New and singable CCM

Since I Found You

Natalie Layne

Natalie Layne took social media by storm with 2023’s gospel-steeped “Grateful For.” On her latest single, “Since I Found You,” a bouncy bass and wah-wah keys retain those signature influences with a more pop-oriented direction. Layne’s rootsy, rhythmic playing gets slightly obscured in the high sheen of studio production. Yet her positive, encouraging message and rousing vocals still shine through, letting the listener tag along on her bright morning: “Walked out the doorway knowing / Your way is where I wanna go / I got Your tune in my soul / Your heart, Your beat, Your tempo.”

Brand New

Bay Turner

Bay Turner’s been turning heads since Season 17 of America’s Got Talent, where his cover of Calum Scott’s “Biblical” wowed judges and audience alike. After pursuing a career in opera, Turner changed lanes to lead worship with the iconic Brooklyn Tabernacle Choir. When a routine surgery nicked his vocal cords, Turner was advised he’d never sing again. Three months later, doctors were baffled to find him healed. His ordeal inspired the powerhouse, soul-driven single “Brand New.” With vocal gymnastics and evident joy, Turner praises the One who “[gave] me a new breath in my lungs / You got me singing a brand-new song.”

Real Me

Kevin Quinn

Somewhere in the whirlwind of Disney child stardom and becoming a Netflix musical-movie phenom, Kevin Quinn became a commodity that other people defined. His latest album, however, is the portrait of an artist coming into his own. “Learning To Let Go” is the highly groove-able ode to relinquishing control: “Watched all my plans / Slip through my hands / I could see them picture perfect / Lord knows I deserved it.” Quinn’s “Blessed,” a palette-­cleansing piece of acoustic sweetness, is designed to take you from stressed to blessed.

The Jesus I Know

Brennley Brown

Brennley Brown’s country bona fides come from living on her family’s ranch, where her dad reared her on legends Waylon Jennings and Emmylou Harris. In her new EP, bursting with hard-driving country beats and ripping guitar lines, Brown rails against fire-and-brimstone falsehoods cooked up by works-based preachers and parishioners. Brown howls, “It’s not the Jesus I know!” Instead, Jesus sits at the table with sinners, and “hears you when you’re praying / When you don’t have the words / When you’re at your lowest / He’ll get down in the dirt.”

Hope for the future

The through line for Emerson Day’s latest EP, God Ain’t Finished Yet, is that something better this way comes. With a gliding, ­country-rock groove, Day recalls the frustration of a “dead end road when I thought I was on my way / It’s shattered plans when I thought dreams were being made.” Despite pervasive disappointment, the arena-ready chorus proclaims, “This ain’t how the story ends / I got a hope, a future, a purpose / I woke up and I’m breathing again / So God ain’t finished … yet.”

A simple piano opens the EP’s middle song, “Middle of a Miracle,” in which Day ruminates on the devastation of tragedy, until the chorus exhorts perseverance: “You don’t see it but you’re right in the middle of a miracle / You can’t feel it but under your feet the roots are taking hold.” “Grave Robber (Hail King Jesus)” is Smoky Mountain grit-rock celebrating how Jesus transforms death from an end to a new beginning. —J.K.