Christian Rock Makes a Deeper Connection

Christian rock rarely crosses the great cultural divide between true believers and secular listeners. But while much of the world worships the likes of Limp Bizkit, the young Christian acts performing Saturday at the two-day Rock the Universe festival at Universal Studios claimed a corner of contemporary pop culture for themselves.

Nothing on Saturday suggested any important new musical ideas coming from the Christian acts gathered on five stages across the park. And yet the music of Jaci Velasquez and Audio Adrenaline was never solemn, and it connected deeply with fans by drawing on personal experience at least as often as simply preaching to the converted.

Most moving was a performance by San Francisco-based Justin McRoberts. His music was an unremarkable brand of folk-rock, but he spoke openly of the depression and suicide of his father in 1998, and of his own subsequent struggles with faith. “As you can imagine,” he said, “I’ve had some difficult conversations with God since then.”

Velasquez’s strong, often breathless vocals were best served by her Latin-flavored material, which easily outclassed her slick pop ballads. The five-piece Audio Adrenaline mostly made bland modern rock, though the band dabbled in some high-anxiety, Limp Bizkit-like rock-rap.

The acts performed to excited, well-behaved crowds, as vendors sold CDs and T-shirts reading “Jesus Freak,” and fans enjoyed miraculously short lines to the park’s big attractions. But most fans huddled around the various stages, to hear Jennifer Knapp’s heartland rock or 16-year-old Page’s straight pop-rock, to claim the music as their own.