How do you make a good modern praise album? It's easy, take members from great bands like Seven Day Jesus, Zilch, and dc Talk's back-up band, put them together on a good label and the results will be interesting.

Their sound ranges between modern pop/rock laced with occasional strings and an occasional groove. They also make their influences evident on the album, with Radiohead, Third Eye Blind, The Verve, and Deliriou5? to name a few.

"I Have Come to Worship" starts off the music tracks on the album with a good album start, but not the best possible song choice. The vocal delivery is strong and confident, however reduces itself to almost a whine at the song's close.

"Holy One" makes up for the previous song's mistake delivering a solid groove-oriented track with vocals that remind me of Between Thieves turning into vocals slightly reminiscent of FFH by the chorus. But probably the most memorable and most fun song on the album is the next song, "I Want to Know You," where the bouncy sound of Third Eye Blind is an obvious influence here.

"My Refuge" is another album highlight, a song that may remind a few listeners of really old Imagine This mainly toward the song's close, while reminding others of FFH again at other times. The powerful musical background of the song and the worshipful lyrics propell this track past "filler" status enough to become a favorite.

Sonicflood is a strong band with a strong album, but like most starting bands, are not without flaws. The album starts off with "Invocation," a message from the band, which although it sets up the album, it's a very skippable track once listened to after a few times. Another fault would be the placement of other messages directly following songs like "I Want to Know You" and "I Need You" where it is included in the track instead of being a separate track, so the listener has to either skip to the next track or listen through the entire message each time. And each one could easily have been left at the end of the CD either in track form or hidden track form.

Some interesting and successful cameos on the project include Out of Eden on "I Could Sing of Your Love Forever," a song that could easily pass as an Out of Eden song with Sonicflood being the guests. Three songs later, Kevin Max of dc Talk makes an appearance on "Something About that Name" and helps create a well-built musical portion to include on the album.

So if you're looking for a good ska-less modern praise album that doesn't have that church choir tone to it, look no further than Sonicflood's self-titled debut currently on the shelves. I'm looking forward to watching the progression of this band's sound and ministry in the future.

- Review date: 7/19/99, written by John DiBiase