May 6, 2025 • 18 mins
Brendan engaged in a heartfelt conversation with Canadian artist Joshua Leventhal on the Christian Music Bros Podcast. During their discussion, they explored Joshua's journey in music, the inspiration behind his lyrics, and the impact of faith on his artistic expression. The two also delved into the importance of community in music and how collaboration has shaped Joshua's career. Listeners were treated to insights on the creative process and the role of spirituality in Joshua's work, making for an inspiring and uplifting episode.Attached is Joshua's new Kickstarter to help fund his new album: joshualeventhal.com/kickstarter
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:02):
Welcome back to the favorite your favorite show on the
plan of the Christian Music First Podcast once again. I'm
your host, Brendan and I was gonna say my name
is Bradon, but Brandon's going around the channel. I do
miss Breaden had points, but it's fun just to talk
to these people have a conversation.
Speaker 2 (00:16):
But I think solo Brandon's doing well.
Speaker 1 (00:18):
If you're wondering, he's busy working, spend time with his
girlfriend and doing life things like we all do life things.
But it's fun just to see what said. Lope says Hello.
He told me to wish everyone who's listening to this
page hello. Just a remindered this is now like episode
one hundred and twenty five at the time of recording
this or something. We are almost on a February time
(00:38):
of recording this. Like I said, if I post this
last episode I just did with Jake Rye today at
the time of recording this, this might be the last
episode I'm recording until the end of April, just because
I have eight episodes I haven't posted yet. But you
don't worry. You'll get new content from me. And it's
great to see you guys back here. I remember if
you're like what you're listening to, like following, subscribe to
the channel and yeah, thanks for tuning in today. Joshua
(01:01):
eleventh thought, so I want to, like Joshua introduce himself Rada.
Speaker 3 (01:04):
Yeah, my name is josh Leventhal. I am a singer
songwriter in the Christian space based outside of Vancouver, BC, Canada.
I'm American born, but I have spent most of my life,
the vast majority of my life in Canada. And yeah,
I've been doing music professionally for gosh over ten years now,
(01:29):
but have up until now been doing both ministry full
time and releasing music since twenty seventeen. And I'm actually
just in the process now of going full time with
music and no longer trying to balance both.
Speaker 1 (01:50):
That's very exciting and great to see someone from Canada.
Like you said, you were born in America, and it's
cool to see how you moved to Canada, because I
feel like Canada does again as much respect as they
can in the music scene. Outside of Justin Bieber.
Speaker 3 (02:03):
Yeah, we have, like I mean, I think on the
high level we have, Yeah, a lot of artists who
have come out of here, but they most of them
move stateside obviously, So there is a Canadian Christian scene
for sure, but we're a big country that's not super populated,
so we're pretty scattered all over the place.
Speaker 1 (02:21):
And this is just the voted the fact you're the
second artist that I've had that's been on this podcast
that lives in Canada. So it's pretty cool to see
the second Canadian artists And congratulations nice.
Speaker 3 (02:31):
Who's your first?
Speaker 2 (02:32):
Her name is Lennie Eleni.
Speaker 3 (02:34):
Oh yeah, I know Eleanie, Yeah, totally.
Speaker 2 (02:36):
I'm pronouncing there. That's again.
Speaker 1 (02:37):
I think she's from like Sacho Juan or what ever
pronounced it.
Speaker 3 (02:41):
Yeah, that's uh. I lived in Saskatchewan for a lot
of my a lot of my childhood and some of
my adult life. My parents and sisters live there now.
Speaker 2 (02:49):
So yeah, so get the second.
Speaker 1 (02:52):
I was gonna say, you're the first Canadian artist that
I was like, oh wait, but Joshua, thank you for
joining me today or this evening, whatever time it is
you're watching it. Let's just start a little bit about
your music background.
Speaker 2 (03:05):
How did you get started music?
Speaker 1 (03:06):
Like, are you a pastif kid growing up in music
scene or did you just one day picked up a
guitar and decided oh this is what I want to do.
Speaker 3 (03:14):
Yeah, I'm I. Actually it was a little bit late
to music. I am a pastor's kid. But so I
grew up in church, actually grew up like I, Like
I always say, like I don't remember not knowing Jesus.
