You likely know Malcolm better as a member of the Malcolm & Alwyn duo but he did have a solo album and this is it. After the second Malcolm & Alwyn album they went their separate ways with Malcolm moving to the U.S. to work with Maranatha music. This is the album that came out of that relationship. The album features many of the Gang from Calvary Chapel Cosa Mesa including almost all the members of Gentle Faith but with drumming duty being shared between John Mehler and Greg Gustafson. There were many others appearing but I won’t list them all because it would take quite awhile, there was that many of them. Anyway this was my first time hearing this album and while I do like the album it just doesn’t have the magic touch that Malcolm and Alwyn had when they worked together. It ha s a strong 70’s feel and like I say it’s pretty good but it really lacked a track that stood out and made me want to listen to the rest of the album. That said this is still a great 70’s album and it deserves a listen.
Tracklist 1 – When You Call – 3:45 2 – Morning Star – 3:05 3 – Broken Chains – 4:53 4 – Was It You My Love? – 3:50 5 – Dreams – 3:49 6 – Pride (Before A Fall) – 3:44 7 – The Best Is You – 3:04 8 – You’re The Reason – 3:45 9 – Love Is You – 3:14 10 – The Prize – 3:32
Credits Arranged By [Basic Track Arrangement Assistance] – Don Gerber, Henry Cutrona Arranged By [String Arrangements] – Colin Owen Art Direction [Inner Sleeve] – Neal Buchanan Artwork, Art Direction – Jim Shepard Co-producer – John Pac, Malcolm Wild Concept By [Cover] – Malcolm Wild Engineer – Chris Taylor, Colin Owen Mastered By – Bernie Grundman Photography By – Linda Dillon Photography By [Assisted By] – Gary De Lacy, Steve Churchill Vocals, Harmony Vocals – Malcolm Wild
Companies, etc. Phonographic Copyright ℗ – Pilgrim Records Recorded At – Maranatha! Studio Recorded At – The Old Smithy Recording Studio Mixed At – The Old Smithy Recording Studio Mastered At – A&M Studios
This is Bryn’s 4th album and while his previous album “Grand Arrival” was released in the U.S. I can’t find any record of this one being released outside of Europe and Japan. I was a big fan of Bryn in the 80’s but where I lived the only album available to us was “Pass It On” and “The Gap”. It is great that all these years later I can listen to his other work. This is a rather atypical album from Bryn and falls in line with most of his work. As such there aren’t any real outstanding track but I found Bryn’s version of the Righteous Brothers’ Unchained Melody pretty good but he did it as an instrumental and I think he should have done the vocals too.
Tracklist 1 – Keep The Ball Rolling – 4:02 2 – First Time – 3:52 3 – Let Me Love You – 4:22 4 – Standing On The Rock – 3:59 5 – City Boy – 6:00 6 – Party Girl – 2:12 7 – Luxury Liner – 3:29 8 – Unchained Melody – 4:02 9 – Unemployment Blues – 3:58 10 – Working For Love – 4:35
Credits Arranged By [Brass] – Lyle Harper Arranged By [Strings] – Ted Astley Baritone Saxophone – Bud Beadle Bass – Dave Markee Drums – Henry Spinetti Keyboards – Pete Wingfield Percussion – Simon Morton Producer – Doug Bennett, Jon Astley Saxophone – Jim Cuomo Saxophone, Flute – Mel Collins, Steve Gregory Trombone – Terry Hellyer Trumpet, Flugelhorn – Martin Drover Vocals, Guitar – Bryn Haworth
This album has a but of a strange history. It was recorded at Greenbelt obviously but Larry Norman released it in 2005 on his label. I don’t think Larry actually had the rights to this recording. Yes it was recorded back when Larry and Randy were getting along but in 2005 they were not doing business together. I have no idea how Larry decided he had the rights to this album but who knows what was said back in 1979. That said after Larry passed suddenly Randy owned the rights and released it himself in 2021. Anyway the version you will listen to here is a hybrid I worked over offering the best versions in my opinion. !979 was a great year in CCM music and this album displays that.
