Jesse Butterworth: Blessed with the Gift of Music

Hearing Christian stories in their triumphs and challenges is always inspiring.  In this episode were tracking the journey of musician, songwriter, worship team member and church planter, Jesse Butterworth.  While many Christian lives start with their roots in early family life, most blossom later as we grow, mature and come to a true relationship with Jesus, in a real way.  And every story is unique.  Jesse's "moment" came in a dorm room listening to James Taylor.

It was at this same Christian College that he hooked up with 3 other like-minded musician "want-to-be's" and started  a rag tag rock and roll band that led to an early signing to a record label, recording in Nashville and an album that won them multiple DOVE award nominations and a chance to play on the televised Dove Awards show.   All happening at the age of 22.  A crazy, God driven,  career trajectory!  A career that saw a dramatic change for Jesse in an instant,  while on stage playing a 5 minute 80's rock medley. 

Listen to the episode right here, right now:

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You'll hear about Jesse's recording journey to the Abby Road Studios and playing the same piano that John Lennon did, and singing through the same microphone that Elton, the Beatles, Stevie Wonder, Adelle, and others sang on over the years.   A dream come true.  You can sample the album  “All The Gold I’ve Struck” recorded at Abby Road and learn more about Jesse's work at: https://www.jessebutterworth.com/

You can also watch the hilariously fun video Our Good Old Days that we talk about in the pod.

Our conversation is filled with fun and laughter and hopefully some inspiration.  Don't miss a word of it.  

Oh and you can help us grow our podcast audience by sharing this with a friend, "liking" it and leaving a review.  It really helps spread the word.

God Bless.

JESSE BUTTERWORTH AT A GLANCE

Christian Singer-Songwriter • Former Daily Planet Frontman • Worship Pastor • Church Planter • Recording Artist

Topics

Christian faith • Christian music • Daily Planet • Songwriting • Worship • James Taylor • The Beatles • Career loss • Identity • Ministry • Family • Abbey Road Studios • Gratitude • God's presence

His Faith Journey

Christian upbringing → Parents' divorce → Discovering music as a way to cope → Making his faith personal in college → Encountering Jesus through a James Taylor song → Daily Planet and Christian music → Career-ending injury → Worship ministry and church planting → Finding God through hardship, family and everyday life

This Episode Explores

• Jesse's rise with the Christian rock band Daily Planet, including its hit songs and Dove Award nominations

• How James Taylor and the Beatles influenced Jesse's music—and how a James Taylor song helped make his faith personal

• The devastating injury that suddenly ended Daily Planet's touring career and record deal

• Jesse's struggle with shame, identity and faith after losing the career he expected

• His years as a worship pastor and church planter

• His candid thoughts on authenticity in contemporary Christian music

• His family's journey through his wife's serious health challenges

• Recording at Abbey Road Studios and with the Prague Symphony Orchestra

• Why Jesse believes some of his most meaningful encounters with God happen in the ordinary moments of life

Questions Answered

• Who is Jesse Butterworth?

• What happened to Daily Planet?

• How did Jesse Butterworth come to faith in Jesus?

• How did James Taylor influence Jesse Butterworth's faith?

• What happened to Jesse Butterworth's music career?

• How did Jesse respond when his career suddenly ended?

• What did Jesse Butterworth do after Daily Planet?

• What is Jesse Butterworth's connection to Abbey Road Studios?

• What is the story behind "After It Rains"?

• Where does Jesse Butterworth say he sees God most clearly?

Podcast Transcript:

From Daily Planet to Abbey Road: Jesse Butterworth on Faith, Music, Loss & Finding God in the Ordinary

Ric Hansen

Introduction

Hi there, it's Ric Hansen on Amazing Greats, and our guest today is a friend and a gifted songwriter and recording artist, Jesse Butterworth.

We're going to hear about his career, his life, and how his life has clearly been touched by the hand of God. Take a listen as we walk through the triumphs and the challenges of Jesse Butterworth on Amazing Greats.

Well, welcome to Jesse Butterworth, our guest on Amazing Greats here today.

