, before switching back again to round out the song. This juxtaposition in the vocal arrangement shows a band that is aware of itself and has delivered something creative, different and beautiful
“High Priest” is definitely a track to be enjoyed in your headphones! Using the stereo option to ‘wave’ the simple instrumentation at the beginning between the two speakers sets up a very large soundscape which is filled with some synth chords.Musically it opens up the lyrics which are about the wonder of Jesus as God coming as a man. This band have a diverse range of styles and it seems that they aren’t afraid to experiment with them. As we get to “The Eternal Son” the title track for this album we find a bit of light Jazz styling, complete with saxophone!
Overall this album has some great tracks to listen to. Musically and lyrically there is a depth that is a surprise, but definitely a delight! I know that these tracks have been tried and tested on the road and I am now looking forward to hearing them live and getting a full. rich and deep worship experience.
For track listing, ranking breakdown and more check out onemaninthemiddle.com
