Stomping Into the Future of Gospel Music

Stomping Into the Future of Gospel Musicby Marcus McCullough | NewBlackMan (in Exile)
The after-party was in full effect in the spring of 1997, following my big brother’s honoree ball. But when the song changed an interesting scene followed. The new song was technically a gospel song—but unless you knew that you may have mistaken the genre. After all, the bass line was funky, the beat was fresh, and the song could be heard in the regular rotation on the local hip-hop/top 40 radio station. Unsurprisingly then, some of the young men and women who were dancing continued to—let’s say “grind”—on each other, as if they were dancing to yet another “secular” song.
As a number of the teenagers present, including my brother, looked appallingly at this, someone firmly reminded the dancing teens that, since this was a gospel song, such “freak dancing” was inappropriate. The grinding eventually stopped and everyone went back to the awkward, shy dancing that teenagers do when they try to behave. However, some in the room still decried these more innocent dance moves as too “secular” or “worldly” for that kind of song.
And so it began: the awkward, confusing, mixed responses to this “gospel” song that sounded “worldly” and was played on “secular” radio.
That song: “Stomp” (Remix) by Kirk Franklin and God’s Property.
The bass line (liberally borrowed from Funkadelic’s “One Nation Under a Groove”); the rap verse from Cheryl James, better known as “Salt” from 90s female rap group Salt-N-Pepa; and its popularity on “secular” radio are but a few reasons why this now-classic gospel song was as groundbreaking—and divisive—as it was. The track sparked conversation and conflict among Black Christians: some hated the song because it sounded too “worldly” while others loved it for that very reason, particularly since they believed it could potentially win souls for Christ.
Thus conversations about the Gospel and “appropriate” versus “inappropriate” ways to spread it abounded. These sometimes got emotional, even hostile, as some viewed such music as a threat to the Gospel and a watering down of gospel music. Some even considered the music to be pure evil, a new foray for Satan into the minds and hearts of the saints.
Lost in all of this humdrum is the beauty of the album containing this song, God’s Property. One might say today that nobody really makes albums anymore, rather artists merely record a bunch of songs with no rhyme or reason behind the compilation. I might agree.
Insert God’s Property into the CD player—yes, the CD player.
Though “Stomp” is the opening track, you would immediately thereafter realize that you have encountered a true gospel album. Track 2, “My Life Is In Your Hands,” is the kind of slow, devotional, emotion-stirring song that exemplifies the trust and hope that is the core of gospel music. Similarly, tracks 11 and 13, “The Storm Is Over Now” and “He Will Take the Pain Away,” respectively, exemplify hope and encouragement and may even produce an embodied emotional response. Track 4, “More Than I Can Bear,” exemplifies much of the same with the added touch of riffs from a Hammond organ, a staple in many Black churches.
On and on, track by track by track, it becomes clear that this album is very much rooted in the gospel music tradition while also demonstrating engagement with more contemporary, “worldly” sounds. Perhaps this is most evident on track 9, “You Are the Only One,” where Kirk Franklin features an old school preacher in mid-sermon energetic form while the choir sings “partay fo’ Jesus.” As an album—an intentionally-crafted work of artistry and track placement—it likely surprised a few people, particularly those who may have purchased the album expecting everything to sound like “Stomp.” And what a good, and seminal, surprise it was.
This is the artistic beauty of God’s Property as well as of Kirk Franklin’s genius: new sounds interspersed between more traditional “gospel” sounds in an unobtrusive, inoffensive way. This is intentional, as Kirk stated before bringing on the old-school preacher on the aforementioned track, that we cannot get “caught up on all this new stuff” and must not forget where we came from. Thus this “too secular” or “too worldly” gospel artist paid sincere homage to the tradition while including “secular” references.
Here, then, is more than a conversation—here is a harmony of two different eras of gospel sound done in a special way. This album takes listeners through gospel’s past and present while ushering in its future. Here is a different kind of bridge over a different kind of troubled water.
We cannot overlook how monumental this was. Today with gospel artists and groups like Mary Mary, Tye Tribbett, Tonex, the expansion of Christian hip-hop, and up-and-coming artists like Chance the Rapper blurring the lines some thought firmly demarcated, we may forget that such “secularized” gospel was not the norm, let alone with such a healthy incorporation of traditional flavor. We now tend to take new-age gospel for granted such that any “secular”-sounding gospel song rarely garners attention, except Erica Campbell’s “trap gospel” track, “I Luh God.” Indeed, it is a gift that gospel music keeps evolving in ways that keep the Gospel fresh for new and younger ears.
Still, we must acknowledge that without “Stomp” (Remix) and the album God’s Property, much of this foundation may have never been laid. For this and other reasons, I consider Kirk Franklin to be the greatest (gospel) artist of this generation and God’s Property to be one of the greatest (gospel) albums I’ve ever heard.
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Marcus McCullough is a lifelong member of the AME Church. He holds degrees from Boston University School of Theology, Harvard Divinity School, and Morehouse College. He serves as pastor of Bethel AME Church, Lowell, MA.