Steve Hess & Southern Salvation Reveal the Stories & Passion Behind "God Still Delivers"

Steve Hess & Southern Salvation have completed their brand new album, 'God Still Delivers', and the buzz from some industry folks is that not only is this the best project the group has ever done, it's one of the best Southern Gospel projects they've heard recently.

Producing the album was a team effort between Steve Hess and Mansion Entertainment's John Mathis. The list of songwriter contribution to the project reads like a Who's Who in Southern Gospel Music with names like Dianne Wilkinson, Rebecca Peck. Sue C. Smith, Rusty Golden, Marty Funderburk, Tony Wood and others.

'God Still Delivers' releases digitally world-wide on March 31st, 2017 and the first radio single from the album, "How Great The Debt", will debut on Paul Heil's, The Gospel Greats on April 8th. "How Great The Debt" was written by Dianne Wilkinson and Rebecca Peck and the release will have Les Butler of Family Music Group representing the song to radio.

Q: Steve thanks for doing this interview with us. Let's start with yourselves, who is Steve Hess and Southern Salvation?

Thank you, we are Steve Hess baritone, John McCall tenor, Jay Arview lead. We are three men that love the lord Jesus, and use this music to tell everybody we can the good news, Jesus Saves!

Q: How would you describe your style of Southern Gospel? What sets you apart from the countless trios and quartets out there?

I think every member of each group, brings his or her experiences, taste, texture, gifts and background to a group. The group becomes the sum of all of those parts. That's really a great thing, because it means with each group as they combine all of those wonderful pieces, they create the one identity that is unique to them. So when you hear our albums, or see us live, you're seeing that combination of gifts that defines our sound. As to the group's mission, everyone has an aspect to ministry that fits them. We never assume everyone knows Christ as there savior, so we sing the gospel, we never assume everyone is doing great, so we encourage. We seek excellence in every part of the group, we work hard and pray harder, and then lay it all at the cross.

Q: I was listening to your brand new album "God Still Delivers" and I love it immensely. What were your goals while you were making this record?

WOW!!! Thanks so much, we are really proud of this project. There were a lot of goals going into this project. First that every song had a message that was real and mattered. Musically we really wanted to stretch, we wanted to record the songs in a way that really spoke to what each of us bring to the table, we love to sing together, and we wanted the vocals to show that. We love huge ballads, so that had to be there, I sang a type of music called Jive for many years, so I wanted to visit that stylistically in an honest way on one song. We wanted a project that spoke to as many people as we can, and we tried to mix it up and make it fun to listen to and above all, we wanted to see God's anointing from the fist note to the last. With this project we wanted to reach as many people as we could.

Q: My favorite song is also the song you co-wrote entitled "Watch Them Giants Fall." How did this song come about?

We spend thousands of hours on the road together. We share in each other's triumphs and battles. While going through the recording process, John our tenor was dealing with caring for his mom, who was in the last stages of health battles until she won permanent victory and is now with the lord. We started talking about that and other things we faced, it seemed there were Giants everywhere we looked. If you know the lord and the word, when the word Giants come up, the conversation quickly goes to David. We realized that David had God on his side, He had the sling and the rock, but the giant still stood until he threw the rock!!! The song is saying, when you face things you don't understand, throw the rock of faith, stand firm on the promises of God, and the Giants will fall. Makes me wanna' shout... The promises of God are yes and amen, but we have to step out... and mean business with God, he will never let us down.

Q: What are you most excited about this new album?

The Album has really caught the attention of a lot of people, and in live dates folks are really responding, all of that means more and more people hearing the group, which means more and more chances to sing the message, again that's what we are about.

Q: You sing about God's deliverance on the album, can you relate a story from your own life where you witnessed God's deliverance?

God has been miraculous in all three of our lives. I was raised in church and singing gospel music my entire youth. As years went by I was in secular music on the road 300 days a year for years. I was lost, had addiction problems, a life shattered by circumstance, while at the same time achieving more and more of what I thought I wanted and becoming daily more miserable. When I could not run from God any further, thanks to the prayers of my family and my wife, I surrendered my life to Christ, He changed me, and fixed me and gave me the calling of this group. In the case of John as an angry teenager, he was in a terrible motorcycle accident, the doctor told Johns mom," He's gone say your good buys", Johns mom entered the room and prayed for John, he sat up and started talking "and hasn't stopped since" In Jays case during the birth of their child, the nurse said there is no heartbeat, the family began to pray, and they have a great healthy happy boy today. We share all of this, not to lift us up, but to say.. We serve a mighty God, He loves each of us, and his mercy, love and his power are beyond anything we can imagine... if You need him right now, he stands ready.

Q: For our readers who may want to get to know more about you and/or purchase your new album, where can they go?

We can be found at www.southernsalvation.com from this sight, you can visit our Facebook and you tube page, see tour date and see and hear the group Our new project on the "Mansion Entertainment Label" is entitled "God Still Delivers" and is available all over the world at most all online retailers.

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