And a brief introduction for the folks that don't know who you are. You're not only a musician, but you're a songwriter and recording artist. Some of the accolades that you've had: two number-one Christian radio hits with a group called Daily Planet, three Top 10 radio hits, and you've been nominated for four Dove Awards.

And you actually had Katy Perry as your backup singer or backup act before she was Katy Perry. So that was pretty cool.

You've written songs—like a hundred or more—for other artists to record. You're featured in People Magazine, USA Today, and the Today Show.

And one of the songs that I kind of dug up and listened to for the first time—and loved—is "The Six String Rocketeer," which I love. That was great.

So welcome, Jesse. Thank you for being here today.

The Early Days of Daily Planet

Jesse Butterworth

My pleasure. Thank you.

Ric Hansen

Your group was one of the early influencers in this whole contemporary Christian realm, which has grown and expanded and become huge, a lot of it because of radio and streaming.

But you were kind of at the heart of more of the beginning of all of that with this group called Daily Planet.

In fact, I saw a picture of you from that era, and you look like you might have been 12. I'm not sure.

Jesse Butterworth

We were definitely children. We were straight out of college.

Ric Hansen

So yeah, I was going to ask, how old were you when that was happening?

Jesse Butterworth

We started the band when I was a sophomore in college, and then we got signed right out of school and moved to Nashville. We were just wide-eyed kids.

So I was, I think, 22, maybe, at the time.

Ric Hansen

Okay. The first name for your band turned out not to be the ultimate name. What was the original name?

Jesse Butterworth

House Blend was the name.

We liked that from coffee, and we were all coffee drinkers. But what we found is that was also when the coffee shop thing was really big back in the early 2000s, and people kept thinking that we were a really chill acoustic coffee shop band.

And we were not. We were a very rambunctious rock band.

So we had many disappointed clients. We were like, "We need to change our name."

Ric Hansen

For those who are not familiar with the music from back then, this is about the early 2000s, right?

Your music was hardcore rock and roll. This was raucous stuff that was going on there.

In fact, you kind of had to dig a little deeper to find the Christian roots for that music because it just sounded like a rock and roll band up on stage or in your recordings.

So, how did you come up with the name Daily Planet?

Jesse Butterworth

I've always been a really big superhero fan. You can't see it because it's over here, but off camera I've got a whole bunch of Superman and superhero stuff.

Daily Planet is the newspaper that Clark Kent works for. So that's how we landed on it.

Ric Hansen

Yeah. Well, you see the Lone Ranger back there in the background. So that was the prelude to the superhero era, right?

So you got together with these other guys. There were four of you in the band. This happened in college. Were you college mates?

Jesse Butterworth

Yeah. We all met at Azusa Pacific University in Southern California, and we were actually playing the clubs in LA.

That's where we cut our teeth. That's where I think we really honed the sound because we had to figure out how to keep people who just showed up at the club to hear music engaged.

And we played a lot of churches too, so we kind of had a foot in both worlds.

From James Taylor and the Beatles to Christian Rock

Ric Hansen

Listening to some of the things that I've seen online, I've dug into your background there, Jesse.

Your influences as a young person were not really the hard rock bands. It was almost like you were ahead of your time—or after your time—because you talked about James Taylor and the Beatles and Elton John and Billy Joel, all of which were well before your time.

And yet this rock and roll sound came out of all of that.

How did that transition? Is it just because you felt there was a need for more rock and roll, or did you love doing it?

Jesse Butterworth

Yeah, we just—I mean, I think it was the sound of the time too.

But if you listen, especially to something like "Six String Rocketeer," or several other songs, I think we were a bit more melodic than a lot of the other bands that were happening.

If you really listen, you can hear lots of Beatles influences and Elton John hooks and things like that.

And that's still true to this day. If I were to choose what to listen to, I usually go back to some of those incredible albums from those luminaries of the '60s and '70s.

It was just such a golden era for songwriting.

Ric Hansen

So were all the guys Christians?

Jesse Butterworth

Yep, yeah. Azusa Pacific University is a Christian college, so we all met there.

