3/11/2023 0 Comments Best days of my life skillet![]() ![]() Jeff: So what role does the Bible play in your songwriting? How do you get from Bible to music? And these days, people always want to know more, so they go online. Even if I talk about God, these days everybody talks about God, so I’ve always found music is a great diving board for people to get into Skillet. So we sound spiritual to people, but they don’t always know what that means unless they come to a concert, unless they hear me speak. Now people may recognize them as spiritual sounding. Certainly, the songs aren’t overtly preachy. There are definitely still people who listen to Skillet that don’t know we’re a Christian band. Jeff: So what response do you get? Do people sort of find you through the music and then come to learn you’re Christian? And not new age, I like to make it clear. We were positive, but we were Jesus fanatics. So Skillet began to be known as the positive rock band. And around 2005 and 6 and 7, positive music began to become popular in the mainstream world. And we were a band that was singing what they would call positive music. I would even say nihilistic, like nothing really matters, you know, suicidal. In 1996, when we started, rock music was very dark. But for rock music, we were too Christian. Took us about 10 years, 11 years maybe, before people really started knowing who we were. But really took off in the early 2000s, and … Jeff: And you’ve been around for a while. I got into rock music because the music is fuel. So everything I write, I try to write from that Christian worldview. I had a good day, this is what I’m going to write about. You know, I had a bad day and this is what I’m going to write about it. That’s your three-minutes, your three-minute sermon. Because when you write songs - and I know for some people that’s interesting, and they don’t think of rock music as being Christian - but when you’re writing you have a chance to say what you believe. And so for me, I think playing rock music was just a great way to express my faith. We play with Metallica and Aerosmith and Ozzy Osborne, any metal band. But we play most of our shows in the secular rock world. Even for the Christian market, I’m very outspoken. When I was introducing myself, I forgot to say the other unique thing about Skillet is that I’m very, very outspoken about my faith. Their song “Monster” - big, big hit - 412 million streams on Spotify. If you look them up on Spotify, they have 6.4 million monthly listeners. They just had an album, Dominion, that came out in January. Jeff: For those of you who don’t know the band Skillet, amazing success. as we were just discussing before the podcast, I am an interesting character because I play hard rock music. My daughter is the eldest, my son is younger. ![]() ![]() My wife, Korey, and I just celebrated our 25th wedding anniversary last week. ![]() I’m the singer for the rock band Skillet. Our guest is an amazing individual, John Cooper, the lead vocalist, bassist, and songwriter for the rock band Skillet. Although today, we are in Nashville, Tennessee, at the National Religious Broadcaster’s conference. Jeff Kloha: Welcome to Today at Museum of the Bible in Washington, DC. To listen to the whole interview, check it out on our podcast, Today at Museum of the Bible. The following interview has been edited for clarity and space. Below is an excerpt of his interview with John Cooper, lead vocalist, bassist, and songwriter/producer for the rock band Skillet, one of the best-selling rock bands of the century. During the National Religious Broadcaster’s conference in 2022, our chief curatorial officer, Jeff Kloha, captured interviews with some of the biggest names in Christian radio. ![]()
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