Nemo will also be playing ;)

not sure that personal religious / spiritual beliefs have anything to do with whether the music is any good, whats your point?

what does the bible say comes before anything else?

NOT CHRISTIAN?!?!?!!!!

Brent Christoffersen is 26, recently married and lead singer of Sideway, a rock band praised for their ‘hi-energy shows, awesome tightness and groove, and powerful vocals.’ With its driving nu-school rock sound, Sideway has played support for Blindspott, and packs Wellington venues like Valve, The Cross, and the Massey Bar.

The band has just been signed by Gherkin Productions, so it seems life for this young ‘muso’ is on the way up. Come Friday night though, there’s nowhere he’d rather be than with thirty incredibly loud, almost-teenagers in an inner-city Salvation Army church. ‘That’s just music,’ he says. ‘This really matters!’

Whether in his usual ‘stylie’ garb, complete with piercings and jewellery, or - later in the evening - as his over-the-top 70s alter-ego, MC-ing a lip-sync competition, Brent is not what everyone expects a Salvation Army youth worker to look like. And, like him, the other leaders seem altogether too laid-back to be doing something so challenging and important. But appearances can be deceiving.

‘We’re not typical, straight Salvation Army,’ he admits. ‘But because of our backgrounds we’re aware of the issues kids face.’

What is ‘straight Salvation Army’ is the Christianity that’s at the heart of Brent’s work with the kids. ‘I’m never ashamed to say I’m a Christian and that I’m running a Christian club,’ he says.

That club is called ‘Ground Zero’ and it’s just one of many Wellington Youth Services programmes operated under the umbrella of The Salvation Army’s Wellington City Corps (church). Throughout the country there are similar Army clubs, by that name and others.

To the intermediate age kids from Wellington’s Mount Cook school who storm through the doors each week, Ground Zero simply translates as ‘fun’! ‘We do heaps of cool things,’ says 12-year-old Margaret (who later demonstrates that ‘she’s the bomb!’ in the lip-sync competition). But that’s not the best part—‘They really care about us!’

SALLIES ARE WIERDOS!!!! THEY SCARE ME.

Ahaha! Brent Christoffersen! Last time I saw him he must have been about 8! They were at my local corps (Whakatane) till 1984, I think. Hey santaisgoon, do you have tabs on the rest of the Christoffersen whanau?

That's OK - I barely remember you. I hung out with Angela for a while, and Lynley should remember me too.

God and da salvation army 1st, warping little minds into non thinking, sheep-like followers of a distant presence who judges all of us all the time. And music just like all those other bands to back it up. Music that they've already heard a million times before and nicened up a bit to take all the edge and excitement out of it then pumped into them in amongst preachers spouting the evils of drugs and sex and fun. Oh yeah. I know what you're all about babay.

Show me christians who are doing something interesting with music!!! Scott Weiland found god - Stone Temple Pilots became shit!!! Creed???!~ need I say more. The White Stripes are great but they arnt not really serious about all that God crap right?

Damn breeders. Put on a johnny, goddamnit and don't baptise babies - it'll fuck with their chakras.

Congratulations Geoff, don't mind idiot child he'd lick the sweat off Mariyln's yankee boy and consider himself 'original' how you doing by the way, haven't seen you for a while, not since er......92'. haha

Well said..