Philip Joel Urry, known by his stage name Phil Joel, is a New Zealand musician and the bassist for the Christian rock groupNewsboys.
Background
Philip Joel Urry was born in Auckland, New Zealand. He was lead singer and guitarist of the popular New Zealand band Drinkwater. Although he had little experience with the instrument, the Newsboys offered him a position as bassist in August 1994. He also sang background and some lead vocals for the band. In June 2000, he released his first solo album, Watching Over You, on Inpop Records. This release was largely autobiographical. He supported this album with the Strangely Normal Tour accompanied by LaRue, Luna Halo, Earthsuit, V*Enna & Katy Hudson. His second solo album, Bring It On, was released in November 2002 also on Inpop. His third album, The deliberatePeople. album was released on 18 November 2005 in conjunction with Phil and Heather Joel's newly founded Christian ministry, deliberatePeople. The album was praised for its stripped down rock, reminiscent of the Jesus Music era of Christian Music. His wife, Heather, is a former host of All Access and Hit Trip on CMT. He met Heather at a radio station in her native Kansas when he'd only been in the country six weeks. They were married in 1996 and have two children. In December 2006, Joel announced that he would be leaving the Newsboys in order to devote more time to his family. In September 2008, Joel released his fifth solo CD titled The New Normal, which was his third self-produced album. When Phil left Newsboys after 13 years, it wasn’t long before the phone started ringing and ministry opportunities began to emerge throughout the United States, New Zealand, Australia and even China. "Early on, I was asked to lead worship for a series of youth conferences. At first I wasn’t sure if I was the man for the job. I knew I wanted to be involved in more hands-on ministry, but worship leading wasn’t on my radar." His experiences at these youth conferences ended up igniting a passion in him for the next generation, and in 2011 the foundation for his current project, Zealand, was laid at one such conference. Since then Zealand has taken part in major tours and festivals across the country, while continuing to make youth camps and conferences their priority. In December 2017 it was announced that Joel would be joining his former Newsboys band mates on the year-long Newsboys United tour, where he would be pulling double duty, performing a full set with Newsboys, as well as Zealand. Joel's debut book, Redwoods & Whales, was released by Thomas Nelson on 16 April 2019.
