For King & Country

“The beauty of having our father in that role is that we trust him,” Joel told Pollstar of David Smallbone, who got his start promoting concerts in their homeland of Australia. “He’s a great man, an honorable man and conducts business in a very reasonable way.”

Reasonable might be an understatement. The Nashville-based duo made a splash as opening act on major Christian arena tour Winter Jam in 2012. So the reasonable thing was to route the band’s headline tour directly into their fans’ home turf: church.

“A lot of these churches are really beautiful venues – large, with great seating,” Joel said. “There’s this whole world of great venues that a lot of people sidestep, just because of a certain religious affiliation.”

At press time the duo’s current “You Matter Tour” of mostly large churches has sold out 17 of 21 dates, with an average of 2,000 tickets sold, according to the band. And one of the non-sellouts was 6,000 seats at a monster Louisville church that holds 9,000.

“The beautiful thing about doing shows at these venues is that we can keep costs down,” Joel said. “You sidestep a lot of the expenses that you have with a 9,000-seat arena, that end up driving ticket prices way up.” This means the band can offer VIP packages with meet-and-greet experiences for less than $30.

That ethos seems to resonate with fans (340,000 “likes” on Facebook), who have embraced the group’s vibrant uplifting “music about the human experience.” That just happens to include God for the faith-based musical family of seven children, one of whom is fellow musician Rebecca St. James.

Up next for For King & Country is a month and a half off, “for the first time in the band’s career,” followed by Winter Jam 2015 hitting major arenas on the East Coast and Midwest through March. Festivals are planned for the summer, with a headline tour likely in fall “in arena settings with the same business model and low price point,” Joel said.