Joel and Luke Smallbone's the most beautiful colours arrives September 18 with deeply personal songs about marriage, family, failure, aging and finding the light of Jesus in life's broken pieces
for KING + COUNTRY are turning their family history into their most personal album yet-and they are bringing an unexpected celebrity guest along for the emotional ride.
Brothers Joel and Luke Smallbone will release their fifth studio album, the most beautiful colours, on September 18, 2026, through Curb Records. The 10-track collection marks their first full album of original studio material since 2022's What Are We Waiting For? and features appearances by their wives, a moving tribute to their father and a startlingly autobiographical collaboration with Jessica Simpson.
The duo describes the project as its "most joyful & optimistic record yet," but this is not happiness that ignores hardship. Instead, the most beautiful colours explores what happens when marriage requires work, parents grow older, dreams collapse and life looks nothing like the future once imagined.
"Alive with global sights and sounds and a dedication to the message of Jesus," the album combines the brothers' bombastic rhythms and uplifting lyrics with a reminder that miracles may be unfolding within the ordinary details of everyday life. Its central invitation is to see those details "through the lens of heaven," reflecting Jesus as the Light of the World even when circumstances appear fractured. Preorder the album here.
The biggest surprise comes on "My Mosaic," which features Jessica Simpson. Yes, that Jessica Simpson.
Rather than giving the singer and fashion mogul a fleeting celebrity cameo, "My Mosaic" reportedly allows Simpson to confront her own heavily publicized history. An advance review says the song begins by addressing what it was like to have her marriage shown on reality television-an apparent reference to Newlyweds: Nick and Jessica, the MTV series that turned Simpson's marriage to Nick Lachey into public entertainment before their 2006 divorce.
The song reportedly places those painful and exposed pieces within a larger mosaic, asking whether God can create beauty from a life that did not unfold according to plan. Simpson's performance has been described as genuinely autobiographical, with her powerhouse voice given room to stand beside the Smallbone brothers rather than being reduced to a promotional gimmick. Read CCM Magazine's advance assessment.
The Smallbones also bring their marriages directly into the music. "Ever & Ever Before" features Joel's wife, artist MŌRIAH, and Luke's wife, Courtney Smallbone. With both couples singing together, the tender love song offers a much more intimate side of a duo better known for towering drums, cinematic staging and arena-sized declarations.
The romantic track has all the ingredients of a future Christian wedding favorite, but it also fits the album's larger argument: lasting love is not merely a dramatic feeling. It is a choice repeatedly made amid aging, pressure, disappointment and change.
Family takes an even more poignant turn on "A Good Man," Joel and Luke's heartfelt tribute to their father, David Smallbone. The song returns to the man whose courage, business failure and decision to relocate his family from Australia to America formed the heart of the brothers' 2024 film Unsung Hero.
Built around more reflective acoustic sounds, "A Good Man" examines the legacy a father leaves and the kind of husbands, sons, brothers and fathers Joel and Luke now hope to become. It turns the Smallbone family story into a spiritual question: when the applause stops and public success fades, what does it really mean to have lived as a good man?
Musically, the most beautiful colours may be for KING + COUNTRY's most wide-ranging project. Its songs move through global rhythms, organic percussion, towering Christian-pop choruses, synthesizers, musical-theater flourishes, acoustic reflection and even flashes of early-2000s boy-band energy.
The album opens with "World On Fire," the explosive Taylor Hill collaboration that launched the duo's latest era. "Miracle" follows with unabashed optimism and a scale reminiscent of The Greatest Showman, while "What If I Told You?" reportedly turns toward heavier textures and energetic pop. Other titles include "Alle," "Thank God," "Loved" and the closing title track.
A 13-track bonus edition will add three alternate recordings: "Cornerstone (From The Emerald Isle)," "Miracle (From The Emerald Isle)" and "Thin Air (From The Emerald Isle)." The album will also be offered digitally, on CD, on standard black vinyl and as an online-exclusive colored A-side/B-side vinyl.
Joel and Luke will celebrate the record with The Most Beautiful Colours Album Release Tour, beginning September 24 in Spokane and traveling through 16 cities in the United States and Canada. The intimate run will include Vancouver, Seattle, Red Rocks, Las Vegas, Los Angeles, Phoenix, San Diego, Baltimore and Boston, with several performances already sold out or reporting limited availability. Tour dates and tickets are available here.
"Our new forthcoming album, The Most Beautiful Colours, is our most hope-filled yet," Joel and Luke said when announcing the tour.
That hope does not come from pretending that families never struggle or that faithful people never experience broken dreams. It emerges from looking again at marriage, fatherhood, failure, grief and even tabloid scars-and trusting that Christ can illuminate colors hidden within every shattered piece.
the most beautiful colours Track List
- "World On Fire" featuring Taylor Hill
- "Miracle"
- "What If I Told You?"
- "Alle"
- "Ever & Ever Before" featuring MŌRIAH and Courtney Smallbone
- "Thank God"
- "A Good Man"
- "My Mosaic" featuring Jessica Simpson
- "Loved"
- "The Most Beautiful Colours"
Bonus tracks:
- "Cornerstone (From The Emerald Isle)"
- "Miracle (From The Emerald Isle)"
- "Thin Air (From The Emerald Isle)"