Like for me, you know a lot of PK stories
or like just Christian kids stories in general, is like, yeah,
I grew up in Christian home, and then my faith
really became my own, like once I hit my teens
or college or whatever. For me, like genuinely, like I
(03:37):
my faith was always my own even when I was
very very young. And obviously I grew and deepened over time,
but that has just always been the case. And I
was kind of late to music. I actually didn't really
get it, Like I mean, I didn't mind singing in
church and that kind of thing, not like from safe
in the congregation, but I was not music to all.
(04:00):
My household wasn't musical. My dog is running up here,
let's say this is Luna. She's she's getting crazy. And
so I did take piano lests as a kid, but honestly,
like hated it, didn't practice. Didn't really have music that
I had connected with personally, and then we moved from
(04:21):
Saskatchewan Alberta, which is one province west. Once I hit
high school and joined the youth group there, had friends
who introduced me to music I had never kind of
heard before. I got really into first like rock and
pop punk, and then eventually more like the hardcore and
heavy scene, but also while like listening to worship music
and acoustic music and all those kind of things. And
(04:43):
I picked up a guitar there and fell in love
pretty quickly around fourteen, and because I was an angsty teenager,
immediately started writing songs. They were all parable, but I
did it, and very quickly it became like intrinsic, I think,
to who I was. But what's kind of funny is
is I was late to music, but I was around
(05:03):
music decent amount. My dad is a pastor, but he's
also growing up. He doesn't do this as much now,
but he's a professional illusionist. And we would tour all
over the US, doing basically shows at conferences and churches
and other venues and that kind of thing, and oftentimes
we would be on bills with big bands and that
(05:24):
sort of stuff. So I was surrounded by it a
lot and a little bit of road life as well.
And then yeah, as soon as I found music, it
was it was kind of like a no brainer. I'd
always been really obsessed with literature and film and narrative
and story, and so I hadn't really found my outlet
in that yet. And I feel like writing instantly kind
(05:45):
of became that.
Speaker 1 (05:47):
I just because you're a big on songwriting, who would
he say, is like one of your couple of your
songs or like musics for your writing.
Speaker 3 (05:54):
For my writing? Personally, like in the Christian space, people
who've like definitely meant a lot to me have been
guys like McMillan, John Foreman, even to an extent, i'd say,
like from back in the day, like Matt Tison from
lian K. He was like, I mean, none of my
music stylistically bears any resemblance to that. But I think
what I appreciated about him was just his his phrasing
(06:17):
and word choice just didn't seem governed by the same
parameters as a lot of other people. He just kind
of did whatever he felt like, and it felt super
commanded and intentional, but it wasn't. It was extremely unique.
So those guys have definitely all played a massive role.
I would say in a lot of my writing.
Speaker 1 (06:38):
Style, it's really cool and I don't write music, but
like some of this, so I like more like the
I'm more for a lyric person. I'm more of a
lyric person when to come to music personally, Like that's
cool to have a cool good vocals or good guitar
or excuse me, good piano mix and everything, but I
think the lyrics is where it draws everyone in.
Speaker 3 (06:58):
So yeah, i'd agree. I think, like for me, lyrics
are kind of at the forefront, and obviously I want
want the music to marry with that really well. But yeah,
and like for me, I think in a lot of ways,
I can't. I can't as a partaker of music to
one or the other. Like if the music's good but
the lyrics are terrible, I won't be able to engage
with it, and vice versa. The lyrics can be great,
(07:19):
but if the music doesn't feel like it's properly married
to the lyrics, then I'm gonna struggle as well. But
one of the first things I could personally go to
is lyricism for sure.
Speaker 1 (07:30):
Yeah, and if I Swart didn't hear music Journey recently,
you released a full length album, All You Birds.
Speaker 2 (07:37):
Can you tell us attle bit about that album?
Speaker 3 (07:39):
Yeah, So, like I said, I've been doing music while
doing full time ministry the whole time, so like it
was very stop start for a long time. My first
thing I ever released into the world was an EP
back in twenty seventeen, and then a couple singles in
the years that followed, and then I was working for
a megachurch for a few years, and when that happened,
I basically had to put my music entirely on hold.