As we were trying to make our way in that scene, we were trying to pick a lane. Did we want to just do a rock thing, or did we want to do a Christian thing?

And, yeah, we got discovered, if you will, in LA by some folks out of Nashville, and we were able to get a deal.

So we were like, "Well, let's go this way and see what happens."

Ric Hansen

Maybe a bit of God's direction there, right? Throwing that into the pathway of where you were at the time.

Jesse's Faith Became Personal in a College Dorm Room

Ric Hansen

You were raised a Christian because your parents were Christian. Your dad's a Christian guy.

That's another story altogether. Your dad's kind of a notable himself—a speaker and author and all of that.

But as I understand it, the true relationship that you developed with Jesus was in that college period. Is that correct?

Jesse Butterworth

Yeah.

It's like the old joke when you ask a church kid, "What's gray and has a furry tail and eats nuts and lives in a tree?"

And they say, "Well, I think the answer is squirrel, but I'm going to go with Jesus Christ."

That was my life.

I knew the right answers. I was a church kid. I don't know that I ever really internalized it.

I definitely kind of went my own way in high school after my folks' divorce.

But college was the first time that I really felt like I needed to make this my own. I didn't feel like I was just living somebody else's life.

And it was actually through music.

Of all people, it was through James Taylor.

I was sitting down and playing "Fire and Rain" by myself in a dorm room. There's that line that says, "Won't you look down upon me, Jesus? You gotta help me make a stand."

And I just kind of got a lump in my throat when I was singing that.

I stopped and was like, "Man, I think I've got to deal with this. I've got to figure this out."

So that was really kind of the big moment when I shifted and felt like, "Okay, I'm going to go all in on this."

Ric Hansen

That's amazing. I love that story.

So James Taylor was your transformation, if you will.

Jesse Butterworth

Yeah, that's right.

The Songwriter in Jesse

Ric Hansen

Singer, songwriter Jesse Butterworth is shedding light on his faith journey on Amazing Greats.

Music has been the cornerstone of your career. Can you tell me about your own personal journey with that?

Were you the songwriter of the group, or was everybody collaborating?

Jesse Butterworth

Yeah, I was a songwriter. That's something I've always loved.

I've always loved singing and performing, as part of choirs and musical theater and things like that throughout middle school and high school.

But as I mentioned before, it was when my parents divorced when I was a sophomore.

I didn't have my driver's license yet, and I would just kind of try to figure out, "How do I cope? How do I deal?"

So I actually picked up a guitar and taught myself how to play by listening to Beatles records—Abbey Road—and James Taylor.

I would sit there and kind of pluck and figure it out.

And this was way, way before the internet, so I just tried to find whatever music I could find and figure out what shapes I could play.

That was really kind of my deeper connection to that music because it helped me find my way in music.

Then I started writing songs.

They were terrible. Just terrible songs.

Nobody will hear those songs ever.

But you've got to start somewhere.

I started writing songs and found that it was fun. It was a great way of self-expression and processing through things.

Then in college, I met those guys and said, "Well, let's start a band."

I knew nothing about a band. I just knew bass, drums, a guitar and a singer, basically.

So that's what we got.

I was writing these songs, and some were actually okay and some were just terrible.

But we got better and honed our craft.

It's like if you ever hear a stand-up comedian talk about it—you figure out how a song works by putting it up live in front of people.

You can tell if something is going to resonate or if it resonates or not. Then you either make changes or move on and write something else.

We did a lot of that.

We had just as many failures as we had successes, but those failures really helped us become better musicians, songwriters and singers.

The Fast Rise of Daily Planet

Ric Hansen

And in the scheme of things, things happened pretty doggone fast.

Were you out of college when you got signed, or were you still in college?

Jesse Butterworth

We were fresh out of college.

Ric Hansen

Okay. So that was fairly amazing.

And your first album was called Hero, correct?

Jesse Butterworth

Hero, yeah, that's right.

Ric Hansen

Which is again a spin-off from the stuff that's on your wall over there.

So that was in the early 2000s. You got signed, and was your first release off of that album a hit?

