This Whole World Is Your Home

Back in August of 2022, I discovered The Collection. They played Songbyrd Music House in DC and I was hooked. Based out of Saxapahaw, North Carolina, the indie-pop band blew me away with their energy, soul and moving lyrics. Flash forward to last Friday night. The band returned to the area with another fantastic show at Jammin’ Java - more on that soon. 

A couple weeks ago, I was lucky enough to correspond with lead singer/songwriter David Wimbish to talk about the band, their new album and the tour.

The Collection as a project name has been going for 11 years. It’s taken a lot of different forms in that time, starting out as a project Wimbish recorded in his dorm room in college. He was super into artists like Sufjan Stevens and Anathallo at the time, so he made albums where he recorded as many instruments as he could. The evolution of the band has changed quite a bit since then. The band started touring in 2016 and went from an average of 15 people onstage to seven (in order to be able to afford touring). After several lineup changes, it kind of congealed into a more intentional six-piece band the last several years that allowed them to make albums in a more collaborative way.

The new album, Little Deaths, has a beautiful soul. These are songs that resonate and stick with me, probably forever. Wimbish spent years writing the album. “Writing was a long process, honestly around growing.” He was pushed by their new manager to take longer and is glad she did push. “I can’t just settle on a song being good enough. I think a lot of my memories around writing it are these spaces of ‘Does this song scare me?’ and ‘Am I being honest enough here’. If the song wasn’t stuck in his head for a week, it wasn’t going to be good enough.”

That bled into the recording process as well. They worked with producer Jeremy Lutito (Joy Oladokun, Devon Gillfillian, Needtobreathe) who kept them on their toes, trying things they weren’t used to in the studio. “It was a very ‘in-the-moment’ creative process that was so fun”. What was his intention with the new songs? “I definitely had an intention to make these songs stick with the listener,” said Wimbish. “But my hope in that was that these could stick with people in healing, companionative ways, and not ways that are just ‘hopefully this song is a banger.’” He feels lucky to have any sort of platform at all, and thinks that the last few years have been a big shift in realizing, “if I have a platform, I just want it to be used as a space to help people feel less alone”. That was his total goal in this album.

Getting deeper into his songwriting, I asked David about his process. How much time does he put into writing songs? Do most come easily? The short answer is - “it’s so different for every song”. Generally, the songs of theirs that have clicked in the best have almost been “lightning-strike” moments, where the entire song pops into his head in minutes and is done. “That was true for ‘Medication’, ‘Beautiful Life’, ‘In Love With Your Soul’ and ‘You Taste Like Wine’”. “They hit me immediately and I usually know as soon as I’ve written it like, ‘yep, that’s the one’”. 

And for Wimbish, writing is “like a container for processing emotion”. For me, the listener, I take music and songs the same way. Listening to music, especially songs that hit me emotionally, they can help me process what’s going on in my life. Many songs by The Collection check that box including “Spark of Hope”, “Won’t Stop Yet” and “In Love With Your Soul”. 

As for the tour, audiences should expect an emotional roller-coaster. “I feel like our set is full of energy, fun, goofiness, but also seriousness, intention and community,” said Wimbish. This is the last tour as a full band - they’re undergoing a shift after this record and tour. “I hope people can expect to be a part of a bigger, new family at our shows.”

That’s just what I experienced last Friday night at Jammin’ Java. A sense of belonging and a community. The energy and emotion from the band was amazing. The show focused on the new album, while The Collection threw in some older favorites that were real crowd pleasers.

“Rain It Down” and “Firehose”, both off of Little Deaths were a great back-to-back, early in the setlist. “Rain It Down” explodes through the speakers with a booming chorus and a wall of sound, while “Firehose” has a more relaxing swaying sound that’ll make you bop along. (“Firehose” was one of the new songs Wimbish was most excited to play live). 

Some of their older work were huge crowd pleasers, like “Rose-Colored Glasses” and the gorgeous “Sing of the Moon” - which provided a great opportunity for the enthusiastic crowd to sing their lungs out. 

Along with David on lead vocals/guitar/keyboards, I can’t say enough about the other members of the band, their instrumentation and the sheer joy of playing. Guitarist Joshua Ling has some serious chops and provides some excellent backing vocals. Bassist Hayden Cooke lays down some mean licks while immersing himself into the music at almost a frenetic pace. The new keyboard player added fantastic backing vocals along with beautiful instrumentation. Drummer Joshua Linhart keeps a steady beat, whether it’s subdued for more low-key songs or standing to drum and drive the up-tempo songs. Graham Dickey’s joy while playing horns and bells is a spark of joy adding to each and every song (as a former horn player - I love it when it’s added to pop songs). 

Other highlights from the night included the emotional “Medication”, “Spark of Hope” and the true crowd pleaser “You Taste Like Wine” which had everyone dancing and singing along. The show ended with a gorgeous rendition of “Beautiful Life” with only David on acoustic guitar and vocals. I say only, but that doesn’t capture the beauty of the moment. Wimbish stood in the middle of the audience, surrounded by all of us and the band members. We sang, we smiled, we felt something - at least I did. It was a beautiful way to close out a beautiful night.

The Collection are a gift - they’re a band that I love and I will shout it from the rooftops to anyone who will listen. Their songs are emotional and meaningful and give me all the feels. Their live show is not to be missed. “This whole world is your home” is a lyric from the song “Beautiful Life” and it truly describes the shared experience of the audience at a Collection concert. When you’re there, you’re at home. Their Little Deaths tour runs through the end of October. Check out to see if they’re anywhere near you and go see them.