Canter Bridge

Full product information for this item, together with my review, my ranking of the product, and any reader comments, can be found at www.amazon.com.

Amy Grant’s 1985 Unguarded album seeks to make a genuine statement about Christian faith on a highly-produced album that is preoccupied with love. Track after track, the singer explores what love is, beginning with ‘Love of Another Kind’ (i.e. Jesus’ love), continuing with track two’s ‘(Love Will) Find a Way’, and on it goes.

Listening more than two decades after the fact, it is still discernible that Grant was making a novel statement for her time. Both her music and her creed-lite affirmation of Christian faith must have seemed slightly edgy at the time, though neither does today.

Arguably, the album’s best track is ‘Everywhere I Go’, a lilting yet pensive account of God’s searching accompaniment of the singer in all her paths. Possibly more enduring is ‘I Love You’, a hard-nosed coming to terms with the fact that ‘life is very hard’ in the context of a marriage born of dreams. It was not common at the time for a Christian singer to perform a song – perhaps here the album’s title is born – about the tough love of marriage without overt reference to God.

The album manifests strong subdominant current of warning about the cost of lurching off the road. It finds expression first in ‘Wise Up’ and then, more subtly, in ‘Who to Listen To’. The latter begins with the enigmatic words ‘Don’t take a ride from a stranger // no way to know where they go // You may be left on a long dark road, lost and alone’. Then this refrain: ‘You’ve gotta’ know who to (not) to listen to … They’re gonna’ hit you from all sides, baby, you gotta’ know who (not) to listen to.’

The song and the warning are about, in Grant’s words, ‘keep(ing) your heart true’.

All in all, it’s a more sober message from Amy Grant than we had beeen accustomed to hearing heretofore.

Amy’s voice has never stood alone. In fact, it is not the strong, big, supple voice that commends many female soloist to the listening demographic that buys her albums. It is rather her overall appeal as a genuine and deeply Christian artist who performs from the heart in a way that is, well, unguarded.

Through three or four casual listens to this album in preparation for writing this review, I remained unimpressed. However, a final and careful listen has convinced me that this album is a keeper, worthy of our appreciation, and quite important for its moment in English-speaking Christian music.