Jesse Butterworth

Yeah.

If you've ever seen that old Tom Hanks movie That Thing You Do, it's sort of a classic now. The Wonders—they were basically on this incredible journey.

That was very close to our journey.

We were wide-eyed kids. We got to go into a real studio, and we had some studio musicians come in and augment some of the stuff that we were doing.

One of the guys was coming off playing with Garth Brooks, and he's playing bass, and we were just like, "Oh my gosh, this is incredible."

We had the time of our lives.

A guy named Reggie Hamm produced the album, and we all just got along great. We had a great time.

I think you can hear it in the music too. We enjoyed it.

Then we released that first song, and it went number one right away.

We were amazed.

Suddenly we were like, "Okay, what are we going to do?"

Ric Hansen

"We're rock stars now, right?"

Jesse Butterworth

Right.

We thought, "Let's go out and play to our throngs of people who are just waiting for us to go out."

Turns out they weren't.

You have to work to get out there and get the name out and make people connect the dots between the song and the artist and where you're playing and when you're playing.

Same as before: some successes, some failures.

We were living out on the road a lot—basically for three or four straight years, living in either a bus or a van, from A to B and then repeat.

The Hits, the Dove Awards and Pat Boone

Ric Hansen

Music is his passion and his true gift from God. Jesse Butterworth is with us sharing his story.

I think, as you mentioned, there were three kind of hit songs off the Hero album, correct? What were those?

Jesse Butterworth

Oh man, wait a minute, I have it.

"Flying Blind," "Everything Revolves," I think was the other one. And then "Six String"—or no, "I Live."

Ric Hansen

"I Live" was the other one. I didn't mean to throw you off there.

That's very cool that you met these guys. This thing happened quickly in the scheme of things.

At the time, you're probably thinking this is taking forever, but it was like what you kind of call an overnight success, really.

And then you got the nominations for the Dove Awards.

Jesse Butterworth

Yep. I didn't win a Dove Award.

A four-time Dove Award loser is what I like to say.

Ric Hansen

Yeah, and you don't get anything to hang on the wall for that.

Not only that, but you performed at the Dove Awards. Was it the 34th annual Dove Awards?

Jesse Butterworth

Something like that.

Ric Hansen

In crazy outfits that were like, I'm sure the audience was thinking, "What's going on here?"

Jesse Butterworth

We were wearing Dumb and Dumber-style suits—tuxedos with the big ruffled shirts.

I was wearing this giant sort of Willy Wonka-style top hat.

It was pretty funny because they seat you in certain areas based on when you're playing in the show.

I ended up sitting right next to Pat Boone. And next to him was Alice Cooper.

So we were sitting there just hanging out and chatting.

Afterwards they were like, "Hey, that was great," but they just never stopped giving me a hard time about what we were wearing.

Ric Hansen

Do you still have the purple top hat?

Jesse Butterworth

I don't, but I do have the suit jacket. I still have that suit jacket upstairs somewhere.

Ric Hansen

Wow.

Well, it's interesting that you mentioned Pat Boone because he was one of our guests on Amazing Greats at one point.

He told his whole life story, and he's an icon. He's been around forever. He was hanging out with Elvis and all the guys back in the day.

He was a great guest.

And I'm sure he mentioned me though.

Jesse Butterworth

Yeah, yeah.

Ric Hansen

He said, "You know who I sat next to at the Dove Awards? This guy looked like an idiot in a..."

So anyway, we also had Debbie Boone on as a guest.

We've had a couple of those musicians from the old days.

And you remember Barry McGuire from back in the day?

Jesse Butterworth

Oh, of course, yeah.

Ric Hansen

Well, he was another guest. He's a solid Christian now—not at the time, but is now.

Jesse Butterworth

Yeah, nice.

When we moved to Nashville, one of the things we learned is there's sort of a Nashville studio musician language.

One of them is when you ask for different fills from a drummer.

The most famous fill is called "Pat Boone, Debbie Boone."

So whenever you say "Pat Boone, Debbie Boone," that's the only thing I can think of:

"All right, give me a Pat Boone, Debbie Boone."

