Larry Norman
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| Larry Norman | ||
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 Larry in Ohio, October, 2001
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| Background information | ||
| Birth name | Larry David Norman | |
| Born | April 8, 1947 (age 59) | |
| Origin |  Corpus Christi, Texas, United States |
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| Genre(s) | Christian, Folk, Rock | |
| Years active | 1966-present | |
| Label(s) | Capitol Records, Solid Rock, Phydeaux | |
| Website | larrynorman.com | |
Larry David Norman (born April 8, 1947 in Corpus Christi, Texas) is an American singer-songwriter considered the forefather of Contemporary Christian Music, an attribution which he denies. He just happened to inspire the imagination of young people looking for a spiritual reality. Although he wrote and recorded hard rock songs on his albums, he is more well known for his delicate and haunting folk rock ballads. They are, by style, ambience and reduction, reminiscent of the mellow songs of artists like Joni Mitchell, Van Morrison, and Neil Young. In addition to radically crafting his contemporary songwriting, Norman is well respected for his lyrics and intricate wordplay. At seventeen, he was the youngest person to be inducted into the Edwin Markham Poet Laureate Society and he continues to take his poetry very seriously. One critic lionized him in 1970 as the "Rebel Poet, Jukebox Balladeer" (Ed Plowman, Hollywood Free Paper). Like a more constrained Frank Zappa, Norman has used music and noise very passionately, mixing orchestras, rock bands and black choirs to his albums to enliven his avant-garde music and iconic rock anthems..
Norman's music has been covered by a variety of artists including Petula Clark, Sammy Davis, Jr., Pat Boone, Jack Jones, Tennessee Ernie Ford, Cliff Richard, Frank Black, and dc Talk. His music has been translated into more than a dozen languages, studied in college literary classes and used in many films - Why Should The Devil Have All The Good Music?, Thief In The Night, Tribulation Force, Live At Greenbelt – BBC Documentary, The Sun Worshippers, etc.
Norman was inducted as a rock singer-songwriter into the Gospel Music Hall of Fame alongside Elvis Presley in 2001.[1]
Contents |
[edit] History
In 1972, Norman made his first screen appearance in Son of Blob (the campy sequel to the film, The Blob (also known as Beware! The Blob!) acting alongside Larry Hagman, Burgess Meredith, Robert Walker, Jr., Carole Lynley, stand–up comics Shelley Berman, Godfrey Cambridge and other established actors.
In the late 1970s, Norman formed Solid Rock Records, which went on to release his own In Another Land and Something New Under The Son; and the Stonehill albums Welcome to Paradise and The Sky is Falling. Larry also produced the Tom Howard album View From The Bridge, and the Mark Heard album Appalachian Melody because these artists were his friends. He produced their albums without a fee and has never taken any money from those original pressings. In 1981 he could see that the future of music was in independent labels so he shut Solid Rock down in America and started Phydeaux Records. Over in England he set up Solid Rock – Chapel Lane records and produced his European friends for free. He took lodging at a £7.00-a-night room in a small bed and breakfast down the road from the recording studio to provide more money for the company. He lived a charming life there and ate his lunch at The Bunch Of Carrots pub on the other side of the road.
The dog of the house was a big black labrador and she did not like men and growled and bared her teeth to Larry every time their paths crossed. so Larry decided to heal the dog of its neurosis. Within a few weeks he had taught Hanna tricks and commands and would lay on the floor next to Hannah and pet her until she fell asleep. He had a lot less success with artists, particularly the ones in America. Though he made them all financially successful as he introduced their music to fans all around the world, each of the artists, except for Mark Heard, behaved typically ... deciding that they didn't want to be known as an artist discovered, educated and produced by anyone. They wanted to revise their biographical history and say that they had done it all on their own. It was such a regular occurrence in his experience, and the experience of other producers with whom he was friends, that Larry was quite shocked when all of the European artists, like Alwyn Wall, Norm Barratt, etc. remained his close friends and were eager to work with him on any project or tour that he needed them for. Twenty five years later, the loyalty and love between all of them is very evident. His closest friend, Dave Markee – the bass player for Eric Clapton first met Larry in 1981 and after he left the band, with Clapton's drummer, Henry Spinetti, they all formed a band and worked on "Love All Around The World" and other songs which are still on the shelf. Markee had a heart attack and Larry's health made the band too tenuous to pursue, besides the Atlantic Ocean between them.
