Dutton
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Worship band Dutton, from Texas, started out after David Crowder asked them to stand in for him in leading worship at their local church. Intrigued to know more, LTTM caught up with the band's lead singer Logan Walter to find out the full story.
For those who haven't heard of Dutton before, can you tell us a little bit about who you are and how you got involved in making music?
We are a five piece worship band based out of Dallas, Texas. We've never had any aspirations to be a performance or concert based band. We simply...
Read More Worship band Dutton, from Texas, started out after David Crowder asked them to stand in for him in leading worship at their local church. Intrigued to know more, LTTM caught up with the band's lead singer Logan Walter to find out the full story.
For those who haven't heard of Dutton before, can you tell us a little bit about who you are and how you got involved in making music?
We are a five piece worship band based out of Dallas, Texas. We've never had any aspirations to be a performance or concert based band. We simply aspire to see people's hearts drawn upward through words and melodies that can be explicitly directed to God in worship. Nathan Jennings plays drums; Josh Hicks plays bass; Shane Wilson plays electric guitar and pedal steel guitar; Brian Patterson plays electric guitar and keys; I play acoustic guitar and sing. I started playing in my youth group's praise band on Wednesday nights with Shane ten years ago, when I was a freshman in high school and he was a freshman at Baylor University in Waco. I met David Crowder through my youth minister, Bob Johns, and three years later, Crowder asked if I could lead in his absence at his home church, University Baptist Church, which is on Dutton Ave. By then, Nathan had joined the group. A year later, Brian would follow, and Josh is the most recent addition, joining in 2008.
You started out as the 'back-up band' for David Crowder, did you learn a lot from those guys?
Crowder has been blessed with tremendous success but has remained grounded to a home church. He doesn't settle for second-rate art. He leads his band with humility and Godliness. He reads great books, listens to great music, and he uses his influences to create something original and beautiful. In all of these ways, I aspire to be just like him.
You released your latest album 'All Things Fade' last year - tell us a little bit about that album and what the inspiration behind it was?
Each song has its own inspiration. "In Control" was inspired by a near fatal car crash that I experienced with Josh, Brian, and Shane. We were driving in my new Kia Rio and I said, "This car is small but safe. There are airbags, here - here - and here, but don't get me wrong; I don't think we could withstand the impact of a truck." And about 30 seconds later, we were T-boned by a Dodge Ram. The airbags deployed, and we walked away without a scratch. Josh had a toenail injury, but that was the extent of the damage. That night, I was lying on Nathan's couch, with my heart still racing, and I was impressed with a sense of God's sovereignty. Our lives could've been taken in the crash that night, but God chose to spare us. Before I fell asleep, I wrote the lyrics to the chorus: "Jesus, I believe You're in control. You're in control, and you are everything to me. I put my hope in you, Lord." In a similar way, all eleven songs were born from inspired moments.
Which is your favorite track on the album and why?
My favorite song from the "All Things Face" album is "When Heaven Came Down." It's a Gospel song, in the sense that the chorus allows the worshippers to sing about the good news. It says, "This is the good news: our God became one of us. And this is the good news: the God of the universe became a man to stand in the gap for us." The first verse focuses on the miracle of our Creator God coming down to Earth in the form of Jesus Christ, describing the incarnation as heaven coming down and kissing the earth, while the second verse hails Jesus as our redeemer God and thanks Him for sending the Holy Spirit in His place. The ending allows the congregation to really sing out in worship by taking the melody into a higher vocal register. But mostly, I just like it because of all the stories I've heard about God using "When Heaven Came Down" to draw people into God's grace.
What's your song writing process?
For our first album, "The Surface," I would start with a musical idea and pair it with worshipful lyrics. "All Things Fade" has a few songs that were written that way, but for songs like "When Heaven Came Down" and "You are Good," I started with Biblical words and let the lyrics guide the melody. This is becoming my favorite way to write, as the lyrics are the primary connecting point for most worshippers. In no other genre of music are the lyrics projected onto big screens with the intention of everyone singing along. So I want to make sure the lyrics are the most intentional part of the songwriting process.
How would you describe your style of music and what are your influences?
The best and worst part about "All Things Fade" is that it doesn't have a "style" per se. "Welcome Here" is a rock song, "Stand Up" is a dance song, "Oh What a Joy" is a gospel song, and "Nothing's Gonna Get me Down" is a country song. The rest of the album would probably fall under genre of "pop rock," which describes most of our favorite bands. We all love bands like The Beatles, Coldplay, Wilco, and Phoenix to name a few. In the worship realm, I always tell people we fit somewhere between Chris Tomlin and David Crowder.
In your opinion, what makes the perfect worship song?
In a sentence: The perfect worship song has a singable but interesting melody that allows the worshipper to sing out its poetic, Biblically dense lyrics.
What advice would you give to any aspiring bands out there?
Being in a band is about relationships. It's about your relationships with each other, your relationships with the people affected by your ministry, and most importantly, your relationship with Christ. Don't let the creative process or travel stress diminish your love for God and others. Let your lives exemplify 1 John 3:18, as you "love - with actions and in truth."
You're stuck on an island, it's hot, you only have enough battery life left to listen to one song on your mp3 player. What track is it?
The past five nights I've fallen asleep to the last track on Arcade Fire's new album. It's called "The Suburbs (continued)" and is only one minute twenty-eight seconds long. So why settle for one listen? I'm pretty sure that battery could get me through three, maybe four repeats of that little tune. Three for one? Come on. That is a good deal.
What does the next year hold for Dutton?
We'll be recording our next album in February and releasing it in April of 2011. In the meantime, we are working on new original songs and looking forward to another year with our two conference tours, Planet Wisdom and Stuck in the Middle. Follow us on Facebook and Twitter to keep track of our ministry.
Reviews
Dutton - All Things Fade
for those who don't know much about Dutton, the band are frontman Logan Walter, Josh Hicks on bass, guitarists Brian Patterson and Shane Wilson, and drummer Nathan Jennings. The band have been playing in sorts since 2004, playing…
