Christian Metal Meets the Metaverse
Andrew Schwab spent four years writing a novel about a tech company that offers to upload your soul and let you live forever. He thinks most people would take the deal.
The question in the book started during COVID, watching the world his kids were going to grow up in. Take digital salvation with a guarantee, or trust a God you can't taste, see or touch. "I think most people would sign up for the first thing because it's guaranteed. And what if that is the great delusion?" He also told us something that didn't show up anywhere in our research. He isn't part of a local congregation. He leads a church on Discord every Sunday, and it doesn't even have a name. Why he built it that way is the rest of that conversation.
Andrew started Project 86 in Orange County in 1996, signed with Tooth and Nail, and put out the first record in 1998. Ten albums later he announced a final chapter and wrote I Need Truth, a memoir about the whole run. Then came P86:OMNI, a darker, heavier double album with electronic elements, seven music videos and a companion novel. He's also 426 episodes into the band's podcast.