for KING & COUNTRY ‘Love Me Like I Am’ featuring Jordin Sparks
“This is still a young friendship we have going on,” says for KING & COUNTRY’s Joel Smallbone about their new collaboration with the incredible Jordin Sparks for a new version of the beautifully heartfelt ‘Love Me Like I Am.’
The discography of for KING & COUNTRY, brothers Joel and Luke Smallbone, is more than deserving to be described as a phenomenon. They’ve been referred to as one of the music industry’s most respected and decorated duos. They earned immense success with their albums, such as ‘Burn The Ships’ and this year’s insightful ‘What Are We Waiting For?’ record that proposed deep-diving questions in the time of global suffering.
Throughout their career, for KING & COUNTRY has won four GRAMMY Awards, seven GMA Dove Awards, a Billboard Music Award, 13 K-Love Fan Awards, and their nine No. 1 songs have produced an astonishing 1.8 billion career streams.
Keeping this in mind, no wonder Jordin Sparks was already a fan before any collaboration talks. She explains how it all came about: “My husband was like, hey, this band for KING & COUNTRY wants you to do a song with them. I was like, really, is this happening? Because I’m a fan of theirs. I was just very excited about the prospect of it, and then I found out what song it was”.
‘Love Me Like I Am’ is taken from their latest, fourth studio album, ‘What Are We Waiting For?’ that found for KING & COUNTRY confronting relevant issues and confirming the duo’s commitment to community, diversity, and family. The project’s lush, vivid pop sound carries a common theme of ‘questions.’
One of the lead singles being ‘Love Me Like I Am,’ the Smallbone brothers tackle the topic of insecurity that starts with heavy vulnerably lyricism:m: “I can be a little self-critical now / I am a little unable / To put all my cards on the table now”. Joel depicts how he came up with the title: “I was sleeping, and I woke up to the phrase ‘love me like I am’, I wrote it down in my phone, and then we went to the studio, and our co-writer completed the phrase with ‘it’s amazing that you can, love me like I am'”.
He then elaborates: “The heart and sentiment of it is the idea of either God to humanity, or human to human, the incredible version of love, the true love meets people and accepts people right as they are”.
‘Love Me Like I Am’ is a hopeful, forward-looking track that encourages self-belief. We should accept everyone for who they are; everyone is perfect the way they are. Jordin Sparks adds: “It’s a beautiful message, it’s a beautiful story, and it’s something everybody needs to hear, but also that’s what everyone wants to experience, especially now when there’s much distraction, there’s a lot of crazy things going on, and you look at it all, and you’re like ‘where is the love?”.
She proposes a question of the decade. Current affairs are taking away our last glimpse of hope for the future and our society. What may seem like a dark contemplation only supports the need for more encouraging music like for KING & COUNTRY.
Joel also announces: “Our new version of ‘Love Me Like I AM’, I think our most complete version of the song thanks to dear Jordin”. So don’t wait around, and hear it for yourself, ‘Love Me Like I Am’ is out now.
