There was a moment when I turned to look around me and saw a good number of people looking emotional. Some had tears running down their faces, others seemed lost in wonder.
When you consider we were standing in a field near Kettering, this was no mean feat.
We were at the main stage of the Greenbelt festival watching Gungor – the collective of musicians built around the husband and wife team Michael and Lisa Gungor.
Over the last decade, the band has evolved from an evangelical worship group through to something much more unusual. Some of the music is still worship music, sure, but there is more to it than that. There are songs of doubt, of lament and some party songs too.
While they always had an appetite for creativity and worked hard, this past year has been extraordinary. This month will see the release of their third album of the last 12 months, the final part of the One Wild Life trilogy. The first, Soul, was followed by a second, Spirit, and now they are about to release Body.
Since last they visited Greenbelt in 2012, Michael and Lisa have been on a rollercoaster ride. Michael has spoken candidly about losing his faith and gradually coming back. They were surprised by the arrival of a daughter – Lucy – with Down's Syndrome and complicated health challenges. Add into the mix that they found themselves criticised severely by various evangelical bloggers for Michael's suggestion that six day creationism wasn't true, and it has been a difficult few years.
It has also been rewarding, with the creation of the Liturgists Podcast, presented by Michael, along with 'Science' Mike. The podcast has become very successful and is creating a community of like-minded people who have struggled with doubt and share a love for science and art.
Sitting down with them before their set, I asked whether releasing three albums in a year was a good idea.
Lisa Gungor – It feels crazy that we've done three in a year but it feels really good – it feels like it's complete.
Andy Walton – Did you go into it thinking you were going to make three?
LG – We went into the first one thinking it was only going to be one, but we had so many songs... A lot happened in 2014. We found ourselves just processing all of it through song.
Michael Gungor – As usual pain created a lot of art for us. We just kept writing and we were going to put out one album... But then the ideas popped into our head, "What if we kept writing and kept making the album?" And we did a trilogy, Spirit, Soul and Body. It's been a lot of work.
AW – So you were writing and recording them as you went?
LG – With all the controversy [about creationism] and everything that happened, releasing that first one was a little terrifying – we didn't know if anyone was going to buy it and if we needed to go find other careers! It was really nice – a lot of people said it was the best album we'd ever made... So then we immediately got scared – we have to make two more? It's been a journey, which I'm glad for.... You can hear that in the songs – the wrestle, the ache and the coming back around, moving forward into something else – a new freshness, a new start a new way of seeing life that feels really good.
Our daughter's birth has significantly influenced so much of this record. The idea of One Wild Life came when I was walking down the sidewalk and was struggling with depression. I felt like this is the end for us – we're not going to make music any more. I was afraid of everything – Lucy's heart surgery isn't going to work and she's gonna get sick... I was really just paralysed with fear. Then this Mary Oliver poem kept coming back to me – it's a summer day, talking about the blades of grass, the insects... it ends with "so tell me, what will you do with your one wild life?" You have these moments where you get it. I just stood there and I got it. I just saw, 'I have this decision to let this wreck me because millions of people have faced depression and loss and grief and they had a decision to make. Did they let it destroy them or did they do something with that? I just felt this surge – I'm not going to be a victim – I'm going to do something with this.
AW – Did that feel like your decision or did that feel like something supernatural?
LG - I would definitely say it's both. There are days it felt like my own decision. Seventy per cent of the decisions we make are not actual decisions, but they're just patterns or rituals – habits we've created and so you have to train your own brain and start thinking a different way. [But] it was both – there was this feeling of warmth and love and something helping me get out of this space but it definitely wasn't instant.
AW – You've spoken candidly about your faith journey in recent years. Do you feel a sense of pressure from your public profile – having people invested in your lives?
MG – I'm pretty disconnected from reality a lot of the time. I grew up as a pastor's kid. I always felt like eyes were on me. When you're a pastor's kid and the congregants are like, "Well, is he behaving himself? Is the pastor doing a good job raising a family?" I was the fruit of my father's ministry so I had to be on my best behaviour at all times. I got used to it and probably part of my personality developed in response to [that pressure]. I had to learn to not care too much about what people thought otherwise it would consume me and I'd be miserable.
I've felt pressure – certainly financial pressure, friendship and social pressure to fit something that people expected of me. Whether it be our old music label, or the fans that I really love – I want to please the people that I love and I'm grateful for. But I've also come to terms with it. I can't love the people closest to me and the people that I want to please from a dishonest place for the long run. I can't be something that I'm not – it will just be a lie. To try to be something I'm not in order to please them is not in the long run doing anybody any good.
AW – Do you feel like with the Liturgists and the band you're serving that community?
MG – Yeah – some of my favourite compliments that we ever get from fans are from people that we found who [have] strangely been on a similar timeframe of journey as us. They were with us in those youth conferences raising their hands and going crazy. Then they started having questions about it [faith] while we were having questions about it. We've kind of all being walking together somehow.
I love the people that are new to it and discovering it for now. But there's something really special about the people who say, "I've been listening since Bigger Than My Imagination, the Michael Gungor record, and every step along the way there's been something – I needed to hear that at that time."
AW – What's the future for your country?
LG – I was ready, I was going to pack up my family and leave.
MG – I think everybody's feeling tension, apprehension. [The country is] so divided it's crazy. Everybody thinks the other side is the devil. I can't imagine being a sane, decent human being and voting for Trump. And that's a bad thing to say, because I know there are sane, decent human beings who are going to vote for Trump. But to me he is a monster. But then people could feel that about Hillary. I have hopes that he's not going to win. He's been doing really poorly in the polls lately and that's good.
AW – Do you have any hope from the likes of Russell Moore who've said, from a conservative standpoint, this is not our guy?
MG – I'm sure it's helpful with some people. We live in LA so we've never seen a Trump sign.
LG – But we were recently in Missouri and they were everywhere. I know people who are voting for Trump. I look at them and I'm like, "I love you, you're a kind, decent person. How do you not see this?"... It forces me to go back to just thinking about people. When does the world change? Through people. That might sound super silly or clichéd, but not having hope or your faith in the powers that be.
With all of the heat and the controversy with our two candidates I've got caught up in it for very obvious reasons. The powers that be obviously have all kinds of control but it has forced me to open my hands more and go, "the love in people's hearts is what matters". People going towards good. No matter who wins, it's the people who are going to make change, people who can still do good and still create something beautiful in our country.
It's important to not let all of your emotions get caught up in this thing. OK, so this person is the ruler – he might be a tyrant and a demagogue – but what are we doing with our friends and our family, how are we actually being good conduits of change?
Follow Andy Walton on Twitter @waltonandy
