More is less

Something More

Ginny Owens

Rocketown Records

Something More

Ginny Owens

Rocketown Records

In her recent release, Something More, Ginny Owens sings, “Gotta be something more than running circles for a living/Gotta be some important puzzle piece that I am missing.”

The puzzle piece that seems to be missing from these lyrics, and the rest of Owens’ Christian adult contemporary stylings, is originality.

The 26-year-old singer-songwriter-pianist broke into the mainstream in 1999 when Sarah McLachlan hand-picked her to represent Nashville at a Music City tour stop for the for the now-defunct summer women’s music festival Lilith Fair. Heavily sought after by several Nashville Christian labels, she released her commercially successful debut album, Without Condition, in 1999 on Rocketown Records. Owens has written and co-written the 12 tracks of Something More, her sophomore effort.

Owens earns points for singing, writing, and playing her own music, the marks of a true musician. She does not fall into the typical confessional trap of many female singer-songwriters, yet steers clear of this problem perhaps too much. Her songs ineffectively try to encompass mass concerns through her own experiences. This attempt might work if Owens wrote more personally.

While sweetly sung and inflected with generally pleasing soft piano, the songs on this album are ultimately trite. Owens is not breaking any new ground with the track “Something More,” but does make an honest effort, characteristics for which the Christian pop genre is notorious. Her attempt at good simple music is laudable, but Owens needs to delve deeper.

Owens’ music is best suited to the overproduced background music of elevators and sitcoms. Her music has in fact accompanied the WB sitcoms “Roswell,” “Felicity” and “Charmed.” The main problem with this album is that Owens’ inorganic music just doesn’t make the listener feel, and doesn’t give Christian music the kick it needs.