Another pivotal song on the record, “Ocean Wide,” was birthed through a series of wrecked relationships that Josh witnessed. “In the world today, a lot of marriages don’t succeed, and we make a lot of mistakes … God is forgiving of all those things, but it’s awesome that God’s love is not like that. He’s never going to tell us, ‘I don’t love you anymore.’ He’s never going to tell us, ‘I’m fed up with you; you’re getting annoying.’ But His love for us is forever, and it’s because that love is an ocean wide. It’s forgiveness and grace and mercy—all those things that make love last forever.”

In revealing their own stories, each of the guys seem to possess wisdom normally found only with more seasoned artists. Hardly the transparency one might expect from a band that’s famous for their face-time on MTV.

Brad continues to elaborate, painting a beautiful picture of the music they strive to create: “There’s an un-noble part of life where we are only seeing a small section of the things that are going on with us, and we think about the way God sets out our time. The image that we have is God moving pieces around to teach us something or set something up so we will learn something later, and sometimes the things that we go through are amazingly difficult. But you come through that and you see that, Okay, that fell into place here and that fell into place there and sort of worked out so I will be where I am now. …”

But don’t fool yourself into thinking that the new record is all dark and thoughtful and multifaceted. Leave it to The Afters to do what they do best—lighten the mood.

Enter “MySpace Girl,” a song about their former bass payer who met a girl at In-N-Out Burger, looked her up on MySpace and ended up marrying her about six months later. The couple has been happily married for a year now and actually assists with the handclaps on the song. Forget MTV, with this song, the guys have dibs on VH1:  “Maybe when they have ‘Remember the 2000s,’ when they flashback to the music, they’ll remember the MySpace era, and then they’ll remember the MySpace song,” Josh jokes.

From the serious to the comical, the band clearly stretches itself—both musically and lyrically—on the new record, and fellow artists are already taking note. Among them, Skillet’s Ben Kasica: “[OK is my] favorite record since Switchfoot's Beautiful Letdown. The songs have the hooks and heart that will grab people immediately.”

Hooks and heart. That’s what The Afters are all about…and they want to make sure no one is excluded from the message.

“We want people to know that our faith is the most important thing in the world to us,” says Josh. “We’re Christians, but we make music for everybody. We’re never ashamed of our faith. God has opened the door for us to be able to talk about that in all kinds of places, even MTV. …”

“Beautiful Love” may have been where it all began, but The Afters are interested in more than just another smash single—they’re out to bring a message of transformation to the world. Let’s face it, they’re leaving OK in the dust.

© 2008 CCM Magazine.  All rights reserved.  Used with permission.  

**This interview first published on April 9, 2008.