NORTHFIELD — Multi-award winning artist and songwriter Zach Williams will share his music and life journey away from and back to his faith this Saturday, Oct. 12 at the Moody Center as one of the first stops on his headlining “Rescue Story Tour.”
“We have a bunch of new music that we’re going to be playing on this tour, so we’re getting pretty excited for it,” Williams said, speaking ahead of the concert.
Williams will be sharing stories of his life and return to faith as part of his boldly vulnerable and hope-filled sophomore album, “Rescue Story.” The national tour, which features guest artist Josh Baldwin of Bethel Music, is sponsored by the Compassion International and Christian Healthcare Ministries. The single “Rescue Story” was released in July ahead of the full album’s release last Friday, Oct. 4.
Williams’ music evokes a strong soulful feel, with lyrics that carry honesty and vulnerability from the artist. His band consists of roughly seven members, from instrumentalists to back up singers. A husband and father, Williams said his family is able to join him on tour making it easy for the family to spend their time together.
“I’ve been playing music for a good part of my life, so they’ve never known me to do anything but travel – everybody’s kind of used to it,” he said.
Growing up in a small town outside Jonesboro, Ark., Williams had a loving and encouraging upbringing. Yet he says the safety and security of his childhood seemed like a distant memory as he “watched his life spiral out of control,” becoming seduced by the lifestyle of rock stardom, drugs and alcohol use. These days, the now Nashville-based artist says he is a renewed man.
As one of the top contemporary Christian musicians in the country, Williams has carved out a niche for himself with a blend of Southern rock, country and faith-based songwriting. Growing up with his faith being a strong part of his childhood, the 41-year-old singer said he didn’t always have the desire to be a musician. His journey as a musician began when his journey toward athletics was put on hold.
“Growing up I was a sports guy,” Williams said. “I wanted to play basketball and try to get a scholarship.”
As a teenager, he showed signs of athletic prowess and looked to follow in his father’s footsteps as a gifted basketball player, even being pursued by college scouts. However, toward the end of high school, Williams began getting into trouble with drugs and alcohol. He received a full-ride scholarship to play Division 1 basketball but lost it after getting in trouble for drugs, he said.
“I got mixed up with the wrong crowd,” Williams said. “I lost track of everything that was really important to me.”
After taking time off from school and working construction with his father, Williams tried out for the junior college team in Northwest Arkansas and received a full-ride scholarship to the school. Unfortunately, he injured his ankle before the first game, forcing him to sit out the entire season. While recovering from his injury, Williams began to tinker with his roommate’s guitar, truly falling in love with music at 19 years old.
By the end of his 20s, Williams says, he had been married and divorced, and was traveling with a Southern-rock band, traveling and living a “reckless and wild” lifestyle. When he was 29, he met his current wife and his two stepchildren. While in Europe in 2012, Williams felt like he was at the end of his rope. As he sat on the tour bus one afternoon the driver scanned the radio. Suddenly, the song “Redeemed” by Big Daddy Weave came through the speakers.
“I immediately knew the song because I worked construction with my dad for almost 15 years and every day on the job we listened to Christian radio,” Williams recalled.
As the song played, he realized the need to change his lifestyle. Soon after, he quit the band and began to separate himself from the rock star lifestyle. After returning home, Williams took a job as the campus director and worship leader for Central Baptist’s campus in Jonesboro, Ark. While working at the church he wrote new songs related to his faith, eventually writing the single “Chain Breaker” with fellow musicians Johnathan Smith and Mia Fieldes.
In 2015, he moved to Nashville to begin writing with a producer, signing a record deal in 2016. Williams went on to win his first Grammy, Best Contemporary Christian Album in 2018 for Chain Breaker, his debut album as a solo artist which released in 2017. While the inspiration for his freshman album and the newly released “Rescue Story” come directly from his own life experiences and struggle to maintain his faith, his music reflects similar struggles that many have faced in their own right. Now, Williams’ music continues to impact people all around the world.
“Writing this record came from a slightly different place, a different season for me,” he said. “Twenty years ago when I first starting out … God was there working out all the little details. I couldn’t see that then, but I can look back now and see the things that he was doing. I think a lot of the stuff on ‘Rescue Story’ I’m writing from a place of reflection and sharing a lot of those stories with people on this new record.”
Reach Zack DeLuca at zdeluca@recorder.com or 413-772-0261, ext. 264