Duncan - Really? I didn't know that! That's fantastic. I know that, as I said before, that a lot of the fans have said that the night that we play has been the biggest all-time attendance at a certain show. I think a part of it is that our fans are so fantastic. They've been with us for years, they're incredibly loyal and they'll come out. They will come out and support us where ever we play.
Kim - This has been a year of firsts for you guys. Back in April you were at the Pepsi 300 Nascar Series and you were the first rock band to ever do the pre-race concert.
Duncan - Yeah that was another thing. I think there was a little bit of concern there too about having this pop/rock band at this event, which had never been done before. They'd never had a Christian band either. They'd always had country performers. There again, it was like Nascar and us sizing each other up in a way, not sure how it would go. But after we did all of the promos, it was fantastic. They said it was one of their biggest turnouts at a pre-Nascar show. It's been fantastic to have all of the firsts this year. It's been exciting to see that, for a band like us, who's been around for a while now, that there is new things for us. We're just having a blast. I've been married over seven years now, with two beautiful girls and life is good.
Kim - That's wonderful. When we last talked, Adoration had just come out and you were just getting ready to start the tour. I read that on that tour, at a Teen Mania event, you had a turnout of over 40,000 people.
Duncan - Yeah! That's like a culmination of our whole year at the Teen Mania event. We've headlined the event for probably three or four years now. Every year it gets stronger and stronger. It's a blessing to be a part of. We've known Ron for quite a few years. He's the founder of Teen Mania. We love what they do. Taking kids on mission trips. I think it's probably a lot of times, that the kids go on these trips, and they end up getting more out of it than the people that they go to help. I'm really excited about what they do and we're in full support of what they do. So that's been exciting. Also, I want to mention that the tour was a sell-out tour. I think we had the first seventeen or eighteen shows were completely sold out. And then we had a couple that just had a few seats left. I heard from one of the managers that 95% of the shows were sold out. That was another exciting thing for us.
Kim - That's awesome. I read a couple of interviews that you did during the tour where you talked about how different is was because it was less effects and it made you really eager and excited again because the shows were more than "just another show".
Duncan - Yeah. Over the past years, we've always been a band that tries to give people $80 worth for their $30. So we've always had that mentality and we've tried to give people as much of the show as we can. We've had flying saucers, spinning drum risers, and all of this crazy stuff. It's been great, and the fans have loved it. But on the Adoration tour ... we still had great production, don't get me wrong, but we had less gimmicks, less bells and whistles. From what the fans said, it was the most powerful show that we've ever done, even though we had less gadgets. I think they went away more fulfilled in a sense, with a sense of purpose in their lives. So that was great and it was exciting to know that the music and the spirit held up over the lack of gadgetry.
Kim - Did that feeling and spiritual growth have anything to do with the reasoning behind recording a second worship album?
Duncan - I think that there's always a temptation to do make two of the last record when it's successful. But it really wasn't that. I think it's a continuation from Adoration. I think it's a better record. I think that the songs are better. I think the lyrics are better. I think the playing is better. I think that it's a stronger record all around. I think it's just a great record. Whether you put it in the genre of praise and worship, I don't know. I don't really know what that is. I think you can praise and worship to heavy metal as much as you can to symphonic music. To put a genre label on a style of music and call it praise and worship is something I don't agree with. I think this record has been a natural progression from the last one. There's some pop songs on this one. There's some worship songs, obviously, but there's what I call pop songs. I'm talking stylistically. I'm talking songs that get your head bopping and you sing the chorus as soon as you hear it. I think it's just a great record. A great record to come after Adoration. It makes Adoration make more sense in a way.