Tracklist 1 – Intro-One True Love – 4:41 2 – Keep Me Running – 5:43 3 – Teen King -4:09 4 – Lung Cancer – 4:26 5 – Venezuela – 3:10 6 – Through The Glass Darkly – 5:53 7 – The Great American Cure – 4:26 8 – You Really Got Me – 3:06 9 – Trouble Coming – 4:44 10 – Good News – 4:47 11 – Let That Tape Keep Rolling – 6:09
Bruce Cockburn is the greatest songwriter of all time! OK…that may be an exaggeration…but not by much. Along with being intensely prolific, Cockburn is also incredibly intelligent, diverse, creative, original, stark, honest, transparent, intriguing… When I was first hired as a 16 year old at a local Christian Bookstore I was already a “music expert” of sorts. I had begun collecting Christian music much earlier, first as “hand me down” albums from my parents and older brother and sister, and then using my allowance or money from odd jobs to buy my own. Then as I could save money I would ask my parents to drive me to Maranatha Village or other Christian bookstores in town to pick up the most recent releases from Sweet Comfort, Daniel Amos and Darrell Mansfield. My Youth Pastor subscribed to CCM Magazine and I subscribed to Camus Life, both of which had a heavy impact on my growing love and appreciation for the genre. My first few days at my new job was primarily an education in how the store worked, my responsibilities and dealing with customers. But the owner’s daughter was a music fan, especially of more cutting edge and controversial artists. On one of those first few days she took an LP of “Dancing in the Dragon’s Jaws” and placed on the in-store play system. As a fan of Bob Dylan I was immediately drawn to Cockburn’s nasally, borderline off-key vocals and compelling lyrical content. This birthed my fascination with Bruce Cockburn, an artist I have had the privilege of seeing in concert over 10 times and one of the few artists that I own every album he has released. My favorites remain those released between the mid-70′s and the mid-80′s. Cockburn had become a Christian at just about the time his solo career began despite being born and raised in an agnostic family setting. Cockburn’s Christianity would impact and influence his content from the earliest days. His brand of Christianity also informed his view of environmental and human rights issues. These two subjects, especially the latter, would be an integral part of his work. Like the previously discussed songwriter, Bill Mallonee, Cockburn has drawn criticism from evangelical circles for his subject matter and for his use of provocative language. But also like Mallonee there never appears to be an illicit purpose for the use of language, but rather an understandable inclusion of such language to express or prove a point. The subject matter, though, is quite often more provocative than certain linguistic choices. Leaning toward the political left, Cockburn has rubbed American evangelicalism the wrong way on more than one occasion. It should also be noted that Cockburn is quite the impressive musician. He is easily one of the finest acoustic guitar players around. His early work especially proved this point. One concert I attended was a solo concert in which 20 separate instruments were place behind him on the stage. That night he performed 20 songs using a different instrument for each song. I was later told be a friend that the following evening that the order of the songs remained the same but the placement and instrument choices on stage changed!
Contributor David Lowman – https://legacyccmsgreatestalbums.wordpress.com/
Tracklist 1 – Creation Dream – 4:00 2 – Hills Of Morning – 4:25 3 – Badlands Flashback – 6:12 4 – Northern Lights – 4:06 5 – After The Rain – 3:59 6 – Wondering Where The Lions Are – 3:42 7 – Incandescent Blue – 4:35 8 – No Footprints – 5:38
Credits Art Direction – Bart Schoales Bass – Robert Boucher Drums – Bob DiSalle Engineer – Gary Gray Engineer [Assisted By] – Frank Kitson Guitar, Voice, Chimes, Synthesizer, Dulcimer – Bruce Cockburn Lacquer Cut By – Cub Management [Direction] – The Finkelstein Fiedler Co. Painting [Cover] – Norval Morrisseau Photography By [Inside Photograph] – Christopher Dew Piano, Marimba – Pat Godfrey Producer – Eugene Martynec Translated By [Traduction Par] – Marcel Mousette Words By, Music By – Bruce Cockburn
Evie generally put out 2 or 3 albums a year 1979 was a year with 2 albums and of course this is one of them. I was very surprised to discover that this album contained Evie’s first ever CCM charting single. How did CCM magazine not recognize this artist earlier as her music was exactly what they loved. Anyway yes “Shine” made it to #17 on the CCM charts and it deserved to do better as it’s a pretty good song. Yes I said it was good because even though this isn’t my genre I know a good song when I hear one. Actually I’ve listened to a few Evie albums at this point and quite frankly this is the best one so far.