(08:01):
But I was still writing in that time, and that's
where most of All You Lepis came out of. I
had released the song Lepers, the kind of the title track,
as a single, and it had just been a demo
or recorded in my friend's basement, and I'd actually written
the song in my parents' basement when I was like
depressed and trying to figure out what I was going
to do with my life. Essentially, I had like the
(08:23):
threshold of ministry and music and was trying to figure
that out. And I just had written a lot in
that time, and Lepers was one of those songs, and
just over the course of kind of the following years,
and especially during COVID, a lot of yeah songs kind
of fell out of me, for lack of a better word,
and that led to all you lepers. I've been fully
(08:44):
indy this whole time, So we crowdfunded it did through Kickstarter,
saw overwhelming support for that, and then released it fully independently,
and it has been a pretty wild journey since then.
I'd say like the songs are really focused a lot
on the tension between hope and suffering and knowing who
God is and lived experience and trying to just reconcile
(09:08):
those things and just be as honest as possible. I
kind of try to like write the music that I've
known I needed at times, and so the response has
been insane, Like it definitely catapult to my literac listenership
for sure, and got some pretty significant award recognition here
in Canada, which is cool. Our Gospel Music Wars, like
(09:29):
our our our branch of the Double Wards essentially at
one Album of the Year and Song of the Year,
which is really sweet. Got nominated for a Juno, which
is our Grammys, And but I think the thing that
was the most meaningful and beautiful to me is like
just literally hundreds of messages from strangers people have never
met before telling me that this was exactly what they
(09:51):
needed to like know their God more into like pray
to him in the midst of hardship and that sort
of thing. And I think that that is something that
is kind of unique to writing music onto Jesus, is
that we have the opportunity to share things that transcend
(10:11):
just an emotional experience into like and actually like change
my eyes. This can change the way that my heart
sees the world and understands my God and communes with him.
So I've still never been able to put full words
to that. It's just been the most beautiful thing. And
so yeah, that album came out a little while back,
and I've released single since then, and I'm now working
(10:33):
on a pretty ambitious project going forward.
Speaker 1 (10:39):
I just want to say, I like your partner in
crime right there next to you, that this.
Speaker 3 (10:44):
Is she's she's the best her before we got married,
and so I adopted her as her dog dad. So
she's the best.
Speaker 1 (10:56):
You see, I don't want a dog coming in my
room when I recording, where she'll be like getting all
to headshit. So like dogs are just flash forward to
twenty twenty five. I mean, we're only we're two months
in at the time of recording. We're almost into March
and twenty five. Do you have any new music or
anything you're working on coming this year?
Speaker 3 (11:12):
Totally? Yeah. So my so over the course of this year,
with the blessing of my church, I'm transitioning into music
full time and they've been overwhelmingly supportive in that. And
my next project is actually going to be a multi
volume concept record that's kind of come out over the
course of several years. It's called Tapasari and it is
that's the Greek transliteration of the word tapestry, and it's
(11:34):
basically a twenty five song genesis to revelation concept records.
So looking at the whole of the Biblical narrative all
through POV songs. So some will be from the perspective
of Yahweh God, some will be from this perspective of
various figures throughout scripture and trying to find unique ways
(11:54):
of doing that. Things like you know, Ables goes speaking
to Kane after he's already murdered him and talking about
the mist of Jesus, like through the eyes of a pharisee,
somebody who hates him and trying to make him look
beautiful through that, and so that project is going to
kind of unfold over the course of years. But recording
Volume one starting next week, actually going out to Pender Island,
(12:15):
which is a golf island off of the coast of BC,
And so me and the guys have been working with
since Alli Lepper's will be will be tracking for Volume one,
which will be nine songs, and the first singles actually
already been finished and it's going to release sometime probably
late spring, early summer. And my single Kingdom, which came
(12:40):
out in twenty twenty three, is actually going to be
from the Jesus portion of that record as well. So yeah,
all that is in the works right now. In addition,
we recorded a live album as an anniversary show back
that would have been end of twenty twenty three, and
we've been released seeing videos from that on YouTube. But
(13:01):
we're actually gonna releasing a number of songs to streaming
platforms over the course of the next few months as well.
So lots of music in the hopper and ready to
to unfold.
Speaker 1 (13:13):
And when means are coming out, some artists have like
show or something coming out. Do you have any shows
coming up for people to come support yet.
