And I ’ m looking at my daughter who at the time would have been maybe three . Old enough to start having conversations that are really important and informative . And I was asking those same things . I was at the time traveling in the band Unhindered , nonstop , and every weekend I was at a different conference at a different denomination of church . They were amazingly articulate and passionate people talking about the question , “ What is God like ?” And everyone had a slightly different spin or angle on that one thing . And that ’ s just inside the church ! Outside the church you get a whole different narrative . So that first line , “ I ’ ve heard a thousand stories of what they think you ’ re like ”, wasn ’ t poetry as much as it was observation for me , critical observation . Gosh , that song , I still have the first time I sang it all the way through recorded on my phone in voice memos . Such a wild memory .
[ WM ] Your release this month , Act Justly , Love Mercy , Walk Humbly , has been produced over the past two years , and because of that , has been created both before and during Covid19 . Collaboration often refers to songwriters working together , this collaboration also includes multiple producers , studios , players and singers . Tell us about the project . I will address specific songs in just a bit .
[ Pat ] Yes ! This project was really significant for me for a number of reasons . I ’ ve never recorded an album like this with such a big scope of recordings and producers . There are a lot of things about it that are really amazing and inspiring … and stretching . It ’ s also come at a time where I ’ ve even observed things in myself . I ’ ve been playing music and writing songs long enough at this point where I can almost look back on it like a journal . Some of those earlier records and even records not that long ago where I listen back and it ' s like looking at an old photo album in a lot of ways . Wow , that is me at the time , and I hear some things that don ’ t connect with me as much musically .
At the time , I felt like the sound or the vibe captured my creative expression or stylistic influence and now I feel like there ’ s more influences . This record for me was not just an acknowledgement of that but also a celebration of that in a lot of ways , where I decided to include on the album all of the songs that in the past I would maybe feel didn ’ t belong . I fought with that a lot , probably because of insecurity , but what I ’ ve landed on time and time again is that for me all of these songs held a deep place of communion and worship .
Even if they were unexpected even to myself in their origins and sounds and even the lyrics , it made me more excited to share it because I feel like a lot of times we can be encouraged to compartmentalize . These songs belong and these songs don ’ t . This sound belongs , this sound doesn ’ t . When really , our life is not a clean genre , or a perfectly manicured lane that we walk in . It ’ s winding and walking in directions you didn ’ t expect to find yourself walking in and then finding God there . A lot of these songs carry that spirit for me . So I didn ’ t just include