Twenty Years Later

Ric Hansen

It all comes full circle for sure.

I think one of the cool aspects of all of that was the fact that those guys are still friends.

I saw your 20th anniversary online chat—the same four guys that were in the original Daily Planet band.

Looks like you're still as jovial and fun as you probably ever were 20 years later.

That was very cool to see as well.

Jesse Butterworth

Yeah, it's great.

I keep in touch with a lot of those guys.

Ric Hansen

Are any of those guys doing music for a living?

Jesse Butterworth

Yeah, we've all—I mean, I'm still doing it—but the other guys have moved on, as far as I know.

The Injury That Changed Everything

Ric Hansen

You started out, and you've already mentioned one of your challenges, and that was early on.

That was the challenge of your parents splitting up and you having to deal with that at a young, tender age.

That must have been difficult.

But there were some other challenges as well, and one happened to be a performance challenge.

The parents' split was one of the problems, but the other split—the one that really changed your life in a lot of ways—was the actual performance split.

Tell us about that.

Jesse Butterworth

During every show—we actually started doing this in college and got a lot of notoriety for it—we started doing this thing called the "80s Medley."

We would take 20 songs from the era of the 1980s and put them all into five minutes, going one to the next to the next.

It was super fun. Everybody knows the songs and sings along.

I would always end with sort of this David Lee Roth-style split off of the drum riser.

We were in LA playing a show. It was kind of a hometown show from where we went to college. It was sold out.

I jumped off the drum riser and did the splits, and this time I just landed funny.

My right leg ended up fully dislocating my ankle, shattering the bone into, I think, about 28 pieces or something crazy.

I kind of blacked out and came to, and my toe was pointed in the wrong direction.

I was like, "I think the show's over."

They carried me off the stage, and I got into an ambulance.

Little did I know that was going to be it.

I thought it was just sort of, "All right, put me in a cast."

We were actually playing Disney World a couple of days later. They do this big thing called Night of Joy.

So I told the guys, "Hey, get on the plane. I'll meet you guys there."

Little did I know that was not at all what was going to happen.

I had to have a few surgeries, and I couldn't fly back home to Nashville for weeks because of all the trauma and surgeries.

We had to cancel basically all of our tour dates after that.

I couldn't travel. I couldn't do much of anything.

I could barely walk.

Little did we know that was the end.

We got dropped by the label. We couldn't play any shows anymore.

It was just sort of like That Thing You Do—it was super fun, and then it's done.

When a Career Ends in a Split Second

Ric Hansen

And so at that point, because you were laid up and unable to perform, the band kind of went their own ways and you lost the record deal.

Jesse Butterworth

Yeah. We got dropped from the record label, couldn't tour anymore.

We ended up in this place where literally, in a split second, everything changed.

Ric Hansen

"Split second." I like it.

Jesse Butterworth

A split, split second.

So we had to figure out what to do.

The guys all kind of ended up spreading out and trying to figure out what's next.

I ended up moving to the Northwest. That's where my wife is from.

I grew up in California, but we ended up up here.

Then I became a worship pastor at a church outside Seattle called Overlake Christian Church.

It was the first time I was kind of in full-time church ministry outside of doing Christian music.

Ric Hansen

And that's how you made your living at that point.

The songwriting continued during that period of time?

Jesse Butterworth

Yeah, I never stopped writing songs.

Nashville's one of those places that you really have to be there in order to be seen and heard.

If you move away, it's really hard to continue to keep the attention of publishers and other artists.

But I still wrote songs and still got some placements—just not as much as before.

When Success Turns Into a Faith Question

Ric Hansen

He's a gifted musician, songwriter, father and follower of Jesus.

We're hanging out with Jesse Butterworth on Amazing Greats.

How did you reconcile that kind of turn of events with your faith?

Did you blame God for what was going on? How did you personally deal with that spiritually?

Jesse Butterworth

Honestly, I think that the way I tried to deal with it was by not dealing with it.

I was just sort of like, "It's okay. It's okay. We'll figure it out. This is probably better."

