Hi Jessica, this is Crowder.

Hi Crowder. How are you?

I'm doing fantastic.

Thank you so much for taking the time to chat with me today. I really appreciate it.

Absolutely. Thank you for including me in this thing. I'm excited about it.

Oh, thank you. I'm stoked to chat with you to hear about the new album. Whereabouts are you right now? I know you've been touring a bit.

Yes, we have been. This is our fourth weekend out on this tour. We're part of, right now we're actually in Hampton, Virginia. I don't know if you, have you heard of the Hamptons?

Yeah, I have. Hallmark will do that to you. Yep, perfect.

It's just the one Hampton. It's just the Hamptons. This Is Hampton, Virginia. Okay. A singular Hampton. We've only got one Hampton, not a lot of them. So it's not anything like the Hamptons as far as I can tell.

Good to know. I'll make sure I don't go there unless I know someone . That works well. So can you tell me about your album I Know a Ghost? The title – I love it. I know you spoke about how compelling the idea of a ghost is as opposed to Spirit when you're speaking to someone who doesn't know God yet. Can you tell me how you came up with a title and what it means to you?

This there's a friend of mine who's on the road with us who runs all of our merch stuff and he has a tattoo and it says that, it says, “I know a ghost” on his forearm. And I’d say he's probably been out with us for, gosh, almost a year. And I had never noticed it. And then all of a sudden I was sitting there one day and I was like, “Does that say I know a ghost?” He's like, “Yes”. And at first I just thought that's really cool. And then I was thinking about it probably two or three days later and probably what you're referencing hit me. I had never heard of, I grew up in church. I was on a staff at a church for 16 years. That's how I got started to go Texas. And I just had never and had heard the Holy Spirit talked about I know a ghost.

Yeah. And it was a little freaky. I was like, “Hang on now I don't know if that's right. That feels weird.” And then I was reframing the last supper discussion like, “Hey guys, I gotta go, but I'm going to leave my ghost with you.” And I was like, “That's kinda like a spooky thing to say,” yeah?. And then I thought, well, maybe this is not proper. I've heard of the Ruach of God – Spirit of God. I've heard it talked about that way and well, I should look into how our ghosts is the word ghost in scripture anywhere. What's the deal with the ghost in terms of how we know it in English? Is it in the Bible of my world? It's right in the front of the Old Testament.

Samuel is dead and Saul's worried about this battle. Samuel told him, “You need to kill all of the people who can conjure spirits. You need to get rid of those folks. They're not good. So he's been doing that and then he's nervous about this battle and he decides, you know what? I gotta go get one of these guys I haven't killed yet and ask them to holler at Samuel. So sure enough, it says, he finds one, this lady who can conjure spirits and he says, “I want you to call up the ghost of Samuel.” And she's like, “I'm not fine for this because the king's going to kill me if I do this.” And Saul’s all in disguise. He's dressed up Halloween, he's trying to hide so he's not [appearing like] the king, which is so weird. It's like the freakiest Bible story ever! And he's all hidden in disguise. And then she's like, “I'm not going to do it. I'm not going to fall for it.”

And all of a sudden, Saul pulls the disguise off. “I'm the king, you have to do this now.” She's like, “Oh no, I don't wanna get Samuel's ghost.” He goes, “Get the ghost.” And so she calls the ghost of Samuel. Samuel shows up, “Why are you doing this? I told you not to do this. I told you to get rid of everybody do this.” And he's [Saul’s] like, “Well, I just wanna know if I'm going to win this battle.” [Samuel’s] like, “Well now you're sure not going to win the battle cause I told you not to do this. Now I gotta go. I got stuff to do”! . And he disappears. And then Saul sits down and then the lady who called up the ghost of Samuel goes, “Man, you look tired. I think you sit down and I should make you something to eat. I'm going to go kill a cow.”

So that's the first time that a ghost is actually talked about in scripture. Not to mention the breath of God into the dust bringing us to life, which is where I went with the whole album is that “dust to dust”. We are actually going back to God and his breath is what breathed into us. Nothing more than that. We're just nothing but dirt and water and the breath of God and we're going back to God. And that is His spirit in us, and bringing us back to communion with our maker. And so that's really where I've started down this trail of last record with, of this trilogy thing I've got going on.

So many of your past albums – love the imagery in them and you talk so much about reconciling with God and how we're so separated from him. How is this album different in some capacity? Obviously that's still a theme but what makes this album different to your past work?

