re: If you're religious, what's your jam?

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Grew up SBC then non-denominational, going to an Episcopal church now. The liturgy is really cool to me -- I like being connected to thousands of years of tradition. Bonus points for not re-sacrificing Christ every week.

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This is me to the T as well. I don't know what your Episcopal church is like, but I also like that mine tends to encourage questions rather than claiming to have all the answers.

I can't abide modern praise music. Repeating the same thing over and over and over and over and the powerpoints at those churches is just crushing to me.

You are correct. We are winging it.

I have a wide variety, so I will just list artists:
Skillet
Red
Flyleaf
DCB
Chris Tomlin
Casting Crowns
TobyMac
Newsboys
Kutless
Hillsong
I'm probably missing a few.

Flyleaf is from where I live.

Odd cookies but nice people. The bassist attended my small group for a time.

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Do Protestant churches bring the hierarchy and sense of institutional support? I feel every time I go to mama's church they're winging it.

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Protestant ecclesiastical structure is an interesting phenomenon.

I can really only speak to my life in the Baptist church. Baptists are 'congregational,' meaning each church is united through a statement of faith, but retain individual rights to other laws/rules. The pastor isn't the head CEO in theory, the members decide everything via voting. Just like outside the church, this is both good and bad -- crappy pastors don't stay long, but good pastors who want to change a racist congregation (for example) don't stay long either.

The churches are united through districts (similar to presbyteries or parishes). The head of the districts really just supports the churches in that district, he never tells them who to hire/fire aside from advice or 'suggestions.' Above that is state convention, then regional, then national. These conventions are important because they support the individual churches financially -- particularly ones that cannot function otherwise (like rural TN or urban ghetto NYC). Their a sense of unity, but also incredibly individuality that makes a Baptist church in Alabama incredibly different from one in Minnesota.

Again, that's both good and bad. So to answer your question, in many ways, there isn't really a hierarchy that matters, but the institutional support is certainly there.