It wasn't that long ago that an independent Christian artist would have zero chance of breaking big. Christian radio wouldn't play them, venues and tours wouldn't book them, and the major award shows pretended they didn't exist. Doing things on your own, with no financial backing, and little structure or team, felt like a last resort of existence, and the kiss of death towards any future success.
2024 will go down in Christian music history as the year that all changed.
The Game Is Changing
Instead of being an exception to the rule, many independent artists are growing their audiences on their own outside of any traditional business model, and forcing the industry to pay attention. For decades, Christian music has felt like it has had to shoehorn into a specific format, missing large portions of the population hungry for something different.
For now, the "gatekeepers" as they are known (the ones who decide what plays on radio, who gets booked and nominated), are the last to arrive at the party, and the music that audiences are streaming by the hundreds of millions sounds like nothing that's dominating the rest of the charts.
That's because the game is changing. Christian artists are finding new ways to reach audiences drastically underserved by the worship and contemporary-dominated machines. And it's working.
Josiah Queen
Take, for example, 21-year-old Florida native Josiah Queen.
I was introduced to Josiah not by my local radio station, or even social media feed, but by my 17-year-old daughter who sent me a link to Spotify. I was instantly hooked by the raw production, and passionate lyrics, and was shocked at his early following. Throughout the next year, I watched Josiah release a lot of music, consistently engaging his growing fanbase which swelled to over 2.2 million monthly listeners on Spotify alone.
Queen built his following like many Gen Z artists. He began by releasing his music on social media but was also performing regularly at worship conferences across the nation. His constant engagement and on-the-ground work locally, regionally, and nationally caught on, and then that moment hit that every online content creator craves–a clip for "I Am Barabbas," one of his biggest tracks, went viral on TikTok, amassing more than 2 million views.
"I think God has used these songs to reach my age demographic," Queen recently told Billboard.com. "That's the biggest dream come true because there are so many people that are my age that are underserved with Christian music. Seeing the people at the live shows and the fanbase that was sharing the music with friends through word-of-mouth–not even just through social media–it wasn't a planned thing."
On May 24, 2024, Josiah released his 11-track full-length debut album and a week later, sent shockwaves throughout the industry. The Prodigal debuted at No. 1 on Billboard's Top Christian album chart, a rare accomplishment in Christian music for any album released independently. That fact would be impressive by itself, but the album was also the biggest streaming debut by a new artist in CCM history. Ever.
Independent artists are no longer just releasing records. They are now breaking them.
So now everyone is paying attention. Josiah is being added to Christian radio. He was nominated for K-Love Fan Awards, and recently received two GMA Dove Award nominations. (We nominated Josiah last year for THE NEXT BIG THING in the We Love Awards). A very green Josiah Queen even presented at this year's K-Love Fan Awards.
Tours are also following, with Josiah joining the 17-city Child Of God Tour that is already selling out multiple dates with another artist who is making similar waves on an even larger scale, Forrest Frank.
Forrest Frank
Forrest recently dropped his independent debut album this past weekend, and with streaming numbers 3x the size of Josiah, we could be talking about yet another record-breaking week in Christian music by an independent artist.
Forrest Frank isn't as new to the music scene as Josiah, but before 2022, few knew his name. He was part of the mainstream group, Surfaces, and found similar streaming success. Using much of the straight to social marketing that is redefining how artists are building their audiences, Forrest leaned heavily on that model these past two years. Half of his massive, 20-track debut album, had already been released, with each track seeing hundreds of millions of streams.
His bio on Spotify is two sentences. All lowercase. No punctuation. Kids these days.
He'll be battling his tourmate, Josiah Queen, for New Artist of the Year at this year's GMA Dove Awards, an organization that hasn't nominated an independent artist in that category in its 55 year history. Let alone two.
David Kushner
As impressive as Josiah Queen and Forrest Frank are together, they are unmatched by what's coming next. David Kushner is releasing his debut release, The Dichotomy, on August 30th under the "Christian" genre, and there's no doubt that it will become the third independent Christian release to smash records in 2024.
The 23-year-old currently has 21 million monthly listeners on Spotify alone. In comparison, Skillet, one of the most consistent and well-followed bands in Christian music for the past 20 years, has 8 million. NF, an artist who claims the Christian faith but is marketed by a mainstream label and has sold out arenas for the past decade, has 14 million.
Christian music has never seen this level of artist before. Ever. And David has only been releasing music for two years.
It's a bit mind-boggling.
His numbers would make any A-level seasoned artist drool. Over 1 billion streams in his first year. 13.7 billion TikTok views in under 6 months. His video for "Daylight," his breakout single, is approaching 300 million views. It was released one year ago this month.
I'm shocked David is releasing his album in the Christian genre. Not because the content isn't Christian–it absolutely is–but because "Christian music" is supposed to be this kiss of death. At least that's what every single independent CHH artist will tell you. "I'm a Christian making music, I'm not a Christian artist." Well, if David is making it cool again to be a "Christian artist," then we are here for it!
Forget our country. Make THAT great again.
What's Next?
All of this begs the question: How will the Christian music industry respond?
If I'm a label, I'm looking at these three back-to-back-to-back success stories and reworking the entire approach to how music is marketed and made. The current approach isn't even scratching the surface of the potential out there.
If I'm a radio station, I'm looking at adding these artists into heavy rotation.
And if I book tours, I'm bringing these artists to my city and booking them on my tours.
Beyond that, I have to wonder if the success has more to do with the fact that the Christian music industry has chased consolidated sounds for decades now that continue to narrow and become carbon copies of itself. Every label artist is squeezed into fitting a constantly decreasing mold of worship and contemporary, broad and emotionless, as unrecognizable as the next act being pumped through the system. Those criticisms of Christian music have been loud and constant ever since I started NewReleaseToday in 2001. It has only gotten louder. Everywhere I go I ask the same question: "What are you listening to?" The answers back rarely match what is showing up at the top of radio and sales charts.
So an underserved audience–hungry for authentic faith and starving for an answer to the hopeless, degenerate, mind-numbing product mainstream music is delivering–is finally finding its voice. By the end of the year, the three top-selling albums in Christian music could all belong to non-worship, independent artists, an unprecidented accomplishment that felt unimaginable just one year ago.
As a site that has championed the independent artist since our beginning, that will be music to our ears.
Kevin McNeese started NRT in 2002 and has worked in the industry since 1999 in one form or another. He has been a fan of Christian music since 1991.
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