It wasn't as much that I blamed God.

I think I went into sort of a shame spiral.

"What did I do? What did I do wrong to end up here when we were on a path that seemed like it was going really well?"

It's interesting to go from being in a really broken place and then into leading people spiritually, especially being young.

Authenticity is a huge value of mine.

I always try to be authentic, but you can kind of only be so authentic when you're leading because there's a fear that you could be too authentic and end up casting a lot of doubt in other people.

They might think, "Well, gosh, if he doesn't believe it, should I believe it too?"

So I think there was a lot of trying to find who I am and what I believe.

And then, how does that play out in front of people as well?

Worship Ministry and the Desire for Creative Freedom

Ric Hansen

So your career and your life at that point was being a worship leader at the church.

And in the back of your mind, were you still saying, "I really like writing. I like recording"?

Was that kind of a lingering thought that somewhere along the line you were going to do something with your gift?

Jesse Butterworth

Yeah.

I was still writing and recording at that time, and we released a lot of albums when I was there.

We did a lot of worship music albums that I was still writing.

So it never really stopped.

I think the thing that was happening in the back of my mind was that I was missing the freedom we experienced when I was in college playing clubs in LA.

There wasn't a feeling like the theological police were out there listening to your songs and trying to give you notes:

"Well, you said this, or you said that."

There'd be radio stations that would tell us they weren't going to play a song because we inferred something or got into some minutia of theology.

And then being in a really large church and writing songs, you still get angry letters from people and whatever.

I thought, "Man, I do miss that."

I missed the freedom of being able to go out and just play to people—play music and feel like it's really self-expression—as opposed to congregational music.

I still really like congregational music. I think that's a great thing.

But if that's the only thing you do, it can start to feel a little like you're handcuffed in one lane.

So I was really wanting to get out and explore the other side.

Jesse's Perspective on Contemporary Christian Music

Ric Hansen

Let's talk just a smidge about your long history in the Christian music genre.

Christian music has blossomed over the last 10 years, a lot because of radio. Radio stations across the country have picked it up as a format.

The format has become strong, ratings are good, advertising is good, fundraising is good, and streaming has made the product available to anyone, anywhere.

What's your overview of contemporary Christian music now?

It's certainly a whole different thing than what you were doing back in the early 2000s.

Jesse Butterworth

That's a loaded question.

Here's the way I would answer that.

I think it serves a lot of people out there and that it is an incredible gift to people who don't see behind the curtain.

That's what I would focus on.

I'm really glad that happens.

I think I saw too much behind the curtain and still have friends in the industry. I know how it doesn't quite always match up the way people present on stage.

Again, authenticity is a big value for me.

I struggle sometimes knowing that a person is very popular and successful and they're borderline terrible people.

But that's what I'm saying: I think God can use anybody and anything.

That's why I'm so happy to know that so much of that music is a gift to people who are listening and really ingesting it—that it means something to their lives and that they are hopefully getting more intimate with God because of it.

There's just always going to be some kind of dark side to something.

I've been in ministry for a long time too.

A Church Plant, Adoption and His Wife's Health Journey

Ric Hansen

So challenge number three in your life—and you probably knew I was going to go here somewhere—is your wife's health issues.

She's challenged right now in this season of your life with some health things going on.

Can you share with us that part of your story?

Jesse Butterworth

I was a music pastor for seven years, and then my wife and I both felt called to start a church.

We planted a church in downtown Bellevue, just east of Seattle.

We genuinely started from nothing.

We had a group of about 12 people, and starting that church was extremely tough. It was a huge lift.

We also adopted our daughter from Ethiopia, and because of the way the timing worked out, we ended up adopting our daughter at the same time we were launching this church.

So there was a lot happening at once.

I was the lead pastor, and my wife was—I mean, if anybody knows ministry, especially early on, your spouse ends up kind of being everything.

She was incredible.

But then we started noticing that she was having a lot of chronic pain, unexpected weight gain and swelling.

We couldn't figure out what it was.

She went to several doctors and specialists here, and it actually ended up being an old neighbor she ran into at the grocery store.

