I tape a lot of videos, mostly Christian rock ones but also other ones that I enjoy, and this week the two videos I've been watching numerous times on videotape are P.O.D.'s "Rock the Party" (which I taped Saturday night off TBN's "Real Videos") and Billy Gilman's "One Voice" (which I taped 2 days ago off the country music channel, G.A.C. [Great American Country]).

Well, apparently yesterday (7/26), P.O.D.'s "Rock the Party" was the #1 video on MTV's TRL. And apparently it was #4 before that, and the band appeared in person on the show this week, too. When I first saw a video by this band last year (before "Southtown") on TBN's G-Rock, the lead singer had short hair and was not so impressive looking. I never would have dreamed they'd be played regularly on MTV later on, let alone reach the #1 spot on the "dumb"-dominated TRL.

I've heard some commentators say that P.O.D. has been more successful than other Christian bands because they're better, but I think also the fact that their label is Atlantic Records is a huge plus. Most Christian bands are on labels that are more familiar to the Christian market (Forefront Records, Sparrow, Myrrh, Gotee, Tooth & Nail) and perhaps less effective at marketing outside that niche. The fact that most Christian rock bands are filed under the "Gospel/Contemporary Christian" section of the record store instead of the "Pop/Rock" section is an indication; that filing system helps the Christian buyer if he wants to buy only Christian rock albums, but it doesn't help the Christian rock band if they are wanting to reach the average person.

I also think "Rock the Party" is a great song for this political season. I can see people going to the political conventions this month singing along with their fellow "party people" about how they came to "rock the party." (I don't know when Alice Cooper's "Elected" came out, but that's another great "campaign rock" song, although of course in a twisted kind of way.)