Perhaps the most controversial involvement in Norman's career occurred over Daniel Amos's Horrendous Disc LP. The album, which was recorded in 1978, had been dropped by Maranatha! Music after the label decided to quit releasing rock and roll albums and focus on children's releases and gospel music. So the band, now without a record contract, began to shop the project around to various labels. After considering a number of offers including the Warner Brothers' label Curb Records, Amos settled on Norman's Solid Rock Records in late 1978. Norman had the album mixed and took photos of the band for the album's cover, though most of the tracks were recorded back in 1978 with Mike "Clay" Stone (Queen, Frank Zappa) as producer. For reasons that remain a mystery, the album was shelved until its release in April 1981, weeks before the band's follow up on Newpax Records, ¡Alarma!, hit record stores. While in People! during the mid 1960's, Norman shared the stage with D.A.'s Terry Scott Taylor in one of his early pre-Daniel Amos bands, Copperbrick Window. Decades later, Norman paid homage to Taylor on the D.A. tribute album, When Worlds Collide. However, the Horrendous Disc episode strained the relationship between D.A. and Norman.
Norman re-released Horrendous Disc on CD in 2000. The re-release stirred controversy among Daniel Amos fans by the inclusion of two bonus tracks: Tribute recordings to Daniel Amos that Larry recorded at the end of the Horrendous Disc CD. There was supposed to be eight minutes of silence after the album was finished, and then the surprise bonus tracks. But the pressing plant thought the eight minute lapse was an error and moved the two tribute recordings to follow immediately after the Daniel Amos album.
Larry was furious when he received a copy of the 1,000 units of the CD which had already been sent out and distributed. And it also angered Daniel Amos' hard core fans. The covers sung by Norman were of his favorite Daniel Amos song – "Hound of Heaven". One recording was a straight-ahead tribute version of the song and the second tribute recording was a version using a very laid–back jazz band. Norman was also accused by the DA fans of being too defensive in his liner notes, and so once again he was branded by this battle that the DA fans have upheld for almost 25 years now. It could be said, diplomatically, that the amount of controversy generated years after the album's original release is a testament to the lasting, devoted fan base both Norman and the band Daniel Amos have retained throughout their careers.
Currently, Daniel Amos and Larry are putting together a "Deluxe Edition" or "Horrendous Disc" with the original Horrendous Disc on the first disc and many bonus tracks on the second disc. It will be the ultimate experience for the DA fans who love this classic album.
[edit] Influence
Many artists have been influenced by Norman's music, including Frank Black of the Pixies. His album Frank Black & the Catholics features a cover song of Norman's Six-Sixty-Six. Black also covered Norman songs during solo concerts in 2005 and 2006. In the song Levitate Me, Black also parroted Norman's California/Texas accent with "Come on pilgrim, you know he loves you" – a phrase that Norman had inserted on the end of his 1978 blues song Watch What You're Doing. Black was one of the "special guests" at the June 2005 Elsinore Theater concert in Salem, joining Norman on the song, Watch What You're Doing. [1]
Other artists such as Dc Talk count themselves as fans of Norman's. Guns N' Roses keyboard player Dizzy Reed performed on Norman's Copper Wires album. While Norman was recording at George Martin's AIR Studios in 1974, Paul McCartney was quoted in an interview as saying that Norman could have been one of the most significant artist of the 1970s, if he didn't only restrict himself to spiritual themes. Bono and The Edge from U2 are also fans. (1968).
In the 1990s, animators for the popular television series, The Simpsons created a limited edition comic book featuring Norman as a Simpsons character. Watches were also sold that featured Norman's yellow, three fingered Simpsons' likeness.
[edit] Characteristics of Norman's Music
The majority of Norman's music that was produced during his most creative years (1966 - 1978, from his People! albums up through solo works like Something New Under the Son) remain the fountainhead of his creative work.
