CHRISTIANITY MAGAZINE

ANDY FLANNAGAN
SON
ICC
There are so many hooks in Andy Flannagan's great music that I'll be singing them all day! The album opens with rock/pop 'Talk All Night' which is a guitar-led number that is a great opener for this excellent album. Andy's writing is so descriptive; you'll want to digest lyrics, over and over. His song 'Watch This Space' is painful and sad then you just recover to be bowled over by the powerful 'Open Arms' a song about the prodigal son. There is humour, poetry and challenge in his writing. It is an album written by a man with his eyes open to insight and a desire to include God in every part of life. The musicianship is spot on, with nice use of strings and acoustic guitar as well as the ubiquitous electric guitar. Great album.

Selling point:A mix of worship and story songs.

High Point:Superb songwriting, rich and varied songs, challenging. Great

Low Point:How do you get the songs out of your head?!

Star rating:***** (5/5)

Cross Rhythms Magazine

Issue 81 by Tony Cummings

In retrospect, Andy's previous album 'Invisible' was just a tad too introspective and singer/songwriter-orientated to make a major impact. 'Son' though is much more accessible as this most intelligent of songsmiths takes us through a set of lyrically wide-ranging songs aided by crisp inventive production from Trevor Michael. There are tender-hearted worship songs like "All I Am", "Stop" with its challenging call to stay long enough among the broken and hurting to be able to become the hands and feet of Jesus, and a wonderful evocation of the Prodigal Son story "Open Arms" written from the perspective of the son who didn't go off to blow his inheritance but stayed and worked for his father. The playing throughout is exemplary with Karen Bousfield's violin, Dan Wheeler's rock'n'roll guitars, Bernie Gardner's percussion and Matt Week's bass all adding rhythmic texture to the set. A creative triumph from the versatile Mr Flannagan.
9/10

YOUTHWORK MAGAZINE
CD - PICK OF THE MONTH
Son
Andy Flanagan
ICC Records £13.99

Reviewed by Martin Saunders, Editor of Youthwork magazine

To anyone who attended November's Youthwork the Conference, Andy Flannagan requires no introduction. A soulful, melodious and enormously creative singer-songwriter, he's also a thinker, a poet, and a jolly likeable chap. After a promising but unremarkable start with Advertising the Invisible, he's returned with a more mature, better-produced and far more diverse second album, Son.
From the first note of the opening track, as Flannagan's voice immediately asserts above rousing guitars, you get a good feeling about this. His songwriting is prolific and engaging - involuntarily engaging any listener's feet in instant tapping - but the real beauty is in the lyrics, as he bares his soul, talks to his Father and pleads with his audience in cyclic motions.
Of the many outstanding individual moments, perhaps the worshipful 'All I am' and 'Open arms' represent the highest peaks. These two, Flannagans calling-cards of late, are likely to provoke most recognition in first-time listeners, and the latter, a deeply emotional operetta based on the Prodigal Son, and the true summit of Son, is (for me at least) a cathartic experience. Here a perfect example of Flannagan's extravagant use of language and engaging imagery is found: 'God is running towards me, exploding with life.'
Many of the tracks on the album are far from worship songs. The exceptionally political 'Arms', for instance is the rallying cry of an angry young man who has thought through what his Christianity means in action. In the same vein, the song 'Prince' sobs from poignant personal experience of divisions in the singers' home of Northern Ireland.
Aside from the music, what's perhaps most impressive of all about the CD is the amount of effort that Flannagan has put into the package. On a Hi-Fi, Son is a great album; in a CD-Rom drive it steps up to another level. Like a special edition DVD, the disc is packed with extras, including videos, guitar tabs, wallpapers, and even a brilliant series of video diaries, as Flannagan explains the stories behind the songs.
I'm aware I'm in danger of going over the top, so I'll finish there. Suffice to say, this is a worthy addition to the very limited canon of 'great' modern Christian albums, and more importantly, to the thinking person's CD collection.

CHRISTIAN HERALD

Although originally from Northern Ireland, and one of the prime movers behind the Summer Madness festival, Andy has been based in Luton for a while now, working as British Youth For Christ's national songwriter, performer and worship leader.

Besides his own debut "Advertising the Invisible", and live recordings from Summer Madness, Andy's songs are beginning to surface elsewhere on Spring Harvest CDs (the youth-orientated Distinctive 2003 and Evolution 2004), and alongside Robin Mark, Eoghan Heaslip and others on ICC's recent "Worship from Ireland" compilation. Deservedly so All I am (the second track on SON) is a superbly crafted song of devotion, its instantly memorable chorus punctuating the poetry of the verses, whilst final song Kingdom Come is a gritty meditation on the Lord's Prayer, strongly underpinned by Andy's passionate social conscience. That hunger for justice also surfaces on Stop and Arms, which offers a stern critique of the international arms trade.

And he doesn't stop with performing the songs: and array of CD-rom content includes cell group discussion material, music videos, video diaries with Andy explaining the origins of several songs, plus lyrics and sheet music.

An impressive and challenging package.

FAITH FOR LIFE

SON, Andy Flannagan's latest album, is perhaps his most tender and sensitive yet. For anyone who has a wayward offspring, the cover alone is sufficient to evoke strong emotions. Rarely will you find a performer who is so self-effacing and yet so passionate.

This album, a little different for Andy in terms of its production, less acoustic, more big production feel, manages to keep intact is a very distinctive spirit filled, honest and emotionally charged content. Which of us, if are honest, can say we don't relate to some of the words in track five; Open Arms; " with my journey home is filled with fear, of what I'll find when I draw near, is there a welcome for me here?"

Track three, stop, based on some of his experiences in Bangladesh, when he visited that country as part of Tearfund's " Lift the label" campaign demonstrates that there's more to this man that making music, but doesn't he do that superbly well? Son is a must!

TROIKA WEBZINE

Emerging from the shadows into the limelight, Andy Flannagan is an inventive and talented 'Youth For Christ' artist with a worshiper's heart. He is now a pop-rock songwriter-singer and worship-leader who is steadily earning discriminating acclaim with this his second solo project. Clearly of artistic creativity, he - with credit musters and masters his musicianship skills for the evangelistic ministry and praise-and-worship purposes. Potentially, some songs here could have wide impact if they get airplay. Gently here's progressive Christian art. Multi-cultural, his music appeal will go a long way

PREMIER MAGAZINE

Irish singer/songwriter Andy Flannagan sings with brutal evocative honesty about a variety of situations. The theme of the album comes out most strongly on the album's highlights Open Arms and Watch This Space, which are a pair of "good dad/bad dad" songs. The first gives a new twist to the story of the Prodigal Son and the second tells the story of a teenager rejected by his father. Arms and Stop were written after he travelled to Bangladesh with Tear Fund and they're powerful stuff. The CD-ROM section includes two song videos and Andy's video diary where he shares the story of the songs.