Amy Grant Announces 5/7 Release Date For How Mercy Looks From Here

Amy Grant announced that she will releasing a brand new album of new material called How Mercy Looks From Here on May 7. The project has taken a year from start to finish and features a handful of unannounced guest stars. The album will mark her first all-new album of new material in almost a decade.

The title song, “How Mercy Looks From Here,” was inspired by the Nashville flood. Grant’s home was one of only two on her street that wasn’t flooded.

“I worked on a house of a music friend of mine who said, ‘When the water in the house was up to our armpits, I had a standing lamp that was on. I can’t believe we weren’t electrocuted,’ ” she says.

That title song also references her father’s dementia – a story she shared last spring in People magazine. Her recounting of the former medical doctor’s struggle touched many readers who aren’t even Grant’s fans.

“Standing in the grocery store line, in the carpool line – I’ve gotten so much response from that. At Radio City Music Hall backstage, I hear, ‘I’m in the same situation,’ ” she says.

“It’s word salad and nonsensical, except phrases he’s had his whole life, like ‘I’m proud of you’ and ‘I love you,’ she says of his failing communication skills. “It really simplifies your connection with somebody when words are taken away.”

“I have a line in the flood song that’s about my dad and talking about loss – ‘A brilliant mind that fades away,’ ” she says. The subject is still so close to home she hasn’t addressed it in song much. “There are times in life where there’s too much to say.”

Amy Grant on WhoSay