Eden ( Isn ’ t It Just Like You ?)
pandemic , 2019 . I had a bit of an existential crisis , if you will , where I think things just started unraveling . I realized I needed to rebuild a little bit . The album is very much me on a journey of doing that . It ’ s a documentation , if you will , of me going through that whole process . I remember at the time , Chris York , who is now my manager , would call me and he ’ d be like , “ Hey man , when are you going to do a record ? I think it ’ d be awesome .” I was like , “ Bro , if I put out a record right now , it would just be so depressing . I ’ m not in a good place . I don ’ t feel like I have hope to give people .” I ’ m writing songs about it . I was like , but if that was all this album was , it would be fine if this was my fourth album . If this was my Coldplay Midnight kind of moment , that would be fine .
But I was like , as a debut record , I do not want this to be the tone I ’ m introducing into the world . My favorite art of all forms has this thread of hope and points you towards something greater . It says it might not have all the answers , but it does say there ’ s a light at the end of the tunnel . There ’ s something we can reach towards as humans . I just didn ’ t feel like I had that at the time , but I was working on it . That is one of the reasons it ’ s 25 songs , because it ’ s really among the other things I do .
It ’ s three plus years of work and documenting that story . Really in the latter years of it , I was able to come to a place where I had a little bit of hope I think , to give people . I think one of the interesting things about it is maybe a spoiler alert , but the album starts with that first song , “ Hold Onto Your Hats ”, which is saying , “ We ’ re in for a bumpy ride here ”. But the last line is , “ But if faith is a fight , I ’ m going to win ”.
At the end , the last song , what ’ s interesting here is there is no really grand resolve . The resolve on the last song is , I ’ m going to get through this . I guess that ’ s picturesque of life . There ’ s these things that you walk through and it ’ s not often until hindsight you realize you ’ re through them or what happened . Does that make sense ? It was like , the resolve in this for me was like , no , there is hope . It ’ s not I ’ m through , but no , there is something worth fighting for here , something worth striving for .
That ’ s a lot of the story of the record . The song “ Eden ”, that song started so long ago in its initial form . Actually , the very first version of , “ Oh Praise the Name ”. I don ’ t know if you ’ re familiar with that song , but the very first version of that had the lyrics in it . Had lyrics that I think