I didn’t fully know what to expect of this book. The part of me that grew up in this culture wanted this book to be an ode to a life I loved. But it was more honest and at times cynical than that. I still enjoyed it.

Given the long and tangled debate over Christian pop and rock music, Beaujon's task as a secular reporter is unenviable and seemingly impossible. He pulls it off with admirable grace and courtesy, though, leavened with an outsider's sense of healthy skepticism and a reporter's flair for flexible honesty. He stumbles a bit when he awkwardly launches into a discussion of Christian conservative politics, but he rallies nicely when he talks to the bands themselves. Some of his nicely-diverse interviews are worth the cover price alone, notably the conversation with Aaron Weiss of mewithoutYou.

This is one of the VERY few books where I could not exactly finish it.

The strangest thing is the book's description versus what the writer felt about the subject.

Look at this:


Body Piercing Saved My Life is the first in-depth journalistic investigation into a subculture so large that it's erroneous to even call it a subculture: Christian rock. Christian rock culture is booming, not only with bands but with extreme teen Bibles, skateboarding ministries, Christian tattoo parlors, paintball parks, coffeehouses, and nightclubs,encouraging kids to form their own communities apart from the mainstream. Profiling such successful Christian rock bands as P.O.D., Switchfoot, Creed, Evanescence, and Sixpence None the Richer, as well as the phenomenally successful Seattle Christian record label Tooth & Nail, enormous Christian rock festivals, and more, Spin journalist Andrew Beaujon lifts the veil on a thriving scene that operates beneath the secular world's radar. Revealing, sympathetic, and groundbreaking, Body Piercing Saved My Life (named for a popular Christian rock T-shirt depicting Christ's wounds) is a fascinating look into the hearts and minds of an enormous, and growing, youth culture.


Now did you get any idea that the writer absolutely despised Christian rock and completely picked it apart? Well if so, the description sure fooled me.

I was fairly surprised that in the intro the writer admitted to not being a believer. Okay. I accepted that.

But the chapters following featured the writer bash everything that people believed about the culture that is "Christian rock" became increasingly unpleasant for me to continue.

According to this writer the bands P. O. D. have "hard-core" origins that are so shocking they are pretty much generic now to what they used to sing about (anti-abortion song, etc.), Switchfoot, according to the writer is ashamed to admit that they are Christian (I believe quite the opposite), and many other bands are just terrible according to this man.

Now while I don't completely agree with this culture (I read the words "Christian tattoo parlors" and my eyes when big and thought "What...?" And what is up with there being Christian nightclubs?_) I feel that this genre is one small step to get this young generation and any other one that learns about this culture exposed to the word of God.

It is so sad that this writer does not ultimately understand what knowing Christ is all about. The real "spirit" that is hard to explain because it is a mystery to even the believer and all we know is that what we learn and what is told us comes directly from God. Talk about a "phenomenon!"

I feel in effect he just couldn't understand which is a shame.

Body Piercing Saved My Life: Inside the Phenomenon of Christian Rock is a great book. It is humorous, informative, and well-written. Andrew Beaujon is one of the editors of Spin magazine, and tells the reader of Body Piercing… early on that he is not by any stretch of the imagination a Christian. This makes for extremely interesting reading. I learned a great deal about Christian music from this book, as well as about the musicians themselves and those who listen to them. Beaujon makes many good points and - despite his self-proclaimed non-religiosity - even finds time to give theological insights.

Though this is a book about Christian music, it is not written primarily for a Christian audience. Anyone could find this book accessible and entertaining. Having said that, musicians, and those who grew up on Sandi Patti (back when she hadn’t changed to “Sandi Patty” yet) et. al., should especially enjoy Body Piercing Saved My Life. A fun read.

Andrew Beaujon is not a Christian. The most important thing about that comment is that it is what makes this book so terrific. If any Christian musician or writer had set out to do a year-long project researching a book about Christian rock, you would have ended up with something completely different. Beaujon’s neutral standpoint—just looking at the music for the music’s sake, from the point of view of a writer for the magazine Spin—has a great deal to teach us about Christian music, and even modern Christianity as a whole.

The title of Body Piercing Saved My Life is based on a T-shirt slogan (featuring Jesus) that Beaujon saw at the Cornerstone Festival, a Christian music event. Throughout the book, he discusses the history and progression of Christian music and the Christian rock movement, conducts in-depth interviews with influential people from the Christian rock market—Doug Van Pelt, Steve Taylor, David Bazan, Brandon Ebel, and many others. These are current and former musicians, magazine editors, and record producers, all who have a tremendous impact on the Christian music scene. Beaujon looks analytically at Christian music and poses many thought-provoking questions. Should Christian music be a genre? Is there a difference between Christians in a band and a Christian band? He also talks to the musicians themselves (those who were willing to talk to him) and asked the same questions. The answers he receives are varied and eye-opening.

