The City Harmonic – It’s How You Finish

We were all feeling called to invest in our local church communities and I think that’s exactly what we’ve done. That’s a very big factor here, feeling like aliens in our land and wanting to be faithful to the calling that God has for each of us in our own neighborhoods. So it’s bittersweet, but it’s also exciting because, yes, we’ll keep making music, albeit separately, but we’re also again feeling invested into the part of the church that matters the most—the people who can hold us accountable.

We were on our farewell tour in Canada and the promoter—who is the main promoter in Canada for Christian music, and has been for a long time—was sitting at the dinner table. He said, “I’ve been a part of a few farewell tours, but I’ve never seen one where the band is sitting at dinner joking like it’s their first tour.” It was an awesome reminder that we’re healthy. We haven’t been the most popular band. We haven’t had the most chart-topping singles. But at the end of the day, I don’t care. We have some incredible stories and friendships and I think God has done for the kingdom exactly what He wanted to.

CCM: How vividly do you remember the feelings and experiences of that night in Hamilton?
ED: The whole night was incredible. We had family and friends and really anyone that ever had anything to do with us there. The string players there were the same ones who tracked on most of the records. So the players on violin and cellos on I Have A Dream (buy) and Introducing (buy) were literally on stage playing with us that night. A lot of the friends we’d get together to sing gang parts on our records were also there. The guy that recorded the live record owns the studio where we recorded our first two records anyway. So it was just this really cool full circle. We didn’t leave a trail of bodies behind us. We’re leaving with friends and incredible relationships, which to me means that whatever we did, we did it right.

There were moments where we got teary and stuff on stage, but none of that makes the record because no one wants to listen to someone yammer on in a recording. However, the rawness of the feeling is definitely there. You can hear it in everybody’s performances. You only get that moment once, and I think you can hear it.

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