Speaker 3 (13:20):
Yeah, so well, I'd say, first off, the biggest thing
to support is I'll be launching a cake starter for
the for the first volume of the record pretty soon
here we uh you know. I've I've been able to
stay indie, which is kind of a love me to
control my career, and for now I'm going to stay
doing that, which has meant relying on community to kind
of help make this happen because it's really expensive as
(13:42):
far as shows go. One of the things I've done
with my church is being incredibly generous and how they're
helping me make this transition. Part of that is going
to be for the first six months of this year,
I'm not going to be doing any traveling. But after
that I'm planning a Western camp the tour. I'm already
looking at some dates for the US down the line,
(14:05):
and all that will be on my website. It will
also be available if you subscribe. If you go to
my website, there's a subscribe button, my mailing list and
all socials. I would just say just follow me on Instagram,
but these days you just never know if people are
actually going to see what you post.
Speaker 1 (14:18):
Anymore so, and and when that Kickstar comes out, feel
free to send it my way. I'll post it in
the description of this video because your Kickstart probably will
be live before this video g even gets posted, so
sorry if you're listening and like I want to do
the Kickstarter now. This is like I said, we're in
like the end of February. Kickstar probably will go live
(14:39):
probably towards.
Speaker 2 (14:40):
The end of spring. So yeah, totally, that's everything. We
just have a few extra minister with you today.
Speaker 1 (14:46):
I like to give our guest the floor about to
speak about It could out any topic I missed about
your music. Therea anything you want to care about, your meticure,
message of story, and so to four is yours.
Speaker 3 (14:54):
Yeah, I would just say that, like, I feel really
fortunate that the thing I care most about, which is lyrics,
which we've talked about, is the thing that people tend
to bring up the most when they talked about my music. Sonically,
I have tried to be like as kind of unique
to me as possible. I always say that like when
you start, when you start writing music, when you start
(15:14):
recording music, you tend to sound like your heroes, like
whoever has influenced you. Tends to be kind of what
you reflect into the world, and as you kind of
develop your own voice and identity, that that happens less
and less and sonically, you know, it used to be
back in the day, it was a lot of like, oh,
you sound like need to breathe sounded John Mayer, that
(15:36):
kind of stuff. That was like the kind of what
I was aiming for at the time. And these days
there's no real direct comparison sonically, which I appreciate. I
think the closest thing I can do to describe my
sound is like if Peter Gabriel and Boney Vere had
a baby, but then lyrically, like so I try, I
try to be unique in terms of sound, but lyrically
(15:58):
that's that's always been what I care about the most,
is just the poetry of it, and I think married
with music, that's what matters. That's what allows it to
be this kind of like holistic mind, heart, body, spirit experience.
And I have just felt really fortunate that that tends
to be what people zone in on. So that has
(16:19):
been probably the most beautiful part of the journey. Like
I mean, now I'm kind of getting to a point
in my career where the breadth of reach is significant,
like getting to hear like see big numbers and hear
stories from a lot of places, But I think the
depth has always been the thing that matters the most
to me, which is like getting to hear from individuals,
and like, I'm really grateful that people still like DM me,
(16:41):
Like you know, it's like people don't just go, oh,
he's got this many followers or that kind of thing,
he won't listen to me. They still send me messages
and I respond to every single one because it never
gets old getting to hear, like it just feels so
sacred and humbling to know that something you've made is
making a difference in somebody's life.
Speaker 1 (17:03):
And that's kind of how we got but you so
I'd say it works. But anyway, for no sory me,
make sure don't check.
Speaker 2 (17:11):
Out Joshua's album.
Speaker 1 (17:12):
Check out the new albums when it comes out like
slowly will come out slowly but surely.
Speaker 2 (17:18):
You can follow his Instagram page for more.
Speaker 1 (17:20):
Updates, his YouTube channel, Spotify channels, everything He's on everything,
actually say everything. We're not my space at least I
hope you're not going to space.
Speaker 3 (17:30):
I technically have a Twitter account, but I never touch it.
Speaker 2 (17:34):
So Twitter died like.
Speaker 3 (17:39):
I post about Severance on threads. How about that.
Speaker 2 (17:43):
I have not watched Severans yet, but I heard it's good.
Speaker 3 (17:45):
You gotta check it out. It's my wife and my
favorite active show right now.
