photo : Paul C Rivera
Cody with his wife Kari Jobe
it is interesting to do a live recording and you get basically one shot , one night . You don ’ t know who ’ s going to show up , you don ’ t know what kind of expectation people are going to bring , if they ’ re going to sing , if they ’ re going to engage with you . And I was so blown away by the level of excitement that people brought into the room and the expectation . And they really sang with me and they ’ re all new songs so they ’ re learning them for the first time , and they really leaned in , and I just was just so blown away by it because it ’ s the first time I ’ ve ever really done something like this . I ’ ve been a part of other live recordings for other people , but this is the first time I ’ ve ever done one for myself . And so , I had no idea what the level of expectation would be . But it was really special , with some really powerful moments . I ’ m very proud of these songs and I ’ m so excited about all these moments on this record .
[ WM ] As a former art director , I must say that I love the cover for the new project . The goal of every new project sold online should be for its visual representation to be iconic and recognizable , in basically a one-inch square . Your team has done this . Great job !
[ Cody ] Yeah . That ’ s attributed to Jay Argaet and the Avenir Creative House , they ’ re incredible creative people and we had a lot of fun just bringing this idea to life . It really communicates what I feel like the heart of the album is , a billboard size statement that God is good . And I feel like that ’ s even come into question so much in the church lately . Is God really good ? Is He who He says he is ? And as an artist , I really wanted to make a bold statement of , “ Yes , I believe God is good and I believe what He says is true .” And so that was the way to do it was , “ Man , let ’ s make a billboard massive and let ’ s make the album a full statement with an exclamation mark .” God is Good !
[ WM ] And you don ’ t even have a song by the name of “ God is Good ”! The project just stands on its own . That ’ s unique .
[ Cody ] That ’ s right ! Yes . The name came because there ’ s a lot of songs on the record with good in the title . And that was unintentional . I ’ ve basically been writing songs for the last 18 months not really with a project in mind , just more so wanting to write songs for the church . And so , writing 18 months with friends and collecting all these songs , and then one day I sat down a few months ago and just looked at all the songs I had written over the last 18 months . And I realized that there was a lot of songs with good in the theme , good in the title . “ Too Good To Not Believe ” is one that ’ s already been out for a while , “ Good To Be Loved ”,