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Coby and the Prisoners began in 2012 during some downtime between projects for songwriter and founder Coby Hartzler. Having grown up in a fairly conservative small town, with religion starkly at the focus, Hartzler began to question what he was being fed. Similarly, small-town America rejects the idea that a grown man can continue to pursue the art of music as something more than a teenage hobby. For Hartzler, his music is a way of clawing back at some of these ideas.
Hartzler’s latest album, I Imagined A Window, was born at the end of a year-long transition for his family. He quit his day job to stay at home with their 3-year-old. They sold their house and bought the cheapest house they could find to fix up. Hartzler was cutting a deal with the world, one where he will trade money for more time for the things he cares most about. It was a hectic period, but it ultimately bore one of the most freeing and creatively productive times for Hartzler.
His previous album, Everyone, was the start of this transition. Still in the chaos of life, working a 9-5 job, Hartzler was trying to fit music in any free space he could. I Imagined A Window was the payoff of that transition. “To me, it is proof that it all worked,” Hartzler says. “We have found ourselves at an easier pace in life.”