His songs addressed topics touching on politics (The Great American Novel), the eventual emptiness of free love (Pardon Me), the passive commercialism of war–time journalists (I Am The Six O'Clock News), witchcraft and the occult (Forget Your Hexagram) and alienation (Lonely by Myself), religious hypocrisy (Right Here In America) and many other topics unadressed by most American songwriters.
[edit] Quality of Production
Other than Streel Level and Bootleg, which were intentionally raw and dirty productions, the rest of Norman's music was of a significantly higher production quality than that of most other music of the singer–songwriter genre. Larry was able to get significant figures in secular music involved in the production process, most notably George Martin and Andy Johns.
[edit] Surrealism and Nightmare
A recurring thematic element in Norman's music is that of surreal imagery and nightmare. In many of the songs in this style, the main characters seem to move in and out of alternate times and dimensions. On his solo debut album, Upon This Rock, songs like Ha Ha World and The Last Supper presented verbal imagery that seemed a hybrid of biblical philosophy crossed over into The Twilight Zone.
This continued on So Long Ago The Garden with Be Careful What You Sign and Nightmare, in which the sleeper engages in a tortured conversation with a marionette of Harpo Marx that rattles off apocalyptic warnings about mankind's future.
In Another Land saw a more subdued version of this element with The Sun Began to Reign (featuring Dudley Moore on piano), and stretching the paradigm a bit, the song 666 (featuring John Michael Talbot of Mason Proffit fame on banjo). However, Something New Under the Sun once again took listeners into another journey into the surreal with "Larry Norman's 97th Nightmare" and to a lesser degree I Feel Like Dying. Something New... was very much a blues–influenced album by a white songwriter consciously and subconsciously referencing a number of important blues myths and themes. This was revolutionary at the time.
[edit] Albums as Conceptual and Thematic Art
While the "concept" album had probably been born with Lee Hazlewood's 1963 album, trouble is a Lonesome Town, the Beach Boy's Pet Sounds album and Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band", Norman took the concept one step further, tying multiple albums together. The albums Only Visiting This Planet (The Present), So Long Ago The Garden (The Past) and In Another Land (The Future) were grouped together as parts 1, 2 and 3 of "The First Trilogy". In a 1980's interview with CCM Magazine, Norman explained that the track order of the songs was originally designed to allow certain thematic elements to occur at specified intervals within and across albums. Because the record companies refused to allow the songs to be placed in the order he intended, Norman complained that the hints and foreshadowing intended by this positioning no longer existed.
While the "Trilogy" albums were obviously related, Norman also indicated that there was actually a larger concept interwoven between his first seven albums. When Something New Under the Son was released on vinyl, many of Norman's fans were puzzled by the album sleeve art, showing a different inner gatefold jacket and a series of letters that formed circles, numbers and the cryptic statement "Numbers Don't Count". Those who listened carefully to the album realized that Norman was hinting at (if not outright telling them) the names of his next seven albums. Later on, Norman revealed that the first seven albums were related to the first seven days of creation and that the number of words in the titles of both sets of seven albums (First Trilogy and Second Trilogy) had exactly 33 words, the age of death for Jesus. The second seven albums (of which Something New Under the Son was the first) were to represent another 7–day "week", but from a different part of the body–soul–spirit dimension. Madness? It all made sense and these albums were electrifying in their content and his amazing songwriting ability. But before he began releasing the Second Trilogy he went on a 7 month world tour, to Europe, Israel, India, etc. Upon his return he was in an airplane accident at LAX in which the overhead luggage carrier broke loose and crashed upon his skull, driving his spinal column down into a torqued spiral. He didn't record another important album for twelve years. Instead he turned his record company and his estate over to his family and his father released live recordings and odds and ends of studio recordings.
The first seven albums:
- We Need A Whole Lot More of Jesus (And A Lot Less Rock 'N' Roll) (censored and retitled I Love You by Capitol) (He left Capitol the day the album was released.)
