Tag: Mark Heard

Randy Stonehill – Celebrate This Heartbeat – 1984

Celebrate This Heartbeat starts out with an overture, which really does have a strong orchestral sound that only stops a little bit short of sounding like an outtake from The Nutcracker.

“Who Will Save The Children” is an important song on this record. The liner notes included a sign-up form to sponsor a child. Sally Struthers was working hard to get children sponsored at the time, and Randy had his hat fully in the ring starting around this time.

As usual, Randy gives us a fun song to both entertain us and challenge us on this album
Stop the World / I wanna get off / This place is too weird for me

This album is another polished studio approach from Randy, and a little farther from his rock’n’roll roots than what we were used to hearing. Fortunately we wouldn’t have to wait long for him to come back to the rock style we got to know him for.

Tracklist
1 – Overture: Celebrate This Heartbeat – 3:25
2 – Still, Small Voice – 4:04
3 – Celebrate This Heartbeat – 4:08
4 – Modern Myth – 3:51
5 – Who Will Save The Children – 5:27
6 – When I Look To The Mountains – 3:41
7 – Allison – 3:18
8 – Whatcha Gonna Do About That – 3:19
9 – Stop The World – 4:34
10 – I’ll Remember You – 4:26

Credits
Acoustic Guitar [All Acoustic Guitars] – Randy Stonehill
Arranged By [Rhythm Section And Vocal Arrangements] – Barry, Randy
Art Direction – Tim Alderson
Congas, Bongos, Percussion – Rick Geragi
Electric Guitar [Electric Guitars] – Danny Jacob
Electric Guitar [Electric Twelve String Guitar] – Mark Heard
Engineer [Engineered By] – Mark Heard
Engineer [Second] – Dan Reed
Flute, English Horn – John Clarke
French Horn – Darrel Gardner
Harp – Michael Amorosi
Mastered By – Steve Hall
Oboe – Barbara Northcutt
Orchestrated By, Arranged By, Conductor [Conducted By] – Tom Howard
Photography By – Aaron Rapoport
Piano, Electric Piano [Electric Grand Piano], Synthesizer, Timpani – Tom Howard
Producer [Produced By] – Barry M. Kaye
Tenor Saxophone, Baritone Saxophone, Flute – Jay “Shotgun” Leslie*
Vocals [All Vocals] – Randy Stonehill

Companies, etc.
Phonographic Copyright (p) – Word, Inc.
Copyright (c) – Word, Inc.
Pressed By – Monarch Record Mfg. Co. – Δ26410
Engineered At – Fingerprint Recorders
Mixed At – Fingerprint Recorders
Edited At – Wilder Bros. Studios, Los Angeles
Mastered At – Future Disc
Published By – Stonehillian Music
Published By – Word Music
Published By – Tom Howard Music

Mark Heard – Stop The Dominoes – 1981

Mark Heard created a tradition of going the extra mile on his records. He wrote lyrics that had real honesty packed in tight, and yet he still managed drop some tongue-in-cheek one-liners. The effect was that when he was cheeky, you still had to take him seriously. Stop the Dominoes is a classic version of this.

He had a lot to say. The liner notes are incredible. CCM records routinely included all the lyrics printed out on the sleeve, but in addition, Mark included 2 full pages of small print, written from his heart to his fans. Mark had a passion for reality. You can hear it in his song lyrics, and these notes include some personal diary entries from his tour stops through Europe. It’s hard to imagine this kind of thoughtful writing being shared with fans now.

These notes were written on his travels, and later collated into this form, typeset and arranged, sent out to print, manufactured, distributed to stores, and then finally brought home to read. I hope a lot of people read them, but then again, I know. In 1982 when we bought records, we read everything.

There was no Twitter feed. The Internet didn’t exist in any consumer form at that time. Mark died in 1992, well before fandom was available online. Long before we would be able to follow someone’s thoughts as they had them.

Sure, we can follow people on social media now, but that’s a different thing. Online posts are so disposable because they are so temporal. Reading someone’s deliberate writing, something that they know they would have to work on, proofread, and only be able to publish to the world once a year – that’s special in a different way.

Mark Heard was one of the most thoughtful songwriters, and gone much too soon and much too young.

