MercyMe

MercyMe was formed in 1994 in Greenville, Texas where lead vocalist Bart Millard turned to music and fulfilled his passion for serving the Lord after being injured playing football. Bart was raised in a Christian home, but did not necessarily have an Christian example when he was growing up. His family went to church, but lived in a highly dysfunctional home. Millard's father was diagnosed with cancer and went to be with the Lord during his freshman year of college. Not long after, Millard's former youth pastor invited him to move to Florida where he dug into a church working with the youth group and leading worship.

The band started slowly, performing mostly at churches as they traveled around the country. They eventually relocated themselves to Oklahoma City and continued writing and touring. They took their career to the next level when they moved to Nashville and immersed themselves in the culture that is Nashville. They learned about the music business and how it operated. They also researched music recording and production, and eventually Invested in a home studio. With this new knowledge they were able to release 6 CDs independently. It was these songs that got them noticed and landed them on tour opening for Audio Adrenaline.

In 2001, MercyMe signed with INO Records, and their first major release was the single song, "I Can Only Imagine". In 2002, MercyMe won a Dove Award and "I Can Only Imagine" was given the honor Song of the Year. This launched the band into major tours and pushed them towards writing yet another album. Later in the year the band released Spoken For which quickly climbed the charts. They quickly turned around and released, Almost There in 2003 In

2004 was a remarkable year for MercyMe. They not only released yet another album, Undone, but they were named Artist of the Year and Group of the Year. It was during this year that the band expanded, adding new guitarist, Barry Graul, to the band. They used this as an opportunity to experiment and expand their sound.

In 2005, MercyMe set out on tour with up and coming acts like Jeremy Camp, The Afters and Monk and Neagle. After coming off such a big tour the band put out their very first Christmas album, The Christmas Sessions and went out touring with Steven Curtis Chapman. It was during this time also that Coming Up to Breathe was being written.

In 2006, Coming up to Breathe released and landed at No. 13 on the Billboard Top 200. This was the first album that truly displayed the bands new direction as a rock band. They later toured the album with Phil Wickham and the band they first went out with, Audio Adrenaline.

2007 and 2008, were a relatively slow years for MercyMe, only putting out one album each year. All That is Within Me turned out to be the bands one true worship album and Coming Up To Breathe: Acoustic was a re-release of the bands previous album in an acoustic version.

2009 was a milestone year for MercyMe. They released their first compilation CD of all their songs, including ones from their independent releases.

On May 4, 2010 MercyMe will release their 14th album, The Generous Mr. Lovewell.

Listen to MercyMe Here