Taking backflips for Jesus

God is trending. A new generation of male pop stars are on their knees begging for redemption. How did the creeping dominance of faith-pop become a thing, asks Hannah Ewens

- Hannah Ewens

When I saw moustachioed pop sensation Benson Boone play a show in London last year, the star performed the best of his pedestrian midtempos last: his religiously ecstatic hit, “Beautiful Things”.

It was inevitable that his UK No 1 track would be saved to leave the audience with a lingering sense of catharsis. In the song, Boone depicts himself as a simple man on his knees, praying to the divine. As the music builds to a holy drop, he belts out: “I want you, I need you, oh God / Don’t take / These beautiful things that I’ve got.” Cue a dramatic backflip, a Boone trademark at this point. (But really, how else can a man demonstrate religious fervour if not by launching himself into the air from a dangerous height?). The mostly reserved congregation went wild.