Newworldson: Odd Band Out
Parisien: Thank God, I don’t have kids right now. Mark and Rich, they have kids and I don’t know how they are doing it. They are dads and husbands, but in my case I’m a husband only and a dog owner. First of all, we wouldn’t be doing this without the support of our families. It’s not like anybody is running away from home. We have the support of our wives and in some cases, the kids. We’re really all one big extended family. Our wives hang out when we’re gone. The key for us is to keep our schedule balanced. It’s very tempting to put as many opportunities on your calendar as possible and people are constantly calling to give us opportunities to come and perform here or there, but we just learned the value of saying no. Sometimes that can mean that if those people want us badly enough they will reschedule when we’re a little slower. We turn out to be gone from home much more than ten days at a time and when we’re home we’re home. That’s the great thing about being in music full time, because when you are off working you can be home and have time to just be with the family and friends. The key for us is to not be away for too long.
gmclife.com: I always say that the band wife is the unsung hero. I think as girls we always think it’s glamorous to date the band guy but it takes a special woman to be married to somebody who is gone a lot so it’s great that you guys have a balance figured out. As far as your specific mission, where do you think your band fits into the whole Christian music scene?
Parisien: We’re still in the Niagara Falls area. We fly in and out of Nashville but we don’t want to relocate with our families. I’ve never wanted to move there. I like visiting and then I like leaving. So much of what we do artistically was not conceived in Nashville, so I think the distance is good for us because we have kind of a fresh perspective on a lot of things, not just music but also the entire music industry.
Every time I come to Nashville, there’s all this talk of decline in the music industry and the contraction of the music market, but we’re out on the road getting a chance to play more and more shows every year, so we don’t perceive music industry in contraction. We’re always in a good mood in Nashville. We’re happy to be there so I think we’re constantly bringing this renewing energy because we’re excited about what we’re doing and the fact that record sales might be down doesn’t really have a bearing on what we do, because our record sales are going up. I think it’s good for us not to be in Nashville. Maybe it’s naïve and simplistic but we go there and we’re energizing everyone. We blow into Nashville like a breath of fresh air because we just see things from a different perch and because of that we are bringing a different thing to mainstream Christian music.
gmclife.com: So besides churches, you guys also play in clubs and such, right?
Parisien: Yeah, not nearly as much as we used to. That’s where most of our material was from was singing in bars. It was about singing about God in an ungodly place. For some people being in that setting might be a problem. It may be tempting to be in a place that serves alcohol, but it’s never been an issue for me. We’re touring in Texas next week. We have five days there. I think Texas is actually the state we’ve toured the most. After that we are on our way to Europe to do six or seven countries there in June. After that we’re playing as many summer festivals as we can and working on promoting our new album, so it’s a busy but exciting time.
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About the Writer
After graduating with a B.S. in Journalism from North Central University in 1998, Christa Banister moved from Minneapolis to Nashville, Tenn. and eventually started working at CCM Magazine/Salem Publishing in various editorial capacities as an editor, columnist and website guru for five and a half years. After that, she launched her own freelance writing company and writes for numerous clients including Salem Publishing, Crosswalk.com (she review movies for them each week), Christian Single, Christianity Today, Threads Media, Songs4Worship.com, PassAlong.com and also helped kickstart the first Christian music blog for MTV. In addition, she also writes bios for professional recording artists and authors and penned her first two novels, Around the World in 80 Dates and Blessed Are the Meddlers for NavPress.