Tracklist 1 – Live For Jesus – 3:22 2 – Hold On – 3:45 3 – Special Delivery – 4:22 4 – Never The Same Again – 2:58 5 – This Life – 4:31 6 – Shine – 4:13 7 – At The River Of Jordan – 3:25 8 – Don’t Run From Reality – 3:57 9 – Home – 3:15 10 – You Have Everything In Your Hands / Jesus I Love You – 3:24
Credits Art Direction [Visual Consultant] – Anders Bühlund Backing Vocals – Christer Palm, Evie-Torngquist Karlsson, Inger Heinerborg, Pelle Karlsson Bass – Sam Bengtsson Cover – Dennis Hill Drums – Roger Palm Engineer – BBo-Göran Lundberg Flute – Björn J:Son Lindh Guitar – Hasse Rosén, Janne Schaffer, Lasse Westman, Pelle Karlsson Harmonica – Luciano Mosetti Keyboards – Kjell Ohman, Pelle Karlsson, Peter Ljung Lacquer Cut By – Ped Mandolin – Pelle Karlsson Oboe – Jan Holmgren Photography By – Labe Allwin Producer, Arranged By – Pelle Karlsson Steel Guitar – Janne Lindgren Strings [Members Of] – The Swedish Radio Symphony Orchestra
This was the one and only album from Writz but they have a long history of many albums from many different names. Writz was Bev Sage and Steve Fairnie, (Later to be the Techno Twins), Steve Rowles who was a member of Fish Co. with Steve Fairnie, along with Arry Axell, Jules Hardwick, and Nick Battle who did some work with After The Fire and Iva Twydell. Let’s further complicate things because Writz was actually called Famous Names for the purposes of their U.S. and Israeli audiences. Yes it’s a complicated story. Anyway they had a great B52’s, Devo sound and as near as I can tell were the only band doing this sound in this Genre. As I said they only had this album but even that’s a little complicated as they recorded an album using the name Famous Names but it never got released. I have that album and plan on releasing it later. It should be noted that they were supposed to play Greenbelt 79 but apparently for ego related issues they did not. Lucky for the fans because After The Fire played instead and had one of the best sets in the history of Greenbelt. Writz did however play Greenbelt 1980 using then name Famous Names.
Tracklist 1 – Night Nurse – 3:00 2 – Luxury – 3:20 3 – Swinging With The Reptiles – 3:50 4 – Drive Away – 3:30 5 – Super Heroes – 3:59 6 – Movies – 3:04 7 – Robberoni – 3:47 8 – Private Lives – 3:50 9 – TV Times – 5:07 10 – Muscle Culture – 6:06
Credits Arranged By – Writz Artwork, Design – Dobney Johnson Studios Bass – Nick Battle Drums – Arry Axell Guitar Synthesizer, Guitar – Jules Hardwick Photography – Paddy Eckersley Producer – David Rees Vocals – Bev Sage, Steve Fairnie Vocals, Guitar – Steve Rowles Written-By – Steve Fairnie, Steve Rowles
Companies, etc. Recorded At – Trident Studios Mixed At – Trident Studios Mixed At – DJM Studios Phonographic Copyright ℗ – Noeland Productions Ltd.
Apparently After The Fire played 3 years in a row at the BBC Paris Theatre, London, England. Luckily these appearances were recorded but they stayed on a shelf somewhere until Angel Air Records released them in 2009. You can buy the CD on their website below. ATF were an excellent live band and this is a great release. Thank you Angel Air Records.
1 – Joy – 3:17 2 – A Little Sun, A Little Rain – 3:11 3 – Laser Love – 3:05 4 – Time To Think – 3:31 5 – One Rule For You – 3:15 6 – Suspended Animation – 4:52 7 – Check It Out – 3:06 8 – Like The Power Of A Jet – 2:50 1980 In Concert 9 – Laser Love – 3:26 10 – Life In The City – 4:04 11 – Can You Face It? – 3:50 12 – Who’s Gonna Love You? – 4:14 13 – Billy Billy – 6:07 1981 In Concert 14 – Frozen Rivers – 4:06 15 – Dancing In The Shadows – 2:53 16 – Sailing Ship – 3:39 17 – Bright Lights – 4:09 18 – Take Me Higher – 7:06 19 – Starlight – 5:03
This is another one of those oddball Canadian bands on the Praise Label (Tunesmith, New Born etc…). It has an excellent seventies sound and would probably done pretty good but unfortunately it was stuck in the Praise records group who, well, I’ll just say weren’t always such a great friend of the bands they signed. Most tracks were written by Ron Badger who is still active in the music industry from his home in Regina Saskatchewan. Only have time for one track? “Victory Road” is the track for you. If you like the 70’s sound this is definitely one you need to listen to as I am willing to bet very few people have heard this one.