Speaker 1 (17:50):
But Joshua, thank you again for joining me today. Appreciate
and everyone who's watching. We'll see you next time on
the Christians Aware's podcast and stay safe one And if
I don't post a new or if I don't record
a new episode till April, we'll see you back in
April new episodes.
Speaker 2 (18:07):
But you'll still have new episodes and watch, so enjoy, everybody,
Welcome back to the favorite your favorite show on the
plan of the Christian Music First Podcast once again. I'm
your host, Brendan and I was gonna say my name
is Bradon, but Brandon's going around the channel. I do
miss Breaden had points, but it's fun just to talk
to these people have a conversation.
Speaker 2 (00:16):
But I think solo Brandon's doing well.
Speaker 1 (00:18):
If you're wondering, he's busy working, spend time with his
girlfriend and doing life things like we all do life things.
But it's fun just to see what said. Lope says Hello.
He told me to wish everyone who's listening to this
page hello. Just a remindered this is now like episode
one hundred and twenty five at the time of recording
this or something. We are almost on a February time
(00:38):
of recording this. Like I said, if I post this
last episode I just did with Jake Rye today at
the time of recording this, this might be the last
episode I'm recording until the end of April, just because
I have eight episodes I haven't posted yet. But you
don't worry. You'll get new content from me. And it's
great to see you guys back here. I remember if
you're like what you're listening to, like following, subscribe to
the channel and yeah, thanks for tuning in today. Joshua
(01:01):
eleventh thought, so I want to, like Joshua introduce himself Rada.
Speaker 3 (01:04):
Yeah, my name is josh Leventhal. I am a singer
songwriter in the Christian space based outside of Vancouver, BC, Canada.
I'm American born, but I have spent most of my life,
the vast majority of my life in Canada. And yeah,
I've been doing music professionally for gosh over ten years now,
(01:29):
but have up until now been doing both ministry full
time and releasing music since twenty seventeen. And I'm actually
just in the process now of going full time with
music and no longer trying to balance both.
Speaker 1 (01:50):
That's very exciting and great to see someone from Canada.
Like you said, you were born in America, and it's
cool to see how you moved to Canada, because I
feel like Canada does again as much respect as they
can in the music scene. Outside of Justin Bieber.
Speaker 3 (02:03):
Yeah, we have, like I mean, I think on the
high level we have, Yeah, a lot of artists who
have come out of here, but they most of them
move stateside obviously, So there is a Canadian Christian scene
for sure, but we're a big country that's not super populated,
so we're pretty scattered all over the place.
Speaker 1 (02:21):
And this is just the voted the fact you're the
second artist that I've had that's been on this podcast
that lives in Canada. So it's pretty cool to see
the second Canadian artists And congratulations nice.
Speaker 3 (02:31):
Who's your first?
Speaker 2 (02:32):
Her name is Lennie Eleni.
Speaker 3 (02:34):
Oh yeah, I know Eleanie, Yeah, totally.
Speaker 2 (02:36):
I'm pronouncing there. That's again.
Speaker 1 (02:37):
I think she's from like Sacho Juan or what ever
pronounced it.
Speaker 3 (02:41):
Yeah, that's uh. I lived in Saskatchewan for a lot
of my a lot of my childhood and some of
my adult life. My parents and sisters live there now.
Speaker 2 (02:49):
So yeah, so get the second.
Speaker 1 (02:52):
I was gonna say, you're the first Canadian artist that
I was like, oh wait, but Joshua, thank you for
joining me today or this evening, whatever time it is
you're watching it. Let's just start a little bit about
your music background.
Speaker 2 (03:05):
How did you get started music?
Speaker 1 (03:06):
Like, are you a pastif kid growing up in music
scene or did you just one day picked up a
guitar and decided oh this is what I want to do.
Speaker 3 (03:14):
Yeah, I'm I. Actually it was a little bit late
to music. I am a pastor's kid. But so I
grew up in church, actually grew up like I, Like
I always say, like I don't remember not knowing Jesus.
Like for me, you know a lot of PK stories
or like just Christian kids stories in general, is like, yeah,
I grew up in Christian home, and then my faith
really became my own, like once I hit my teens
or college or whatever. For me, like genuinely, like I
(03:37):
my faith was always my own even when I was
very very young. And obviously I grew and deepened over time,
but that has just always been the case. And I
was kind of late to music. I actually didn't really
get it, Like I mean, I didn't mind singing in
church and that kind of thing, not like from safe
in the congregation, but I was not music to all.
