1 of 4

Things started off well in 2005 for the David Crowder Band, which got its start as the primary worship band for University Baptist Church in Waco, Texas. In September they finalized A Collision or (3+4=7), which released to strong reviews—it earned high placement on our year-end Best Albums list. Soon after, the band embarked on a headlining tour. And then tragedy hit: Kyle Lake, the band's friend and pastor at UBC, was electrocuted and killed while adjusting a microphone during a baptism. It was hard enough for Crowder and his buddies to be away at such a difficult time, asking all sorts of challenging questions in light of it. What's more, A Collision was created as a worshipful response to death—before Lake's passing. After months of silence on the subject, Crowder was gracious enough to share some thoughts about his friend's death, and the role Lake played in the album's creation.

Tell me about when you heard the news of Kyle Lake's death.

David Crowder We were really set up to have our best day yet. The band and I were on tour in beautiful Orlando, the sun was shining, and we were on the golf course hitting balls. It was just a perfect start, and then the phone rings. It's my wife, who had just gotten a call that Kyle had been electrocuted, and I'm like, "Um, what do you mean?" She tried to explain what she had heard and felt it was pretty serious, but otherwise we didn't yet have all the details. So I told her to call me if she heard anything else, and after multiple phone calls over the next thirty minutes, we finally got confirmation that our friend had died. I just kept thinking, No, there's no way.

It had to be hard for you to be away during that.

Crowder The bizarre thing is, when tragedy hits, you immediately start asking all the "what ifs"—if only this or that had happened. Every time we followed that question, we wound up at a dead end.

Because we weren't in town, a band called Dutton was filling in for us [at University Baptist]. The drums sit right in front of the baptistry, so when Kyle grabbed the microphone, Dutton's drummer immediately pulled it away from him to the point where he snapped the mic cable in two. So as quick as any human could react, he was able to disconnect the circuit.

If it had been us, we would have stood around staring at each other for at least five minutes trying to decide what's going on—"Should we grab that or not?" So whenever we started asking ourselves if it would have helped if we were there, we came to the conclusion that, no, absolutely not—it would have been worse, guaranteed. (Chuckling) You don't want us on the scene providing emergency care!

It's hard enough to deal with the loss of a loved one without the mysteries of "what if," so in a way, that's been the tiniest of blessings, understanding that our presence wouldn't have changed anything. But it was very hard to not be there.

I would think it'd also be hard because of the circumstances. Baptism is associated with new life, yet your friend died in conjunction with that.

Crowder It is an interesting visual, for sure—the symbolism of it all. They say irony is dead, and I don't know if that's true [in light of this]. Of all the moments for someone to go, especially as a pastor … it's just hard to look at an event of such depth and beauty in a negative light.

Have you come to any conclusions about it?

Crowder No, not really, though I think all of us are in the same boat when it comes to talking about death. Psychologists say that the unconscious self cannot comprehend our mortal end. You can't picture yourself dying in such a way. Anytime we picture death, we imagine it being inflicted on us by someone or else just quietly passing one day. Culturally, we don't know how to cope.

next page... |  1 of 4