It Is Well

Very Cool
I didnt know of this band until yesterday when I bought the MP3 album. I really enjoy the music. Nice work Kutless, To our most high God be all the glory

I don't usually like 'praise' albums, but...
I am not typically a fan of 'praise' albums. They tend to be far too soft and make me feel like I'm listening to something from my mother's album collection. However, this album is fantastic. Kutless, for the most part, doesn't hold back. It is not quite a hard and driving as some of their other albums, but it is a worship album after all. I have been Kutless fan for years and own all their albums. I count this as one of my favorites. It is most definitely my favorite praise album ever. There is a good reason why this album has now spent 26 days in Amazon's top 100 album list!

Great take on the worship genre
This album is supposed to be a sequel to "Strong Tower" which is decent, but not as good as this one. The opening -and title- track, It Is Well, is really good, with the verses sounding essentially the same as if you were singing it on Sunday morning. Then you get to the chorus which has a great Kutless twist on it. God of Wonders is good. I would rank it as better than the original Third Day song, but I'll call them equal because Third Day's version features Michael Tait, member of Newsboys and former member of dc Talk. All the tracks really stand out against other worship albums in the fact that Kutless brings such a raucous sound to the table. I would put this album in league with Third Day's Oferrings II: All I Have To Give, Newsboys' Adoration and Jeremy Camp's Carried Me, all of which are stellar albums. I hoped that this would be a "rock" album, but I guess we'll have to wait 'til next time.

A little disappointing
I heard a clip of the title track before I bought it and it sounded decent. But I was underwhelmed after listening to the entire song - the chords don't match the vocals, the chord changes happen when you least expect them and don't happen when you think they should, and the rhythm just doesn't work at times. The rest of the albums is decent, but not as heavy as I had anticipated. If you are looking for a heavy worship album, this is not it. If you are a Kutless fan and/or you are looking for a worship album with a SLIGHT "edge" to it, this album might be for you. At the time of this writing, the album is $5.00 in mp3 format. And, although this is not Kutless' best album and not the best worship album ever, it's still worth $5.00.

Solid Addition To The Worship Genre
I became a fan of Kutless back when Sea of Faces came out back in 2004. Their rock sound was a welcomed find for me as I discovered the world of Christian rock. In 2005, they released Strong Tower, a worship album that combined a did a great job combining a rock sound with some familiar and new worship tunes. To this day, the song "Strong Tower" remains one of my favorite worship songs. After a couple less-than-overwhelming rock releases the past few years, the guys have once again returned to the worship genre with the release of It Is Well: A Worship Album. While the album doesn't always hit on all cylinders, the band's take on some traditional and well-known songs, as well as a few of their originals, combine to make this a very solid addition to the worship genre. I really think these guys do worship better than straight-up rock, actually. The album opens with the title track, using a recording of a person walking into a church where the choir is singing the song to transition from the traditional to the modern. It works well, and when Jon Micah Sumrall launches into the chorus (with the melody changed ever so slightly), it sounds amazing. Other familiar songs that work well here include "Hungry," "Remember Me," "God of Wonders," "Give Us Clean Hands," and "Redeemer," which uses part of the hymn "There Is A Redeemer" extremely well (although I wish it was much longer and repeated the verse structure more than once). I know what you're thinking: Do we really need another version of "God of Wonders?" That was my first thought, but the band is really able to make it their own for the most part. Instead of reminding me of earlier versions, it just reminded me why I enjoyed the song so much in the first place. The original songs weren't really anything all that special. Pretty much your typical worship fare. The current single, "What Faith Can Do," explores the power of faith and what God is able to accomplish through it, and sounds made for K-LOVE radio. "Taken By Love" is another solid tune, and "You Save Me" turns up the rock sound more than most on this album. I don't think they were able to come up with a "Strong Tower" on this album, however. This album really made me wish that Kutless would just do an album of all traditional hymns and update them with a Kutless style. "Redeemer" and "It Is Well" are easily the two best songs on the album ("Remember Me" is close, though). That verse structure on "Redeemer," with it's fantastic guitar riff accompanying the familiar tune, built perfectly into the chorus, forcing me into praise of God. Hearing an old hymn given that treatment was fantastic, and I would love to hear more of that from Kutless if they ever choose to do another worship album (and if it's done that way, I'll pre-order it now). This album, although not perfect, does a great job of combining the worship style with Kutless' familiar rock sound and is a worthy addition to the genre.