(04:00):
My household wasn't musical. My dog is running up here,
let's say this is Luna. She's she's getting crazy. And
so I did take piano lests as a kid, but honestly,
like hated it, didn't practice. Didn't really have music that
I had connected with personally, and then we moved from
(04:21):
Saskatchewan Alberta, which is one province west. Once I hit
high school and joined the youth group there, had friends
who introduced me to music I had never kind of
heard before. I got really into first like rock and
pop punk, and then eventually more like the hardcore and
heavy scene, but also while like listening to worship music
and acoustic music and all those kind of things. And
(04:43):
I picked up a guitar there and fell in love
pretty quickly around fourteen, and because I was an angsty teenager,
immediately started writing songs. They were all parable, but I
did it, and very quickly it became like intrinsic, I think,
to who I was. But what's kind of funny is
is I was late to music, but I was around
(05:03):
music decent amount. My dad is a pastor, but he's
also growing up. He doesn't do this as much now,
but he's a professional illusionist. And we would tour all
over the US, doing basically shows at conferences and churches
and other venues and that kind of thing, and oftentimes
we would be on bills with big bands and that
(05:24):
sort of stuff. So I was surrounded by it a
lot and a little bit of road life as well.
And then yeah, as soon as I found music, it
was it was kind of like a no brainer. I'd
always been really obsessed with literature and film and narrative
and story, and so I hadn't really found my outlet
in that yet. And I feel like writing instantly kind
(05:45):
of became that.
Speaker 1 (05:47):
I just because you're a big on songwriting, who would
he say, is like one of your couple of your
songs or like musics for your writing.
Speaker 3 (05:54):
For my writing? Personally, like in the Christian space, people
who've like definitely meant a lot to me have been
guys like McMillan, John Foreman, even to an extent, i'd say,
like from back in the day, like Matt Tison from
lian K. He was like, I mean, none of my
music stylistically bears any resemblance to that. But I think
what I appreciated about him was just his his phrasing
(06:17):
and word choice just didn't seem governed by the same
parameters as a lot of other people. He just kind
of did whatever he felt like, and it felt super
commanded and intentional, but it wasn't. It was extremely unique.
So those guys have definitely all played a massive role.
I would say in a lot of my writing.
Speaker 1 (06:38):
Style, it's really cool and I don't write music, but
like some of this, so I like more like the
I'm more for a lyric person. I'm more of a
lyric person when to come to music personally, Like that's
cool to have a cool good vocals or good guitar
or excuse me, good piano mix and everything, but I
think the lyrics is where it draws everyone in.
Speaker 3 (06:58):
So yeah, i'd agree. I think, like for me, lyrics
are kind of at the forefront, and obviously I want
want the music to marry with that really well. But yeah,
and like for me, I think in a lot of ways,
I can't. I can't as a partaker of music to
one or the other. Like if the music's good but
the lyrics are terrible, I won't be able to engage
with it, and vice versa. The lyrics can be great,
(07:19):
but if the music doesn't feel like it's properly married
to the lyrics, then I'm gonna struggle as well. But
one of the first things I could personally go to
is lyricism for sure.
Speaker 1 (07:30):
Yeah, and if I Swart didn't hear music Journey recently,
you released a full length album, All You Birds.
Speaker 2 (07:37):
Can you tell us attle bit about that album?
Speaker 3 (07:39):
Yeah, So, like I said, I've been doing music while
doing full time ministry the whole time, so like it
was very stop start for a long time. My first
thing I ever released into the world was an EP
back in twenty seventeen, and then a couple singles in
the years that followed, and then I was working for
a megachurch for a few years, and when that happened,
I basically had to put my music entirely on hold.
(08:01):
But I was still writing in that time, and that's
where most of All You Lepis came out of. I
had released the song Lepers, the kind of the title track,
as a single, and it had just been a demo
or recorded in my friend's basement, and I'd actually written
the song in my parents' basement when I was like
depressed and trying to figure out what I was going
to do with my life. Essentially, I had like the
(08:23):
threshold of ministry and music and was trying to figure
that out. And I just had written a lot in
that time, and Lepers was one of those songs, and
just over the course of kind of the following years,
and especially during COVID, a lot of yeah songs kind
of fell out of me, for lack of a better word,
and that led to all you lepers. I've been fully
(08:44):
indy this whole time, So we crowdfunded it did through Kickstarter,
saw overwhelming support for that, and then released it fully independently,
and it has been a pretty wild journey since then.