- Upon This Rock
- Street Level
- Bootleg
- Only Visiting This Planet
- So Long Ago the Garden
- In Another Land
The second seven albums:
- Something New under the Son
- Island In The Sky (unreleased)
- City Of The Lost Angels (unreleased)
- The War Between The Sun And Moon (unreleased)
- The Invasion of Earth (unreleased)
- The Destruction of Babylon (unreleased)
- The Edge of Space (unreleased)
Several songs attributed to the missing six albums have shown up on compilations over the years but it is speculated that most of the material will never be released.
The concept album Something New Under The Son follows a young man through love lost and a revelation. A cross between a prodigal son and a blues vagrant, standing at the crossroads, holding his guitar and looking for direction. The album sets out to show that there is NOTHING new under the sun. It contains a collection of songs that seem at first to be vaguely familiar, either in style, or form. As the album continues, opening lines from classic 50's and 60's lyrics become apparent. Paul McCartney's words "more guitar" from his song "Oo You" can be heard on Watch What You're Doing which then opens with two lines from B.B. King's Shake It Up and Go. While "Larry Norman's 97th Nightmare" starts off with two lines from Stagger Lee, it also opens with Larry and the band imitating the famous false start at the beginning of Bob Dylan's 115th Dream by Bob Dylan, in which the band breaks up laughing and has to start the song again. Larry laughs the same exact number of "ha's" as Dylan did.
Likewise, the photos on the inside of the album sleeve clearly imitate the photos on the cover of Bob Dylan's album Bringing It All Back Home. Larry had a set built to duplicate Albert Grossman's (Dylan's manager) living room and all of the elements of Dylan's cover have been carefully substituted. Sally Grossman's cigarette becomes a rose in the hand of a blonde woman in a red dress. The books and elpees in Dylan's cover are also substituted with items that form parallels between these two separate worlds. Dylan's Lotta Lenya album become The Three Penny Opera composed and co–written by her husband, Kurt Weill, with Bertolt Brecht. There are dozens of rapid flashes of music history which start each song or are buried in the text. The concluding song, Let the Tape Keep Rolling begins as a kind of "Johnny B. Goode" story, but modernized. "I woke up in the morning, I said a morning prayer, I washed my face with soap and ran my fingers through my hair. I went down to the studio on Hollywood and Vine, the clock said 'leven thirty, well I made it just in time, I greeted the musicians, I grabbed the nearest chair. I started playing my guitar and told the engineer, "Come on – let that tape keep rolling . . ." in the long coda there are tinges of rock classics and it ends with an echo of the black slave song, re-stolen by the Rolling Stones' called You Gotta Move, taking all of Larry's rock songs back to where they came from, the Negro Spiritual.
[edit] Selected discography
[edit] 1960s
- I Love You, 1968 (with People!)
- Both Sides of People, 1969 (with People!)
- Upon This Rock, 1969 album
[edit] 1970s
 Larry Norman |
[edit] 1980s
- The Israel Tapes, 1980 live album
- Roll Away The Stone, 1980 live album
- Something New under the Son, 1981 album
- Larry Norman And His Friends On Tour, 1981 live album
- Barking At The Ants, 1981 collection with other artists
- Letter Of The Law, 1982 album
- Labor Of Love, 1982 album
- The Story Of The Tune, 1983 album
- Come As A Child, 1983 live album
- Quiet Night, 1984 album
- bArchaeology, 1984 collection
- Stop This Flight, 1985 album
- Back To America, 1985 collection
- Down Under (But Not Out) 1986 album
- Rehearsal For Reality, 1986 album
- Home at Last, 1986 album
- The Best Of The 2nd Trilogy, 1988 collection
- White Blossoms From Black Roots, 1989 album
- Live At Flevo with Q. Stone, 1989 live album
[edit] 1990s