So two in three record cycles because that's the practical, because that's the contract. I signed a three record deal each time I've signed a contract with the label. So I kind of think, “All right, I've got three little, I guess moments that I get to say something and I would like for them to be connected cause I have a hard time; I need I guess boundaries for my creative process. I need something that I can put down on paper. Here's what I'd like to say over a three records span.”

And so the first zoomed out like Google maps above looking at the whole meta narrative, which begins with us walking and talking in the very presence of God ,with God our maker. And then there is that innocence loss and paradise loss. And the rest of the story is how do we get back into communion with the One that made us? And how does our Maker reconcile the fact that we have turned away and betrayed? And so the next record was more of a personal journey. One of the smaller stories, the story of that I could identify with this, little kid when I heard it first Sunday school and I thought it was just one of rebellion, but it turns out it's actually one of inheritance.

As I got older and into that, the making of that record, it turned into story about inheritance and what do we do with what we've been given? And then this is picking up at the end of that record, which is like, okay, the son comes home and there's a big party thrown. So there's kind of like the party. This is the party, and then the after party, what happens when the party shuts down? So there has been reconciliation, but here we are still. And so the work of the Holy Spirit and me is trying to say over and over what that looks like and what that means for us still here in this between the redeemed and still being redeemed.

Yes. That tension. Absolutely. I mean you've said this creatively nearly three different ways now, the different parts of the journey and that core message of coming home to God and God changing us. If you listen to your music from 20 years ago, in some ways that message is still a core part of who you were as an artist then. How do you stay creative in these album cycles where you have to put a new one out every couple of years and you have to release hit after hit? Where does one the creativity come from, but also how do you avoid the cynicism of it, of the whole industry?

I don't know maybe I'm just naive.

No, I love it. That's good.

Yeah, I think I came into the whole thing…. Maybe I laid my cynicism down before I got into the music side of it really. I was really gone from the church and was pulled back in and I was allowed space and a place to set my baggage down that I had. And it was all really based around my institutional experience of church rather than the person of Jesus that we read of in scripture. And so I feel like I might have gotten a lot of that outta my system maybe before I had to start singing about it.

That's so good.

And being at the church that I was at for 16 years, or on staff for 16 years, that was really a place - it was a collective of people who had been damaged or injured and had we all had baggage and it turned into be a place that was safe to question. And to it was more about our relational journey with the questions among us, rather than dogma and doctrine that dictated us to leave questions at the door. And I think that's really where a lot of my music has come up. My music is really just a reflection of the conversations and the life experience that I've had with people that I'm in living life with. And life twists and turns. And it turns out over and over and over. you need to hear the words that, “You're not too far gone. Grace is big enough for everyone and the blood of Jesus and that final sacrifice of blood spilt covers,” and its efficacy extends well beyond what I think most of us understand and realise. And I think with that alone, I don't know if I could write enough records to try to put all of that into words that sounded enough.

Something I do with all my guests is just shoot a few really quick questions at them. And they're generally questions that people sort of wish they could ask but never have, find the time or place to. So I just wanted to get your thoughts and a couple of things. First was, we're thrown throwing it back here but How He Loves. Do you regret going “unforeseen kiss” over “sloppy wet kiss” ? Yes or no?

No.

a generation of Christians thank you.

Well, I didn't even notice when I first heard the song. I didn't even notice that line in there. And then I led with it one Sunday morning and it was like I split the room in two! Half of the people were like, “That's the most amazing song I've ever heard in my whole life.” And other people were like, “If you ever play that song again, I will like punch you in the throat.” I'm like, “what? “

It's actually political.

Yes. Very polarising. I did not know that. And thank you John Mark McMillan for being so kind as to let us have another half of the church sing. Yeah.

Perfect. Okay, next question. One of my favorite songs that you've done is a super deep cut. It was on the Narnia soundtrack and it was called “Turkish Delight”. I love that song way too much. Now that Netflix has the rights to the whole Narnia empire, would you right ever consider writing another Narnia song about Mr. Tumnus or Mr. Beaver?

See you and my wife could hang out. She is so on me. She's like, okay…It's like my favorite song you've ever done and now Netflix has it and you have to do this”. So now I've got two folks that do it. We have to do this and it has to be done. We have to do this.

That would be

Awesome. I agree. I love that song. Nobody ever heard it, but you and my wife.

I appreciate it very much. Last question, and it's a little bit deeper. What would you say to yourself 22 years ago when you were just starting out releasing music to the Church?

I would say you are going to be as terrified about the whole thing as you are right now. However, it's more simple than you think it is. It's just music. And when music is among people, it is a uniter and people unite around music and it's a lot easier than you think it is.