Her name is Kim.

She started talking about her journey, and my wife said, "Oh my gosh, you're explaining everything I'm experiencing right now."

She said, "Oh yeah, it's something called lipedema."

Essentially, it's kind of a condition involving abnormal fatty tissue and the lymphatic system.

A lot of the symptoms can look like cancer.

We were very concerned for a while that she had cancer.

At that time, nobody in America was treating it, so we ended up going to a specialist in Germany three different times to be treated.

We had great results for a few years.

Then COVID hit, and COVID ended up reactivating the condition in her body.

So she kind of had it come back with a vengeance.

Since then, there is somebody in Tampa, Florida, who treats this, so we don't have to go all the way to Germany.

A year ago she had surgery for that, and she'll have two more surgeries over the next couple of years as we continue.

Ric Hansen

Singer, songwriter Jesse Butterworth is shedding light on his faith journey on Amazing Greats.

And is she feeling better?

Jesse Butterworth

She is.

Thankfully, she is.

There's definitely good days and bad days, but for the most part, she's trending up and to the right, which we're very grateful for.

Ric Hansen

Yes.

Hopefully the audience of our podcast here will be praying for her continued healing.

Sometimes at the end of your resources, the only place to turn is to God for assistance and help and guidance.

Abbey Road Studios: A Dream Come True

Ric Hansen

I don't want to not talk about your latest recording because one of your favorites was the Beatles.

So you went to where the Beatles were and recorded a new album.

Tell us a little bit about that project.

Jesse Butterworth

I had the opportunity to go record at Abbey Road Studios, which is obviously most famous for the Beatles recording so much of their catalog there.

Being in the room where it happened was just a dream come true.

I don't know how else to explain it.

When you know you're going to go somewhere, you're really trying to match your material to the place you're going.

I wrote a lot of songs and felt like, "It's not good enough. That's not up to the level of what we want to capture there."

It was one of the most magical weeks of my life.

We got to record, and every time they brought out a microphone or an instrument, I'd play this game with the engineer.

I'd ask, "Who is the most famous person to play this keyboard?"

He'd say, "Probably John Lennon or Paul McCartney."

I was like, "Wait, what?"

He'd say, "This is the piano they played on this song or that song."

They rolled in a very famous piano called Mrs. Mills. It's the tacky piano you hear on "Lady Madonna" and other Beatles records.

I'm thinking, "Why would you let me play this? This belongs in a museum, not with some hack out of Seattle coming to play it."

But it was fun.

They're famous for these microphones that are pre-World War II, and they have a guy on staff whose only job is to keep these microphones functioning.

Ric Hansen

Really?

Jesse Butterworth

They're a big part of the Abbey Road sound.

I remember asking him, "Who's the most famous person to sing into these?"

It was right when we were about to take a tea break in London.

He said, "Well, here, come out here."

He took me into a hallway that was full of pictures, and every picture was a person singing into that microphone.

Ella Fitzgerald, Nat King Cole, Elton John, the Beatles, Amy Winehouse, Adele, Stevie Wonder.

It was just this wall of fame.

Again, I'm thinking, "And somehow me?"

It was like a kid in a candy shop.

We hired some string players from the London Philharmonic, and they just killed it. Such professional musicians.

It was another dream.

The other funny part of the story is that when we went, they were starting to talk about COVID.

We were there for about 10 days, almost two weeks.

When we left, COVID was like, "Hey, this is becoming a thing."

Then it became, "Y'all better get home. This is a big deal."

We took the last flight out of London back to Seattle.

If we'd missed that flight, we would have been stuck in London for who knows how long.

It was like a zombie movie.

It was crazy because it was one of those big jumbo airliners, and I think I counted 24 people on the flight.

The Independent Musician

Ric Hansen

There was nobody.

It was creepy.

Were you assigned to a label when you went to do this recording, or did you just do it independently?

Jesse Butterworth

I've not been signed to a label since we were signed out of college.

I've done everything independently, which is nice because then you don't have other people telling you what you can and can't do.

