By: Laura Bennett
Whether listening to their albums or seeing them live, Northern Irish folk rock band Rend Collective is known for an energy and dedication to joy that’s hard to match, and great to witness.
But when lead singer Chris Llewellyn’s son was diagnosed with autism in 2020, he needed songs of another kind.
Looking across the landscape of worship music, Chris noticed “a lot of it tends to be very victory focused, and very triumph focused” and “skipped over the challenges” in way that “feels really uncomfortable”.
“[The diagnosis] was really heavy for our family and continues to be,” Chris said in an interview. I was trying to process what kind of worship song I would want in this season and couldn’t really find it.”
The band’s latest single Hallelujah Anyway is their answer to that problem.