Louder Than The Music

Ian Yates, a Christian worship leader and songwriter from Liverpool, UK, releases 'My World is on Fire' on 2nd August, the second single from his seventh album 'Kingdom'.

Yates says ‘This song is about looking at life and some of the things I’ve put on a pedestal or put my trust in that are now on fire. It's about looking at things I thought were holy, untouchable, or of significant meaning and being disappointed.

When working on this project 3 thoughts from Henri Nouwen’s book ‘In the name of Jesus’ struck me deeply. They were: The temptation to be relevant, The temptation to be spectacular, The temptation to be powerful.

As I pondered and sat with these for the last 3 years, I am aware of how many times I and others around me have fallen for these temptations. A lot of the songs on the project ask questions about this. This song asks 27."

Ian leads musical worship at his home church Bootle Elim and is part of Elim Sound, the national worship department for the Elim movement. Ian is married to Kate, they have 3 young children, Jackson, Elijah and Abiah.

His 2014 album DNA reached number 5 in the Official UK Christian Chart and won contemporary album of the year in NFN’s annual awards. In 2015 he co-wrote the song ‘No Longer I’ with 2-time Grammy winner Matt Redman which was recorded at Abbey Road Studios in London on Redman’s ‘Unbroken Praise’ album. In 2016 his song ‘Highwire’ reached number 1 in the UK Christian ‘AStep Fwrd’ chart. His 2020 album ‘Mystery’ was received with glowing reviews and his song ’Loved By You’ from that album has been streamed well over two million times.

Ian's sixth studio album ‘Between The Joy And The Sorrow’ was released in 2 parts. Part 1 dropped on June 24th 2022 with part 2 following on September 30th the same year. The album gained favourable reviews and the song 'God You've Never Failed Me' was added to playlists across the USA on Christian radio, whilst the title track received airplay on BBC Music Introducing.

His songs have been shared on over 41,000 Spotify playlists including Spotify's own New Music Friday Christian, Calming Christian, Indie Spirit and Ultimate Christian Alternative. He has received radio airplay across his native UK as well as Europe, USA, Canada, South America, and Australia, proving himself to be one of the finest artists and songwriters in the present UK Christian and Gospel music scene.