Jessica Gerhardt -- Alight Beyond the Sea

Jessica Gerhardt, one half of Tupesto, delivers a stunning spiritual-ish folk pop album with Alight Beyond the Sea. Gerhardt's voice has a vulnerable purity, one that movingly conveys sincerity, faith – and the doubt that gnaws at them. Like all great religious literature, these songs bear secular and sacred readings equally well: after all, they are songs that ask us to be radically vulnerable in spite of everything that tells us not to.

"Make Me Grow" is a fundamental realization that we all need right now: we are not alone, and we need each other to grow – either in an earthy sense or with spiritual subtext. I am not Christian, and this is the song I needed to hear in this moment. We all have inner reserves of strength – especially those of us who are LGBTQ+ – and as much as it hurts to call on those reserves once again, we can and we will, and we need to unite with a strength greater than ours, be that community or something else.

Gerhardt's music has a minimal pop sensibility to it, one that makes the songs groove without calling too much attention to themselves – a blessed change from most Christian Contemporary Music. Alight Beyond the Sea doesn't try to pull you along with some kind of irresistible groove, crushing you in the undertow of anyone's mighty power: instead, it invites you to take a journey of faith - however that looks to you.

Gerhardt suggests a modern approach to spirituality with "Psalm 139," which incorporates a translation of the text itself alongside her own lyrics. I think this is the way forward: that we need to take what is good from our traditions – particularly because so many of them are being weaponized by corrupt and domineering forces – and add our truths to them.

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