Tracklist 1 – Intro – 0:46 2 – It’s Real – 4:30 3 – Victory Road – 2:59 4 – I Gave To You – 4:29 5 – He’s Coming Back – 4:32 6 – Lord Of Lords – 4:07 7 – You’re Always Around – 5:33 8 – Whatr’e You Gonna Do? – 3:20 9 – God Bless You God – 3:35 10 – Joyful Blues – 3:35 11 – Outro – 0:35
Credits Jim Reid – Lead Vocalist Lori Anderson – Back-up Vocals, Acoustic Guitar Ron Badger – Guitars, Back-up Vocals Don McAreavy – Keyboards Brian Clark – Electric Bass Blaine Bonner – Drums
I truly believe that this album is one of the most important albums in the CCM genre. This was the introductory album from Servant and also the introductory for the Tunesmith record label. I vividly remember my first listen to this album and while there were some CCM Rock & Roll albums out already I would argue they weren’t quite what this album was with perhaps the exception of Gentle Faith. Servant formed out of a commune on Vancouver Island Canada called “Highway Missionary Society”. Several members came together to start a group called “Higher Ground” but quickly changed the name to Servant. it took a few years but the band struck a deal with startup record label Praise Industries. Somehow they got now famous producer Bob Rock to produce the album and you can strongly hear his influence. Unfortunately the deal for them would only be 2 albums as there was some dispute between the band and the label. I’m aware of several bands that had issues with Praise Industries so I think I know where the fault fell. This album is in my personal top 10 but this might just be because of the point in my life I heard it. Is t in your top 10?
Tracklist 1 – Shallow Water – 5:05 2 – Rich Man – 3:45 3 – Here Comes David – 3:34 4 – Rejoice – 4:22 5 – Jesus Star – 3:32 6 – Water Grave – 4:52 7 – Cup Of Water – 4:52 8 – Holy Roller Blues – 3:32 9 – Fly Away – 3:52
Credits Owen Brock – Songwriter, Rhythm Guitar, Background Vocals Sandie Brock – Songwriter, Piano, Synthesizer, Congas, Lead Vocals Bob Brooks – Producer Brady Carbol – Songwriter Steve Chapman – Songwriter David Eden – Songwriter Pat Glover – Assistant Engineer Joe Grier – Songwriter Sammy Hagar – Songwriter Bob Hardy – Percussion, Lead Vocals David Holmes – Drums, Background Vocals Rob Martens – Bass, Background Vocals Bob Rock – Engineer Bruce Wright – Songwriter, Lead Guitar, Piano, Synthesizer, Background Vocals
Companies, etc. Manufactured By – Praise Records Distributed By – Praise Records
This was the final album from Richie on Asylum Records. He had promised them that the album wouldn’t be overt Christian but instead would have Christian overtones. I think Richie held to hs agreement with Asylum but the albums just didn’t sell well so that was it for this record deal. Richie of course would continue on with Myrhh. The title track did actually get some airplay but overall the album didn’t do well. I am a little surprised at this as I think the album is pretty good and certainly as good as most secular work ut at the time. It bridges that late 70’s sound into the 80’s and does it pretty good actually. Oh well we all know Christian artists at the time struggled with secular releases.
Tracklist 01 – Oooh Child – 3:25 02 – Lonely Too Long – 3:28 03 – Island Love – 3:33 04 – Come On – 3:07 05 – I Was A Fool – 4:12 06 – I Still Have Dreams – 3:25 07 – Satisfied – 3:55 08 – Headin’ South – 3:46 09 – Oh Mary – 2:57 10 – What’s The Matter, Please? – 3:32
Credits Acoustic Guitar – Richie Furay Art Direction, Design – Ron Coro Bass – Leland Sklar Drums, Percussion – Russell Kunkel Electric Guitar – Dan Dugmore, Waddy Wachtel Keyboards – Craig Doerge Mastered By – Doug Sax Photography By – Jim Shea Producer, Recorded By – Val Garay Recorded By [Assistant] – George Ybarra, Niko Bolas