I'd say like the songs are really focused a lot
on the tension between hope and suffering and knowing who
God is and lived experience and trying to just reconcile
(09:08):
those things and just be as honest as possible. I
kind of try to like write the music that I've
known I needed at times, and so the response has
been insane, Like it definitely catapult to my literac listenership
for sure, and got some pretty significant award recognition here
in Canada, which is cool. Our Gospel Music Wars, like
(09:29):
our our our branch of the Double Wards essentially at
one Album of the Year and Song of the Year,
which is really sweet. Got nominated for a Juno, which
is our Grammys, And but I think the thing that
was the most meaningful and beautiful to me is like
just literally hundreds of messages from strangers people have never
met before telling me that this was exactly what they
(09:51):
needed to like know their God more into like pray
to him in the midst of hardship and that sort
of thing. And I think that that is something that
is kind of unique to writing music onto Jesus, is
that we have the opportunity to share things that transcend
(10:11):
just an emotional experience into like and actually like change
my eyes. This can change the way that my heart
sees the world and understands my God and communes with him.
So I've still never been able to put full words
to that. It's just been the most beautiful thing. And
so yeah, that album came out a little while back,
and I've released single since then, and I'm now working
(10:33):
on a pretty ambitious project going forward.
Speaker 1 (10:39):
I just want to say, I like your partner in
crime right there next to you, that this.
Speaker 3 (10:44):
Is she's she's the best her before we got married,
and so I adopted her as her dog dad. So
she's the best.
Speaker 1 (10:56):
You see, I don't want a dog coming in my
room when I recording, where she'll be like getting all
to headshit. So like dogs are just flash forward to
twenty twenty five. I mean, we're only we're two months
in at the time of recording. We're almost into March
and twenty five. Do you have any new music or
anything you're working on coming this year?
Speaker 3 (11:12):
Totally? Yeah. So my so over the course of this year,
with the blessing of my church, I'm transitioning into music
full time and they've been overwhelmingly supportive in that. And
my next project is actually going to be a multi
volume concept record that's kind of come out over the
course of several years. It's called Tapasari and it is
that's the Greek transliteration of the word tapestry, and it's
(11:34):
basically a twenty five song genesis to revelation concept records.
So looking at the whole of the Biblical narrative all
through POV songs. So some will be from the perspective
of Yahweh God, some will be from this perspective of
various figures throughout scripture and trying to find unique ways
(11:54):
of doing that. Things like you know, Ables goes speaking
to Kane after he's already murdered him and talking about
the mist of Jesus, like through the eyes of a pharisee,
somebody who hates him and trying to make him look
beautiful through that, and so that project is going to
kind of unfold over the course of years. But recording
Volume one starting next week, actually going out to Pender Island,
(12:15):
which is a golf island off of the coast of BC,
And so me and the guys have been working with
since Alli Lepper's will be will be tracking for Volume one,
which will be nine songs, and the first singles actually
already been finished and it's going to release sometime probably
late spring, early summer. And my single Kingdom, which came
(12:40):
out in twenty twenty three, is actually going to be
from the Jesus portion of that record as well. So yeah,
all that is in the works right now. In addition,
we recorded a live album as an anniversary show back
that would have been end of twenty twenty three, and
we've been released seeing videos from that on YouTube. But
(13:01):
we're actually gonna releasing a number of songs to streaming
platforms over the course of the next few months as well.
So lots of music in the hopper and ready to
to unfold.
Speaker 1 (13:13):
And when means are coming out, some artists have like
show or something coming out. Do you have any shows
coming up for people to come support yet.
