Barlowgirl
    Biography

Contemporary Christian Music's biggest breakthrough band of 2004 is back in 2005 withAnother Journal Entry, an album that is on fire with conviction and commitment. The CD includes a new version of "Never Alone," the song that earned this sister trio multiple Gospel Music Association (GMA) Award nominations, including 2004's Best New Artist and Best Rock Song.

For their second CD, Becca, Alyssa, and Lauren Barlow have written songs that are easily its equal. "Grey" and "My God's Enough" are righteous rockers with grinding guitar. Layered productions with inventive percussive effects characterize "I Need You To Love Me" and "Thoughts Of You." The trio takes on a big, anthemic sound for the powerful ""Take Me Away," a delicately fragile tone for the wounded "Porcelain Heart" and a bopping punk attitude on "Five Minutes Of Fame."

Another Journal Entry also contains a joyously rocking version of David Crowder's "No One Like You" and a beautifully harmonized arrangement of Chris Tomlin's "Enough." As musically diverse as these performances are, they are united by the trio's passionate messages.

"I want to light some fires and shake some foundations," says Alyssa Barlow, 23.

"We tell people, 'You can be a rebel in a good way,'" adds sister Lauren Barlow, 20. "We can be rebels against this world. I want people to get fired up when they hear this record."

"The world is so flashy and it's always screaming at you," says oldest sister Becca Barlow, 25. "That's why it is always harder to look to God."

The striking sounds on Another Journal Entry are aimed at these young women's contemporaries, young people in search of meaning and direction. Few artists have as strong a connection with their audience as BarlowGirl. That's why it is so surprising to learn that the trio was raised with virtually no knowledge of the music of its peers.

"Even though we were raised in the 1980s, we don't know any '80s songs," comments Becca. "I can't name any '80s rockers. Dad and his family raised us on James Taylor, the Beatles, and the Mamas & the Papas, the good oldies stuff. We did have Amy Grant's old records and thought she was the coolest thing ever."

Father Vince Barlow came from a highly musical clan. He and his 13 brothers and sisters all learned to play and sing. Family reunions were giant sing-alongs. The Barlow sisters were participating by the time they were young children. Mother MaryAnn Barlow started all three on piano lessons when each turned seven years old. The Barlows' suburban Chicago home was full of melody, especially when Vince began rehearsing the teenagers as his backup band.

"Dad performed children's music at a church called Willow Creek in Chicago," explains Alyssa. "He wrote this very edgy kids' music and started making CDs for that church's children's ministry. Pretty soon, people got their hands on them around the country and would hire Dad to come and perform his music at their churches. And so we were his backup band" in the late 1990s.

By this time Becca had graduated from piano to guitar and Alyssa had picked up bass guitar. That left Lauren, the youngest, to map out her musical future.

"Just as we all did, I played piano from the time I was a kid," says Lauren. "But I was always hyperactive. Couldn't sit still on that bench. When we were traveling with my dad, I was playing keyboards. One day, I saw a drum set. I went, 'Hey, I'm going to sit down and see what happens.' So I sat down, played a beat and we all jammed together. It was just one of those things. It just happened. I was probably 13 at the time. I've still never had lessons."

"During that time with Dad was also when we started writing songs," adds Alyssa. "The first song we ever wrote, we were supposed to be doing our school work. Instead, Lauren and I heard Becca upstairs in her room with the guitar. We ran up there and were, like, 'What are you doing?' You're supposed to be doing school work!' She's like, 'I just made up this chord progression.' We're like, 'Wow, that sounds great!' Lauren and I started singing something and within a half an hour we'd sat down and wrote this song.

"Of course, we had to confess to Mom and Dad what we'd been doing instead of doing school. Later, we wrote another one. We started performing them at Dad's concerts. People would go, 'That really touched me.' But we still never took it seriously."

Becca and Alyssa began taking college classes. All three stopped touring with their father, but continued to write songs together and perform in nearby churches. By 2002, the sisters had written about 10 songs together. That summer, they decided to attend the week-long GMA Music In The Rockies seminars at Estes Park, CO. This annual confab bills itself as "the essential event for unsigned artists, songwriters, worship leaders, and anyone with a desire to learn more about a career and ministry in Christian music."

The Barlows didn't know that. Nor were they aware that in its 30-plus history the event had helped launch the careers of Point of Grace, Mark Lowry, Babbie Mason, Stacie Orrico, Rachel Lampa, and others.