- Live At Flevo, 1990 live album
- The Best Of Larry Norman, 1990 collection
- Rough Mix 3, 1990, album
- Stranded in Babylon, 1991 album
- Children Of Sorrow, 1994 live album
- Totally Unplugged, 1994 live album
- A Moment In Time, 1994 live album
- Footprints In The Sand, 1994 collection
- Omega Europa, 1994 live album
- Remixing This Planet, 1996 remix album
- Gathered Moments (Somewhere In This Lifetime), 1998 collection & live album
- Shouting In The Storm, 1998 live album
- Breathe In, Breathe Out, 1998 live album
- Copper Wires, 1998 album
- Live At The Mac, 1998 live album
- We Wish You A Larry Christmas, 1998 collection
- Home Box, 1998 featuring Home at Last & Footprints In The Sand together
- When Worlds Collide: A Tribute to Daniel Amos, 1999
- The Vineyard, 1999 live album
- Rough Street Love Letter, 1999 collection
- Father Touch, 1999 Phann Klubb release
- The Cottage Tapes - Book One, 1999 collection (featuring Randy Stonehill)
[edit] 2000s
- In The Beginning, 2000 live album from Creation West 2000 festival
- Blarney Stone, 2000 album
- Sticks And Stones, 2000 album
- Tourniquet, 2001 album
- The Best Of Larry Norman, 2001 30 Year British Anniversary Tour celebration collection
- The Belfast Bootlegs, 2001 live collection through the years
- Agitator, 2002 "The Essential Series - CD2" collection
- Collaborator, 2002 "The Essential Series - CD4" collection
- Survivor, 2002 "The Essential Series - CD7" collection
- Instigator, 2002 "The Essential Series - CD1" collection
- Rock, Scissors et Papier, 2003 album
- Larry Norman Presents Solid Rock Sampler 1, 2003 collection (includes other artists)
- Live At Cornerstone 2001, 2003 live release
- Restless In Manhattan, 2003, live album from the early '70s
- Invitation Only, 2003 concert goer's release
- American Roots, 2003 collection
- The Very Best Of Larry Norman, 2003 collection
- Road Rage, 2003 live album
- Christmastime, 2003 Christmas album
- The Six O'Clock News, 2004 single
- Eve Of Destruction, 2004 single
- Snowblind, 2004 live album from the 1980s
- Infiltrator, 2004 "The Essential Series - CD6" collection
- Liberator, 2004 "The Essential Series - CD3" collection
- The Final Concert, 2004 live Final concert (maybe not!)
- Sessions, 2004 medical expenses special
- Heartland Junction, 2004 collection
- The Norman Invasion, 2004 live 2001 tour collection
- The Cottage Tapes - Book Two, 2004 collection (featuring Randy Stonehill)
- Emancipator, 2004 "The Essential Series - CD5" collection
- On The Prowl, 2004 live album from 1986
- 70 Miles From Lebanon, 2004 live album from 2003's "final" show
- 70 Miles From Lebanon, 2004 live DVD from 2003's "final" show
- Maximum Garden - The Anthology Series, 2004 alternate takes collection
- Maximum Planet - The Anthology Series, 2004 alternate takes collection
- The Very Best Of Larry Norman - Vol 2, 2004 collection
- Hattem, 2005 live album
- Face To Face, 2005 live DVD
- Siege At Elsinore, 2005 album (not to confused with the June concert in Salem)
- Frisbee, 2005 unsanctioned soundtrack album. Pulled upon release and retitled/repackaged as Slinky
- 4 Track Motorola '66 Corolla, 2005 alternate takes and outtakes album
- Live at the Elsinore, 2005 live album from June concert in Salem
- Dust On Rust, 2006 album
- Maximum Son - The Anthology Series, 2006 alternate takes collection
[edit] Song samples
- "I Wish We'd All Been Ready" (file info) — play in browser (beta)
- From Upon This Rock
- Problems playing the files? See media help.
[edit] Selected Contributions
- Welcome To Paradise, Randy Stonehill, 1977, Vocals, Produced and Arranged by Larry Norman.
- Lead Me Home, Dave Mattson, 1978, Vocals.
- The Sky Is Falling, Randy Stonehill, 1979, Vocals, Produced and Arranged by Larry Norman.
- Appalachian Melody, Mark Heard, 1979, Vocals, Produced and Arranged by Larry Norman.
- Stop the Dominoes, Mark Heard, 1981, Vocals.
- Victims of the Age, Mark Heard, 1982, Vocals.