Speaker 3 (13:20):
Yeah, so well, I'd say, first off, the biggest thing
to support is I'll be launching a cake starter for
the for the first volume of the record pretty soon
here we uh you know. I've I've been able to
stay indie, which is kind of a love me to
control my career, and for now I'm going to stay
doing that, which has meant relying on community to kind
of help make this happen because it's really expensive as
(13:42):
far as shows go. One of the things I've done
with my church is being incredibly generous and how they're
helping me make this transition. Part of that is going
to be for the first six months of this year,
I'm not going to be doing any traveling. But after
that I'm planning a Western camp the tour. I'm already
looking at some dates for the US down the line,
(14:05):
and all that will be on my website. It will
also be available if you subscribe. If you go to
my website, there's a subscribe button, my mailing list and
all socials. I would just say just follow me on Instagram,
but these days you just never know if people are
actually going to see what you post.
Speaker 1 (14:18):
Anymore so, and and when that Kickstar comes out, feel
free to send it my way. I'll post it in
the description of this video because your Kickstart probably will
be live before this video g even gets posted, so
sorry if you're listening and like I want to do
the Kickstarter now. This is like I said, we're in
like the end of February. Kickstar probably will go live
(14:39):
probably towards.
Speaker 2 (14:40):
The end of spring. So yeah, totally, that's everything. We
just have a few extra minister with you today.
Speaker 1 (14:46):
I like to give our guest the floor about to
speak about It could out any topic I missed about
your music. Therea anything you want to care about, your meticure,
message of story, and so to four is yours.
Speaker 3 (14:54):
Yeah, I would just say that, like, I feel really
fortunate that the thing I care most about, which is lyrics,
which we've talked about, is the thing that people tend
to bring up the most when they talked about my music. Sonically,
I have tried to be like as kind of unique
to me as possible. I always say that like when
you start, when you start writing music, when you start
(15:14):
recording music, you tend to sound like your heroes, like
whoever has influenced you. Tends to be kind of what
you reflect into the world, and as you kind of
develop your own voice and identity, that that happens less
and less and sonically, you know, it used to be
back in the day, it was a lot of like, oh,
you sound like need to breathe sounded John Mayer, that
(15:36):
kind of stuff. That was like the kind of what
I was aiming for at the time. And these days
there's no real direct comparison sonically, which I appreciate. I
think the closest thing I can do to describe my
sound is like if Peter Gabriel and Boney Vere had
a baby, but then lyrically, like so I try, I
try to be unique in terms of sound, but lyrically
(15:58):
that's that's always been what I care about the most,
is just the poetry of it, and I think married
with music, that's what matters. That's what allows it to
be this kind of like holistic mind, heart, body, spirit experience.
And I have just felt really fortunate that that tends
to be what people zone in on. So that has
(16:19):
been probably the most beautiful part of the journey. Like
I mean, now I'm kind of getting to a point
in my career where the breadth of reach is significant,
like getting to hear like see big numbers and hear
stories from a lot of places, But I think the
depth has always been the thing that matters the most
to me, which is like getting to hear from individuals,
and like, I'm really grateful that people still like DM me,
(16:41):
Like you know, it's like people don't just go, oh,
he's got this many followers or that kind of thing,
he won't listen to me. They still send me messages
and I respond to every single one because it never
gets old getting to hear, like it just feels so
sacred and humbling to know that something you've made is
making a difference in somebody's life.
Speaker 1 (17:03):
And that's kind of how we got but you so
I'd say it works. But anyway, for no sory me,
make sure don't check.
Speaker 2 (17:11):
Out Joshua's album.
Speaker 1 (17:12):
Check out the new albums when it comes out like
slowly will come out slowly but surely.
Speaker 2 (17:18):
You can follow his Instagram page for more.
Speaker 1 (17:20):
Updates, his YouTube channel, Spotify channels, everything He's on everything,
actually say everything. We're not my space at least I
hope you're not going to space.
Speaker 3 (17:30):
I technically have a Twitter account, but I never touch it.
Speaker 2 (17:34):
So Twitter died like.
Speaker 3 (17:39):
I post about Severance on threads. How about that.
Speaker 2 (17:43):
I have not watched Severans yet, but I heard it's good.
Speaker 3 (17:45):
You gotta check it out. It's my wife and my
favorite active show right now.
Speaker 1 (17:50):
But Joshua, thank you again for joining me today. Appreciate
and everyone who's watching. We'll see you next time on
the Christians Aware's podcast and stay safe one And if
I don't post a new or if I don't record
a new episode till April, we'll see you back in
April new episodes.
Speaker 2 (18:07):
But you'll still have new episodes and watch, so enjoy, everybody,
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