"We were so out of the loop," says Alyssa. "We only went because somebody who believed in what we were doing paid for us to go. We thought it was a place for training. We didn't know there were going to be industry people there. We had no clue about getting signed through this.

"So there we were in all these classes. We studied a lot. We thought we would play and the judges would critique us. Well, it ended up being a competition, and we ended up making it to the finals. We were the only girl band. It was cool."

Thanks to word of mouth about their performance at Estes Park, record labels came calling. Within a year, BarlowGirl was signed to Fervent Records.

"We started making the album right away," Lauren recalls. "We literally packed our clothes and moved to Nashville. We brought our songs."

"And then God blessed us with [producers] Otto Price and Bryan Lennox," adds Alyssa. "They were so creative and really just helped us take our songs to the next level. They really didn't change us at all. They just enhanced our music, and continue to do that. They kept us true to who we were. They didn't make us into some product that they thought would sell. They just let us be who we are."

The debut album BarlowGirl became a runaway success story. The group toured non-stop throughout the following year, including two trips to Europe. The Barlow parents went along, helping to manage the increasing demands on BarlowGirl's time.

"The response has been overwhelming," says Alyssa. "There have been more than 40,000 postings on our message boards."

"Every night, kids will come up to us and say, 'What you said tonight changed my life,'" adds Lauren. "Girls will say, 'I'm going to go through my closet and take out all the un-modest clothes because of what you said.' People have become Christians because of hearing the songs."

"It's a daily occurrence," agrees Becca. "On stage, I share with the listeners about eating disorders. And every night I have two or three guys or girls who come up to me to talk about their problems. We've even gotten letters from kids who were about to commit suicide but didn't because they heard one of our songs."

The BarlowGirl journey is related in daily journals that all three keep. Their songs spring from those written meditations, hence the new CD's title, Another Journal Entry.

"As soon as we could write, Mom bought us each a journal and showed us the importance of writing down our walk with the Lord," Alyssa explains. "During songwriting, we open up our journals and say, 'What in here of my struggles can I lay before people that they will connect with?'"

"Us Barlow girls write songs a little bit differently than anyone else," adds Lauren. "We can't just write a song. We have to pray about it. We rewrite them I don't know how many times. That's the story of our lives. We re-write everything."

Another Journal Entry builds on the issues that are central to the BarlowGirl message. In our society, money doesn't talk, it screams. And never more loudly than at young people.

"Look around you," says Becca. "Everything is about being a rock star and getting rich. It's on every t-shirt. Celebrities are huge--look at them on every reality TV show. Our culture thrives on all this."

And, that, say the members of BarlowGirl, is wrong. Life should be a spiritual quest, not an accumulation of "bling." Thus, the pointed lyrics of tracks like "Five Minutes Of Fame" and "My God's Enough."

"We also talk a lot about purity," Becca continues. "You don't have to date around to find acceptance. You end up with a broken heart because you have given part of yourself away." This thought led to the creation of "Porcelain Heart" on the new CD.

"God is calling us as singles," adds Alyssa. "He is saying, 'Don't give your heart away to everybody else. Give it to Me.' We're using relationships as a crutch to cover up our insecurity. The reason why our generation's singles are jumping so often from person to person is because they're searching for self worth."

"I think that abstinence should be a given if you are a Christian," says Lauren. "Some people look at our not-dating thing and go, 'Well, that's weird. That's extreme.' I like being extreme. We don't question what the world does often enough. And I do think that now there is a movement toward abstinence and not dating.

The songs on Another Journal Entry hit hard because BarlowGirl wants to challenge its listeners. Not everything in the music is joyous, because life isn't always.

"Life is hard," Lauren says. "People don't want to know that your life is perfect. They want to know that you've struggled. They don't want the answers. They want to know if you're in pain how you're going through it. Especially kids in our generation. They want something real."

BarlowGirl has one strength that many in the audience might not have, and that is togetherness. Put simply, Becca, Alyssa, and Lauren Barlow have one another.

"They might see me take charge on stage," says Alyssa. "But what they don't see is what is behind the scenes. This partnership is really pretty equal. We are like a triangle. It's really balanced. I feel like I can do what I do, because of the support we all feel from each other. Because all together, we're moving forward."