The author experienced Gospel Music Association (GMA) week, the week in Nashville preceding the GMA Awards. It’s a week of publicity, performances, and a veritable who’s who of Christian music. What Beaujon found there truly amazed me. It was shocking how much was closed to him as a “secular” journalist. The complete unwillingness of people to talk with him about his project left me speechless. I can understand wanting to protect oneself from poor publicity, but this avoidance was almost as telling as an interview would have been.

Body Piercing Saved My Life should be required reading for pastors, Christian musicians, and anyone wanting to read an in-depth, basically unbiased book about Christian music—its good and bad points. Beaujon is never overtly harsh towards Christians and even sought to understand things he found confusing, such as the worship music phenomenon. His comments about Christians in general and the occasional legalistic practices should spur Christians to do some reflecting. The book offered a large amount of discussion material for my family and would make an excellent small group study book. I don’t know when I’ve read a more insightful and intriguing book.

This is an interesting book, especially if you are familar with Christian Music. It talks a lot about the upcoming popularity in the 80's and 90's. A lot of talk about Cornerstone Music Festival. It isn't really a negative review of the scene, but an interesting look into how it works and how it started.

This book is fantastic if you grew up in the middle of the rise of Christian rock. I don't know how it would be for other people. But Beaujon touches on every artist I wanted him to and gives such an understanding evaluation of Christianity in general. Great book all around.

DNF

Very interesting journalistic account of the Christian rock music industry and phenomenon. I was surprised by his mostly non-judgmental perspective. A book for Christians with open minds. Some of it really got bogged down--slow, but it was fun to read about the some of the old, beginning bands that I grew up listening to and reading about artists I've never heard of--and I've heard of a lot living with a music-crazed husband!

The title of this book is somewhat deceptive since the author is not inside the phenomenon of Christian rock. He's an outsider, trying to understand something he's not a part of and doesn't believe. He frequently complains that he is unable to get interviews, is frustrated that no one returns his emails, and frets about his lack of access. But he never addresses how those problems influenced the book he ultimately did write. Did they end up mattering at all?

The author also comes to this (fascinating) project as a music industry expert and consequently the book is somewhat heavy on descriptions of which label did what before it merged with what other label and what it means to sign with which company through which distributor and so on. That part kind of lost me. But I imagine, if the ins and outs of the music industry were your thing, it would be interesting to trace the development of the business side of Christian music.

I was more interested in the cultural angle and I thought the book was a little light there. He remarks at the end that he had learned a lot during the project: he now knows the difference between a Baptist and a Pentecostal. So, do they listen to different kinds of music? He often blurs Christians together, when it might have been more productive analytically to tease them apart. Or is the phenomenon of Christian music an exclusively non-denomenational thing? Either way, it would be interesting -- and probably should have been addressed.

I'm kind of torn about whether he handled the material with enough journalistic detachment. I mostly think he did, only he's sometimes just a tad too surprised to learn that he "actually" likes one of these Christian bands or that so-and-so is "really" a nice person. Oooh. Feeling scorn for your subject is kind of fatal. I do think he knows that and tried to avoid it and even mostly managed. And to his credit, it's not the easiest task to be even-handed when it comes to Christian rock -- which is, we must admit, a punch line.

Finally, there's a random chapter on abortion. He includes it because of all the anti-abortion t-shirts he saw at Christian music events. But it leads him to attend some demonstrations with Christian activists and to explore their position and theology in greater depth. Which really has nothing to do with music. It's an interesting chapter, but I don't know why it's in the book.

All together, worthwhile read. Useful to me and my project. But probably not the final word on this subject.

Very interesting read. It raised a lot of great questions and Beaujon introduces a lot of figures in Christian rock that I've never heard of. I think he maybe bit off more than he could chew. I was also really disappointed that, while he criticizes the church for being racist, he interviews one, maybe two women, in the whole book. The only woman I remember him interviewing works for a Christian record label. There are female Christian rockers out there! I guess if they all turned him down for an interview, I wish he'd at least told the readers that he had tried. Still, it was worth reading.

This book is a fascinating look into the world of Christian rock from a neutral perspective. It has two big flaws. The first is it is written by a former Spin magazine journalist and has the kind of depth you would expect from somebody who used to write for Spin magazine. This leads to the second problem. A lack of meaty questions leads to a loose and repetitious structure. I'm not sorry I read this book, there is nothing else like it out there, but the writer had the willingness to dive into this subject, but not the chops to really deliver on it.