By Kayla DeKraker
Rend Collective has been touring for 15 years now, and a decade and a half later, the band is finding their own unique sound. The Northern Irish Christian band shared in an interview how they are now focusing more on authenticity than approval.
“When we first started, I really wanted to be liked,” front man Chris Llewellyn told Relevant magazine. “I wanted to be a good boy and have everyone cheer me on. But after a while, you realize life’s too short for that. The Bible’s better than that, and our audience deserves more than that.”
The group recently released a new album called “Folk” which is much different than their prior music.
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Llewellyn said, “We’ve bowed to pressure before. Doing something different is scary. It’s tied to your livelihood and your faith and that human desire for approval. But middle age has rescued us. I can’t tell you how much less I care about what people think now.”
He added, “People respond really well to familiarity. It’s like watching the same Christmas movie every year. The industry would rather release Avengers 9 than something brand new.”
More than anything, the group hopes to bring people closer to who Jesus really is.
“There’s always this tension in the Christian story. There’s the version of Jesus who sits at tables with everyone—gentle, loving, inclusive. But there’s also the Jesus who gets arrested and crucified by the state. There’s a political edge to him that feels uncomfortable. And worship should make space for that kind of Jesus too.”
Llewellyn later added, “One of the most beautiful things about identity is that, so early in the story, God declares us good. Sometimes we think we start from a deficit, like God doesn’t like us as we are. But there’s something innately good, something of the image of God in us. That’s where it starts for me.”
In honor of the Folk album which came out this past summer, the group recently began their 2025 Fall tour.
In a post they shared tour dates which take place in both the U.S. and Canada. In the caption they announced, “US FALL TOUR starts in just a couple months🎉 and we need YOUR help, what songs should we add to our setlist?!”
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