Anne Wilson: Having Faith ‘Makes Me Feel a Little Bit Like a Rebel’
By Movieguide® Contributor
Anne Wilson is dishing on her new album, “Rebel,” ahead of its release on April 19.
The album’s name and title track have significance for Wilson, but she believes it will resonate with all Christ followers.
“Having faith in the world that we live in today makes me feel a little bit like a rebel,” she said. “It’s like when we have faith, we’re the odd ones out. But yet the world can go talk about all these horrible subjects, and it’s welcomed and invited.”
“But when we talk about our faith, it’s like, somehow, we’re like the ones in the wrong,” she continued. “And it just felt like an inspiration to go, ‘You know, I’m going to write a record that is so steeped in faith.’ …Being a follower of Jesus in the world that we live in today makes you a rebel, because Jesus was a rebel. And so if you’re trying to be like Him, you’re going to end up being a rebel. And so all those different things came into one big idea and we wrote the song.”
Wilson had “fun” writing her title-track song, “Rebel.”
“I had had this moment of my career just feeling I was too country for Christian—like, my songs were just not being played on Christian radio, because they were too country,” she explained. “But yet the message was Christian, and it honestly fired me up to go, ‘You know what? I’m not going to please Christian music.’”
“And I’m not going to try to change who I am to please country music, I’m going to just be authentically who I am.’ And so it fired me up to go write a song about what it means to be a rebel,” she said.
Her album features a handful of other faith-based songs.
“Wilson—who grew up listening to both country and Christian music—says she wants the album to reach country fans who don’t attend church,” Christian Headlines reported.
“With this record, I felt really called to just preach the gospel point blank, share the truth, it is what it is,” Wilson said. “There are a couple of songs on the record that will be on country radio that maybe don’t specifically talk about God…but it’s like a nod at it. My goal is to get people to hear the song and them want to know more.”
Though many call her latest album “country,” she prefers not to have it under one genre.
“A lot of people are labeling it as country, and I would label it as just Anne Wilson,” she told CrosswalkHeadlines. “Some songs will be on Christian playlists, and some will be on country. And then some will maybe just be in the middle…This album was very interesting, because it really does blend the two together in one.”
Her album’s mix of genres comes from her roots.
“I grew up on both genres—Christian and country. My brother would always have country music on in the car, and my mom and dad would always have Christian,” Wilson said. “So I just grew up with both…I think it also came from growing up in Kentucky and bluegrass music being like a really big thing.”
Wilson recently revealed who she collaborated with on the album: singers Chris Tomlin, Lainey Wilson and Jordan Davis and some notable songwriters.
Movieguide® reported last month:
Per The Christian Beat, “A co-writer on each of the album’s 16 tracks, Wilson teamed up with some of Music Row’s most in-demand songwriters such as Nicolle Galyon, Emily Weisband, Matthew West and Trannie Anderson for a revolutionary project firmly rooted in both Country and Christian music, produced by Jeff Pardo and Jonathan Smith.”
This year, Country Music Television nominated her song, “Rain in The Rearview” for Breakthrough Female Video of the Year and selected Wilson as one of 14 women for its CMT Next Women of Country 2024 list.
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