As I was getting Encounter ready for release I had to shelve working on several good songs which in my mind could not fit the arc of that theme. Some of them had been used on albums that are simply not available on modern streaming platforms. Others had existed as demos distributed to worship teams to enable song learning. Some had been published (some unpublished even though they’d been used live – e.g Can’t earn it – a co write with chums Ivo Ivanov and Christine Britton) but in essence now only existed on paper – no actual recordings existed. Others lay in my head with some lyrics but largely unfinished. At least one had been written whilst still at school but never in my recollection ever performed live. Ever. But still too good to waste. And the icing on the cake, one other was to come from a surprising and delightful co-write with Luciano Manfrinato earlier this year with production from him too.

In whatever form these songs had existed, it was time to finish them, polish them and get them ready to become a cohesive whole for a new album, where necessary rebuilding them from the ground up.

Where a recording pre-existed, my first port of call was to listen to that recording to see if there was anything there which might help to shape the arrangement going forward. I was essentially asking myself “Do I like this version – is it worth working with”. For the most part the answer was “there are some parts of this which are great, some which are good and some which are redeemable”. But listening with a critical ear identified parts which either needed to be replayed, edited, chopped or changed and definitely updated with new sounds. This is especially true of pianos and drums (modern keyboards or VSTs just carry so much more detail in their sample sets), but all parts benefitted from choosing new sounds or new recordings of the old.

Regarding vocals, sometimes an old performance is just right; timing, cadences and emotion. Whilst I sing in tune, these days I will check the tuning and tweak it where necessary. Harmonies benefit from being multi layered and I would have recorded any original demos with each part recorded just singly. So it’s time to add extra vocal layers and a decent vocal effects chain. But everything is up for replacement if needed. My rule tends to be that before reaching for the editing tools at my disposal I have to ask could I sing it (play it etc) better. Should I sing it differently. An advantage of the tuning tools available are that you can explore alternative harmony choices without re-singing. Even so, re-singing is often the right choice.

One of the songs I felt it was worth exploring was the song ‘Worthy’. I had pitched this song to Kevin Mayhew publishers to give me a comparison between them and what I did through CopyCare (now Song Solutions). In the intervening years and having moved house, we lost touch and on deciding upon the inclusion of this song I reached out to Kevin Mayhew and updated them with our contact details. Happily they came back to me to report that the song had been quietly earning its own little nest egg in royalties. Not huge but…something.

I liked how this song came out so much that I felt it was the main contender for the album’s title track. Adding in some ambient drumming again from Pete Welly took the track to another level. To help create a total family feel, I asked daughter Beth if she’d be up for singing the female lead part. We managed to squeeze that in to a trip to London. You’ll love this song and I think you’ll love this album.

It should be live worldwide from the 30th August 2026 – let me know in the comments which tracks were your favourite