At the beating heart of Nashville band Judah & The Lion is a story of a deeply loyal chosen brotherhood, dating back to 2011 when Judah Akers and Brian Macdonald became bandmates in college. Judah & The Lion’s newest and sixth album, I Am A Prism, came after a period of soul searching, and in the midst of a welcome joyous new life milestone: Brian becoming a father again. The last three albums have documented some personally heavy topics - mental health and depression (2019’s Pep Talks), heartbreak and divorce (2022’s Revival), and charting the stages of grief (2024’s The Process). On the other side of this trilogy of hard times and heartbreak, Judah & The Lion was at a creative crossroads. They took some time off, parted ways with their management, and asked themselves some tough but necessary questions.

Judah explains, “We wanted to get really honest with ourselves about those kinds of deep internal questions. What do we bring that no one else brings? Why do we wanna make another record? Not like we were wanting to quit, but it was just like, let's get back to the “why" of when we first started making music together. We do it because we want to help people. That's the heart behind this.”

“We use our music to propel us through hard things in life and shoot us forward into a more hopeful space, without ignoring the really tough parts of being human, and I think that is why our fans relate to it.,” Brian adds. “And I think defining why somebody is connecting, relating to the music that we're putting out was a really important thing for us to discover before we went into making I Am a Prism.”

Case in point, Judah & The Lion fans will likely recognize two songs on I Am A Prism from the band’s live shows last year - lead single “Maybe The Best Is Now” and the album’s midpoint track “Gravel Roads”.