I’m asked all the time how I feel about my previous records. Aside from being a bit invasive (rude)  it appears that I live in a world where most people have an abundance of free time to reflect on past accomplishments.

Or failures. Isn’t that what the questions are ultimately about? “Now that you’ve had time away from the effort and have grown somewhat as an artist, is there anything you would change about it?” Absolutely not! I once asked a songwriter which was her favorite composition and she replied, “Gee Pais, which one of your children do you like best?”

So true. Our artistic creations are our babies. We dream of them, long for them, wait patiently (or impatiently) for them, nurture them, raise them and release them out into the world to withstand the fiery darts of critics and nay-sayers.  It’s tough and a lot of people have a lot of differing opinions and life views. Ultimately what the artist believes has to be what matters.

Obviously I want everyone to love me and everything I do but that’s unrealistic. When someone I admired heard “Leading Horses” and commented how good the record would sound with added guitar it all became crystal clear. LH was intended to be merely drums and vocals. The sound was on purpose. If the “world” did not gravitate to that vision the vision needed to withstand that.

At the end of my life I leave a body of work not just one album someone might have heard over here and another over here. Since I’m doing this to glorify (draw attention to) God it behooves me to trust Him as the keeper of my legacy. Of course there are things on each CD that I might do different today but I did not record them today and on the day I did, I did my very best with what I had to work with considering time, financial and technological constraints. Not to mention talent-maybe lacking at times but hopefully always growing.

Each record has a clear concept at its heart and I am responsible for every choice-good and bad. I hope my work reflects my live and vice-verse. I think at the heart of a strong spiritual path is a man who takes full responsibility for his actions. When I reflect on the past 28 years of knowing Christ I  have to constantly remind myself that as I’ve aged I’ve learned from past mistakes and that I’m not the same person I was at nineteen, twenty-nine, thirty-nine… 

I’m proud of my work both in music and inside myself. But I brag on the Lord who has cleaned up the messes, filled in the gaps, listened with patience, guided with clarity and turned gifts that would be worthless and self-serving into powerful weapons against evil, deception and abuse simply by His blessing of them.

And as for the records themselves?  They made perfect sense at the time.