The 80's came along and as with the 70's and somewhat the 60's, Christian bands tried to be relevant musically and share the Good News of the Bible with their world in song.
Sad to say many of them were put down by the church and many TV evangelists went on and on about how their music was devil worship music or just plain wrong.
My youth group at church like many at conservative churches of the day had meetings about the evils of rock and roll, about backmasking, and on and on. Surprisingly I can't ever remember them putting down Christian rock during those meetings. I guess they weren't as conservative as I thought.
But I say all that to come to my point, there were quite a few really good Christian bands and artists that came out in that era, that if they had gone a secular route would've surely been touted as some of the best bands of the era. But because they chose the Christian niche, most of them are forgotten by the general populous. Here are a few of my favorite artists of the era and genre and a few thoughts. Certainly I could have included, Stryper, Whiteheart and Mylon & Broken Heart, which were some of my favorites of the era, bu they (Stryper at least) are somewhat known. I want to spotlight four bands that really aren't known by many unless they really know the era well.
Pray Naked... yes that was one of the albums from The 77's. Can you believe they even got it sold in Christian book stores? As you can see from the album cover, the album title is nowhere to be seen. Just three naked guys with a well-placed picture.
In an age where Amy Grant and Michael W Smith were producing super-safe Contemporary Christian music, The 77's debuted in 1982 with
Ping Pong Over the Abyss, frankly one of the best album names out there from the era.
Ping Pong is hard to peg, you hear Bowie and The Cars, Jackson Browne and even Led Zeppelin. The band's follow up to Ping Pong was All Fall Down, where they seem to give in to the electronic rock mode of the day. Opening licks remind one of modern day band Arcade Fire. My first exposure to the band was 1994's Drowning With Land In Sight.
Steve Taylor, where to begin. If the Christian community has ever produced a true Renaissance-man, it would be Steve Taylor.
I also discovered Taylor after what many would consider his prime after buying his brilliant album Squint, pictured right.
Taylor can do it all, and pretty much has done it all over the years. Not only did he record a half dozen of the best albums to come out of Christian music in the 80's and early 90's, but he retired from music and went on to become a film director! His film Blue Like Jazz is actually available to view on Netflix.
Never being afraid of controversy, Taylor recorded songs like "I blew up the clinic real good" (a song against violence and against killing abortion clinic doctors), "Lifeboat" (a song against the devaluation of human life in some elitist circles) and his first real splash "I want to be a clone". "Clone" is a song about the early 80's church view that Christians should only dress in certain way at church, things like jeans in church, etc. were thought unholy and wrong. Ideas that would never be found in all but the most extremely conservative churches today. Taylor has a wry sense of humor and at the same time is very intelligent and while he's trying to get a serious point across, he always seems to have a good time with the twist of a line.
Songs like "Clinic" certainly stirred the pot,but that didn't really translate into huge records sales which Taylor certainly deserved based on his talent and writing. I can't help but think that bands like Relient K would never have seen the light of day in the Christian market if it weren't for Steve Taylor.
The Call - One of the few bands on this list that actually saw some commercial success with 1989's
Let The Day Begin which went #1 on the U.S. singles chart.
Like The 77's, The Call released their debut album in 1982 and over the 80's became a favorite on college radio.
The band was led by the late Michael Been, whose raspy voice was a trademark and you could hear his passion in his performances.
Certainly one of the bands of the era I wish I'd have caught live, and now with the untimely passing of Been, that will never happen.
My last selection is not quite as serious a choice -
Jacob's Trouble but they did have a huge influence on a certain Contemporary Christian band called Third Day.
The Atlanta-based band had their share of controversy, in particular a track called
About Sex, which has an amazing lyric and certainly promoted the conservative Christian view but was deemed too controversial to even be released on the band's second album.
I became aware of the band in 1994 at Atlanta Fest which used to be held at Six Flags Over Georgia until moved to Stone Mountain Park.
The band was just a fun blend with influences fromthe The Beatles, The Monkees and others of their own era. Even the album cover looks like it came straight out of the 60's.
I just share a few bands that I discovered in the early 90's that really were ahead of their time. Taking thoughts of faith, life and love and sharing them in the package of music where in so many ways they were ignored at best and condemned at worst. Great song writing and musicianship shouldn't be ignored, just because it happens to come from the Christian music genre. None of these bands wrote in a preachy way, unless they were railing against hypocrisy in the church or in society.
Great thing is these days online streaming has brought back all of these artists back from the brink of total obscurity. Spotify actually features most if not all of the albums from each of these artists. They are certainly worth a listen. You may just discover a band you didn't even know you were missing.
Take care and until next time... Please sit on your sandals!
