My Jesus

My Jesus may be Anne Wilson’s debut album, but the 15 tracks display the kind of confident performance and assured songwriting more often heard from established artists. Anchored by its smash-hit title track, the LP takes personal experiences from Wilson’s own life—like her upbringing in the church (“Sunday Sermons”) and the untimely death of her brother (“My Jesus”)—and translates them into worship songs with broad appeal, with a sonic palette that borrows from country, pop, and contemporary Christian music. “I really like to create music that is real and vulnerable,” Wilson tells Apple Music. “I didn’t dream of being an artist or a songwriter. When I became one, I really wanted to write songs that just spoke to people in all different walks of life, but that were very vulnerable and real.” Below, Wilson walks Apple Music through several key tracks on My Jesus.

“Scatter”
“‘Scatter’ is the opening track on the record, but it’s also, at our live show, the song we do first. So, if you listen from the beginning of the record, you have the intro to ‘Scatter’—it's called the ‘Prelude’—but that's exactly what live shows are like. The concept of the song is just really standing firm in your faith and realizing that all the battles have already been won by the Lord and that your victory is found through Jesus.”

“My Jesus”
“I lost my brother in a car accident in 2017, and it was the hardest thing I’d ever been through in my entire life. I wasn’t much of someone who journaled, but I wanted to document my days and write down exactly what was going on, and how I was going to prove to myself that I was going to make it through the tragedy. About two and a half years after my brother passed away, I was starting to get into music. I noticed that I had only ever written ‘My Jesus’ in my journal, so I never referred to the Lord as any other name. I remember going into a write a few weeks later and sharing that title with them. It was so cool. The other two songwriters had already had that title in their head, and so we’d all come into the room not talking to each other prior to the [writing] and we all had the same concept.”

“Sunday Sermons”
“I grew up in church. Every Sunday, my parents would take us, but I didn’t actually become a Christian until I was in seventh grade. I really had a moment that marked my faith, of realizing that I really could have a relationship with the Lord, and everything changed for me. Even though I didn’t realize it at the time, he was planting seeds along my walk of faith.”

“Mamas” (feat. Hillary Scott)
“I’ve always been a huge fan of country music. I grew up on it. We wanted a female country artist to feature on the song, because the song was so important to me and I wanted it to get the attention that it deserved. So, I wanted to feature a country artist on there, to have another female voice and to have someone who was really strong in the country scene to stand for mamas.”

“That’s What We Need”
“I think we’re all trying to do our best in life. And I think even if you’re not a Christian, you can relate to that, in a sense. I think there’s a lot of loss and broken people, and I feel like our world right now is in a really rough place, especially our country. I think we all need a reminder of what we actually need in this life and what we need to be for other people.”

“Something About That Name”
“I love the melody of that song. It’s so beautiful. It’s probably one of my more worshipful songs on the record. I think it’s already reached a lot of lives.”