You can explore different parts of music that maybe you wouldn't be able to otherwise.

I've either raised money through patronage—Patreon-type campaigns—or taken money from performing, set some aside and continued to put it back into recording.

"Our Good Days" and "After It Rains"

Ric Hansen

Well, the album is great.

I had a chance—I didn't listen through every song, but I listened through several and saw the videos.

I absolutely loved "Our Good Days."

It's a great song, but also because of your acting in that particular video, which was incredible.

Is there a favorite on the album for you?

Jesse Butterworth

I think my favorite song is called "After It Rains."

It was a song that I wrote for my kids.

The short version is that living in the Northwest, it rains a lot.

There's a smell right after it first rains. It's called petrichor.

People know that smell.

It's the smell after it rains.

I started doing this thing with my kids when they were younger.

I remember reading a study that said smell is the sense most closely related to memories.

That's why you can go into a middle school gym many years later and suddenly be flooded back with memories because of the smell.

It still smells the same.

So I started doing this thing with my kids.

We'd go outside, and if I smelled that petrichor scent, I'd stop them and say, "Hey, just take a second. Smell that."

They'd say, "It smells like it rained."

And I'd say, "Yeah, exactly."

Then I'd say, "Every time you smell that, I want you to remember my dad loves me so much."

We started doing this.

It got to the point where we'd walk out and smell that smell, and I'd say, "Hold on, you smell that?"

And they'd be like, "Yeah, Dad. We know you love us. Can we go now?"

It was kind of drilled into them.

I thought, "I'm going to write a song about it."

It's kind of a love note.

My oldest son is a sophomore at Washington State University, and he'll text me sometimes and say, "It rained," and he's thinking of me.

That's one of my favorites on the album.

What's Next?

Ric Hansen

So what's the next step with that album?

Has it been out for a while, or is it fairly recent?

Jesse Butterworth

Yeah, it came out a couple of years ago.

I actually have two albums I'm working on right now that are almost done.

I got to go back to Abbey Road and record another album. That's basically in the can, so we're just in mixing and tweaking mode right now.

And this last March, I got to go to Prague in the Czech Republic and record with the Prague Symphony Orchestra.

We got to do five songs with them.

Talk about a wow experience.

Sitting in a room with 70 world-class musicians, hearing all that sound moving around the room—it was incredible.

Another one of those mountaintop experiences.

Where Has Jesse Seen God Most Clearly?

Ric Hansen

As you tell your story, the spots where God landed—where God was there and guiding you through that experience—I can kind of identify them from my perspective.

One of them would be the Abbey Road experience.

The original experience was you as a young man getting the opportunity to sing.

Where would you say God has been most present in your life?

Jesse Butterworth

I 100 percent agree with you that God made a way for some incredible opportunities in my life.

He allowed me to go do things that I would have never dreamed as a 13-year-old kid trying to learn how to play guitar in my bedroom, listening to the Beatles and James Taylor.

I never would have dreamed that I would be in the same room where they were making that stuff happen.

Incredible things.

But to be honest with you, I feel like the most incredible experiences that I have regularly with God are just in regular old mundane things.

I get to pause and just be grateful for what He's provided.

I've got this incredible family.

I get to continue to do stuff that I love.

I get to be around people who are wonderful.

And I'm grateful for the really tough times—that we persevered and that we learned some of our best lessons through those times.

Closing

Ric Hansen

What a great way to end our conversation today.

It's a very inspiring kind of thing.

And thank you so much for what you do.

And thank you—in all transparency—you are the worship guy at my church in Gig Harbor, Washington, Harbor Christian Center.

That's a gift every single week.

So I appreciate that.

Thank you so much.

We'll be praying for your wife's continued healing and health, and for your projects along the way—your musical projects—that they might find some real followers, and for your continued success, my friend.

Thank you so much.

Jesse Butterworth

All right. Thanks for having me.

Ric Hansen

Jesse Butterworth—not an heir to the giant syrup family fortune, but he is a truly gifted artist with an amazing story.

We thank you for listening to Amazing Greats today.

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Have a great day, and God bless.