Cody Carnes - The Darker The Night / The Brighter The Morning (2017)

A worship leader and a CCM singer with a decidedly mainstream rock bent -- he often seems to be channeling elements of Coldplay and U2 into his inspirational rock -- Cody Carnes first started making music as part of the Dallas-based Gateway Worship before he headed out as a duet act with his wife, Kari Jobe. He started his solo career in 2017.

Carnes first started playing music as a child, and headed his first worship service as a teenager. Throughout his teens and early adulthood he played with a number of bands, including Hit the Ground Running and Crimson Soul. He later became part of Gateway Church, which led him to a key role in the associated band Gateway Worship. There, he met his eventual wife, Kari Jobe. The pair frequently co-wrote songs together, including "Let the Heavens Open" on her acclaimed album Majestic. Carnes and Jobe released an EP called All He Says I Am in 2014. They married that year, relocated to Nashville, and had a son in 2016.

Carnes signed with Capitol CMG in February 2017, releasing "The Cross Has the Final Word" shortly afterward. By May, Newsboys reunited to record their own version of "The Cross Has the Final Word," and by the end of the summer Carnes also released the singles "Hold It All," "Til the End of Time," and "What Freedom Feels Like." His full-length solo debut, The Darker the Night/The Brighter the Morning, appeared in September 2017. ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine