Matthew West's whirlwind 'Live Forever' promotion

Earlier this week, Matthew West kicked off the release of his new album Live Forever with an unusual promotion that began at midnight April 28 and ran through 11:59 p.m. He went on a non-stop "24 shows in 24 hours" event around his hometown of Nashville.

Based on the album's theme of time, "I wanted to do something that illustrated the theme of this record," West shares. "86,400 seconds are in every 24 hours. Every second is a gift, and time is precious. So how can we make the most of the time we have? How can we make a memory and leave a legacy?"

West spent his 86,400 seconds of April 28 performing for the children and their families at Tri-Star Children's Hospital, doing the weather and serenading the morning show of a local news station, visiting and performing at The FISH Radio, Teen Challenge, ASCAP, Waffle House, Grand Ole Opry, Country Music Hall of Fame, Lifeway, a full-band acoustic concert at ClearView Baptist Church and he called into various Austrailian and New Zealand radio stations to do interviews and perform, where he also found out his single, "Day One," went No. 1.

Additionally, he sang the national anthem at the Belmont vs. Vanderbilt baseball game and  sang Happy Birthday to a fan who tweeted him first in a contest. West capped off the day with a performance at Barnes & Noble, which was the site of his first ever artist performance in 1999.

The #24in24 began at Wal-Mart where West met fans and bought a few of them the album, which can be seen here from K-LOVE's exclusive video footage. The day wrapped by getting back on his tour bus to continue on his Live Forever spring tour, hitting numerous cities across the U.S. The entire event was captured by K-LOVE TV whose crew followed West around the entire day, capturing each moment to air as a series exclusively for the network. Details of the airing of the series will be announced shortly.

Live Forever (Capitol CMG) was produced by Pete Kipley (MercyMe) and continues West's mission to tell a story of a different kind with his music – to transform listeners’ stories into life-changing songs.

It came together by West digging deeper into more than 40,000 stories shared with him from people all over the world - stories that six years and three albums later have had a profound ripple effect - beginning with 2010’s The Story of Your Life then followed by Into the Light in 2012. While preparing for the new album, West’s greater goal was to create songs full of joy and life, not just life on earth - but life that is to come.

“It was important this time around to say that there is joy in this life,” West shares. “With so much defeat all around us, people need to know there is victory. Maybe my job in reading a lot of these desperate stories is to extract the hope...This was a very decisive album, in that way.”

West also wanted to acknowledge that no one has a perfect story. “I’ve always had this desire to connect to the hearts of people through the songs that I write. But the past six years have kind of ruined me for ordinary. It’s at such a deeper level now because nothing is more meaningful than sitting down to write songs from these stories. And it’s freed me up. I’m just not interested in songs for hits sake. As long as people write to me, I’ll keep writing their songs, pointing people to the greater story.”

Track listing:

1. Live Forever
2. Day One
3. The List
4. World Changers
5. Grace Wins
6. Tryin’
7. Mended
8. Anything is Possible
9. Born For This
10. Oh, Me of Little Faith
11. Heaven Is The Hope
12. Day One (Acoustic)/bonus track
13. Homecoming (bonus track)
14. Untold (bonus track)