Christian singer/songwriter Matthew West chatted with BREATHEcast about his upcoming album, Christmas song, and being a fan of the Kansas City Royals. In part one of our interview, he shares the details of his Lorde cover and helping a fan with cancer.

As the Kansas City Royals were having their incredible run through the playoffs, West put out a version of Lorde's song "Royals" as a tribute for the team and never expected it to gain the ground it did.

"It started as just kind of a joke. I took a visit to the Royals stadium earlier this summer and we did a concert after the baseball game. I became a Royals fan because the general manager had come to see some of my shows the last few years and our families became friends," he explained, "I was asking him, I bet you guys play that Royals song all the time by Lorde in the stadium, and they were joking about it saying, 'We can't play it because the lyrics say, 'We will never be Royals'."

(Photo : Facebook: Matthew West)

It was then that the idea was sparked in West's mind to flip the lyrics to "We will always be Royals."

"I went and recorded that parody just for the team to hear and maybe they'd play it in the stadium," he said, "But then radio stations and FOX News and ABC in Kansas City started picking up the song in the story and started making their own videos to it. That's went it kind of took on a life of its own."

Watch the video below:

West continues to be one of the more well known songwriters in Christian music, and won several K-LOVE Fan Awards earlier this year.

The baseball team then helped West come to a more important discovery, a dedicated fan named Tim Grimes who had just been diagnosed with cancer.

"At the same time I met a man in Kansas City who is a life time Royals fan - grew up cheering for the team. He's 28 now, but he was just diagnosed with a terminal form of cancer and he only has about six months to live," he shared.

The actual ball club was supporting with their small "Win for Tim" campaign, and West knew he was being called to contribute in whatever way could as well.

"I found out the team had rallied around the young man because he did not have any help with his medical expenses. That's when the wheels began turning and I said, 'Hey, maybe this can go from just a goofy song to actually a way to monetize it and help raise some money for this Royals fan'" he explained.

The singer along with one of his band mates, AJ Pruis, recorded a song called "We Are the Royals" under the monicker of the MVP's. The song can be purchased here.

(Photo : Facebook: Matthew West)
Tim Grimes with Matthew West.

"I couldn't make money off of a parody of another song; that's what lead me to quickly turn around and right a new original song so I wouldn't get sued," he said laughing, "We put it up on iTunes, one of my band members sang it, again because there's all these restrictions when you have your own record deal. We just kind of jumped through some hoops to do what we could do to help a young guy out."

West was then asked why he thought America loved the underdog so much, especially with people rallying behind the Royals regardless of team affiliation.

"The Royals were the underdog, it's kind of interesting that I was trying to raise some money for another guy that I guess you can consider is kind of an underdog because he's fighting for his life. I think America loves to hear the story of the underdog because there's a little bit of underdog in all of us. We love to believe we can rise above disadvantages and really find somehow our way to victory," he said.

He continued, "For me in my career, it's always been, I love it when people tell me i can't do it because I'm going to go out there and prove I can do it and that it can be done. So there's a little bit of underdog in me which is why I cheer for the Royals and guys like that young man Tim."

Currently Matthew West is gearing up for his followup to Into the Light. He has gone through over 30,000 fan submitted stories and is building his album around that. Check back with BC tomorrow for part two of the interview where he delves into the creation of his upcoming album.