Track Listing:
A1 One Of The Dominoes 4:23
A2 Stranded At The Station 3:30
A3 You Could Lie To Me 4:02
A4 One Night Stand 2:52
A5 I’m Crying Again 3:29
B1 Stuck In The Middle 4:39
B2 Call Me The Fool 3:11
B3 I’m In Chains 3:25
B4 Lonely One 4:35
B5 To See Your Face 3:31

Credits:
Arranged By – Mark Heard
Backing Vocals – Dave De Coup Crank, Larry Norman, Leslie Phillips, Little Bobby Emmons, Randy Stonehill
Bass – John Patitucci
Electric Guitar – Tony Eisenbarger
Electric Guitar, Lead Guitar, Slide Guitar, Keyboards, Backing Vocals – Mark Heard
Engineer – Jonathan David Brown
Fiddle – Buddy Spicher
Keyboards – Tom Howard
Percussion – Alex MacDougall
Producer – Mark Heard
Saxophone – Karl Denson
Steel Guitar [Pedal Steel] – Sonny Garrish
Written By – Mark Heard

iDEoLA – Tribal Opera – 1987

This album was a concept album by Mark Heard under the pseudonym iDEoLA. Mark stated that there was no big mystery to the name. He stated “It’s not supposed to be mysterious or anything; I just put a band together and right now I happen to be the only one in it.” Mark played all the instruments with the exception of some percussion samples. All in all it’s actually a really good album. It has a solid Pop sound and I particularly like the percussion segments. While it’s a huge departure from Mark’s usual work I wish he’d pursued this line of music as well as his usual.

Tracklist
1 – I Am An Emotional Man – 4:29
2 – Is It Any Wonder – 3:49
3 – Watching The Ship Go Down – 3:52
4 – Talk To Me – 3:48
5 – Go Ask The Dead Man – 3:51
6 – Love Is Bigger Than Life – 3:36
7 – How To Grow Up Big And Strong – 5:06
8 – Everybody Dances – 4:07
9 – Why Can’t We Just Say No – 4:23
10 – Hold Back Your Tears – 3:46

Credits
Artwork By – Tim Alderson
Drums [People Who Hit Things For Digital Samples & Wengi Drum Machine Introduction On “talk To Me”] – David Baker
Drums [People Who Hit Things For Digital Samples] – Dan Michaels, David McSparran, Doug Matthews, Steve Hindalong
Edited By [Digital Pcm 1630] – Tom Hall
Instruments [All], Lead Vocals, Backing Vocals – Ideola
Mastered By – Steve Hall
Mixed By – Mark Heard
Mixed By [Assistant] – Dan Reed, Jim Dineen, Steve Katayama
Photography – Stewart Ivester
Producer – Mark Heard
Recorded By – Mark Heard
Written-By – Mark Heard

Mark Heard – Appalachian Melody – 1979

This was Mark’s second album and his first on Solid Rock Records.

As is typical on Solid Rock albums the whole gang is on the album. I’ve always wondered why Larry felt the need to sing backup on every album (ok almost all) he produced, but I digress.

The album is a fairly light rock affair but Mark does get closer to the Rock and Roll rank on a few tunes. This is an album that will likely grow on you if a first listening doesn’t really capture you.

Track Listing:
1 – On The Radio – 3:38
2 – Castaway – 3:26
3 – Bless My Soul – 4:04
4 – Here I Am (Once Again) – 3:54
5 – With The Setting Sun – 1:42
6 – Appalachian Melody – 4:17
7 – Happy Cornbread Aniversary – 1:48
8 – Two Trusting Jesus – 4:13
9 – Jonah’s Song – 5:26
10 – Sidewalk Soliloquy – 3:18
11 – The Last Time – 3:16
12 – The Saints – 0:22

And here are the bonus tracks from the 2009 CD release:

Credits:
Mark Heard – acoustic and electric guitars, piano, mandolin, hambone, vocals, harmonies, arranging, co-producer, mixing, photography, album artwork
Larry Norman – background vocals, producer, arranger, photography, album artwork
Randy Stonehill – background vocals
Tom Howard – Fender Rhodes, orchestration
Jon Linn – lead guitar
Flim Johnson – bass guitar
Peter Johnson – drums
Al Perkins – pedal steel guitar, dobro
Chuck Long – electric and acoustic guitars, additional photography
Alex MacDougall – percussion and congas
Janet Sue Heard – harmony, additional photography
Tom Howard String Ensemble conducted by Tom Howard