Christian Rockers Challenge Cultural Division With Revolutionary Message

Published: September 30, 2024

Christian Rockers Challenge Cultural Division With Revolutionary Message

Movieguide® Contributor

Skillet lead singer John Cooper says his band wants a spiritual revolution.

It all starts with their new album’s no. 1 hit, “Unpopular.”

“I want to make very clear to people that this revolution…is not a political revolution,” Cooper told Baptist Press of Skillet’s new album, Revolution. “This is a spiritual revolution. It is a revolution of love, a revolution of understanding, of reaching out to people who are hurting.”

Cooper sees a lot of rebellion, depression, suicide, and mental health issues at extreme levels in culture today. The band’s new album is a cry against what modern culture represents.

“We’re revolting against a culture that creates nihilism, nothingness, and materialism,” Cooper said. “The album is poignant, but it’s also very confident and inclusive as well. It’s a record saying, ‘We have to be willing to stand up for what we believe in — even if it might be unpopular in some circles, but hey, maybe we could have a revolution of love, you know, a revolution of understanding, of tolerance towards people that we don’t agree with and come back to some human dignity and respecting people’s rights and where they’re coming from.’”

“And so, it’s kind of speaking to the division and the polarization that is happening, which I think is a really good message and what the whole ‘revolution’ thing is all about. We allude to it on the record cover where there’s a SKILLET flag, and in the corner it lists I Corinthians, 13:13, a verse that says, ‘Hold onto these things: faith, hope, love. But the greatest is love,’” he explained.

Though the band’s music is embedded in the rock genre, they’re 100% Christian. They’ve sold 22 million units worldwide and have 10 million monthly listeners on Spotify.

“I’ve always wanted to do Christian music in the mainstream rock world. I never wanted to be just only in the Christian music world,” he said.

People “feel all alone in the world,” Cooper said. “They feel completely beat up by society. They have grown up in a culture that tells them there is no higher purpose. There is no God, and if there’s no God, there’s really not a static higher purpose in their life.”

He adds they feel like a “cosmic accident” without God and feel that there “is not better life to come.”

Movieguide® reported:

“The amount of people suffering from depression and suicidal thoughts and who think that they don’t matter is so overwhelming to me. It just breaks my heart,” Cooper told Crosswalk Headlines. “That’s one of the things I really, really care deeply about, is people that are struggling with suicidal thoughts and mental health — those kinds of things.”

Cooper explained that he views the mental health crisis as “a result of a society who has just thrown God away,” adding, “And if there is no God, they really find it hard to find a reason to live.”

But the band wants to share the message that there is a better life out there, even if it makes you “unpopular.”

“We don’t have a lot of songs that are maybe a little tongue-in-cheek, but this one’s got some attitude to it,” he said about their “Unpopular” single, which the Christian Post says might become “the anthem for a new generation of truth tellers.”

“I think the whole point of the song is that in a world gone crazy, in a culture that loves evil and loves chaos and loves the destruction of what I would call God’s created order…I do not want to be popular,” he said. “I don’t want to be on the team.”

Many of the band’s fans aren’t believers.

“John, I’m not into the Jesus stuff, but your music makes me feel good. You guys gave me hope,” Cooper said fans say to him.

“I feel like that’s a job well done for Skillet. I think that that’s throwing a seed,” he said. “I can’t force the Holy Spirit to water that seed. All I can do is throw it out.”

Right now, the band is just doing their part in the “revolution.” As they tour they “tell people about a God who loves them, be non-judgmental to those who don’t accept and preach the Gospel in the most compassionate but unashamed way as we can,” Cooper said.

Skillet’s Revolution album is ready to make waves on Nov. 1.