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Innovative, paranoid, charismatic, myth-making,
frustrating... the epithets could go on, but Larry Norman, whose death after a
long period of ill-health has just been announced was, for some of us, a true
original and an inspiration.
Making a big impact in England in the early 1970s with his second major album
Only Visiting This Planet, he
immediately showed the corporate Jesus-rock fraternity for what it was -
second-rate versions of Simon and Garfunkel or Carole King with a bit of
gentle worship-rocking thrown in. Larry was not like that: his own original
songs like 'Why Should the Devil' or 'The Outlaw' sounded as good as the
Stones or Dylan and paid no heed to gently-rephrased Bible verses.
Furthermore, he worked with proper musicians, in proper studios and it
showed.
Larry came out of the San Francisco street level 'Jesus Rock' neighbourhoods,
but he and his early band People had shared bills with the Grateful Dead and
Jefferson Airplane and he had already tangled with major record labels. His
first solo record proper Upon This Rock (1969) revealed a singer-songwriter with a real agenda,
not too far removed from Randy Newman or Jackson Browne. He sang of abortion,
drugs, hunger and the moon landings with the immediacy of the daily
newspapers, but could also create gentle, hymn-like songs infused with
Biblical echoes, such as 'I Am a Servant' and 'One Way'. He claimed to have
created the 'pointing towards heaven' gesture associated with the latter song,
but said he wouldn't have been surprised if Paul had done it. As an acoustic
guitarist, he was fairly anonymous, but on the piano he could became
possessed by the spirits of William Booth and Jerry Lee Lewis at the same
time.
So Long Ago the Garden and In
Another Land followed in the mid-1970s,
making up a planned trilogy, the latter on his own label, Solid Rock.
Unsurprisingly, he was too radical for Christian labels and too Christian for
mainstream record companies and a slew of abandoned, censored or forgotten
projects would eventually led him to release his own material, reworking and
repressing it many times. Larry continued to tour, notably in the UK and
Ireland during the 1970s and early 1980s, but the nearest he came to
commercial success was through Cliff Richard covering and sanitising some of
his material. 'I Wish We'd All Been Ready' and 'Why Should the Devil' are the
songs most associated with him, but his 'blues' album Something New
Under the Sun is probably his most
consistent set, a rare example of a complete group of songs and musicians in
tune with Larry's vision at the time.
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Onstage he remained a dynamic perfomer, capable of
captivating large audiences with intimate readings of his gentler songs, or
rocking out, as seen in the documentary film Greenbelt Live, which featured a ferocious performance of 'Let
that Tape Keep Rolling' which is more Chuck Berry than Charles Wesley. His
between-song talks could be pertinent and hilarious, although in later years
live albums revealed them to be carefully-constructed routines rather than
the spontaneous moments they once seemed.
In more recent years, promises of new material became increasingly difficult
to believe and Larry had developed a masterly line in obfuscation, listing
titles of unreleased projects to a determined coterie of devoted fans. Some
of these projects, however, did see the light: Home at Last,
Stranded in Babylon and Copper
Wires are all worth a listen. His early
'street level' recordings, dating from 1969-1973 were also reissued on CD,
and the double LP Bootleg
remains a powerful documentary of the 'Jesus Freak' era in America at the
time.
At his peak in the 1970s, he could command the attention of audiences in big
halls with a combination of wit, charisma and powerful, poetic songs, but
over the last 10 Ð 15 years, health scares reduced his concert appearances
and restricted his studio output. Those fond of his music learnt to put up
with endless disappointing rehashes of his best songs and far-fetched excuses
or reasons for ill-health. Rumours and gossip about him eventually took the
place of a regular schedule of new songs, and his label eventually subsided
into releasing too much similar live material simply to help pay for his
increasing medical bills. By the late 1990s, the outlandish talk of accidents
and undefined illnesses gave way, sadly, to a succession of genuine, severe
health problems and heart scares. Nevertheless, Larry's music will retain a
place in the affections of those of us who believe art made by christians can
be radical and questioning - just like the man himself was.
© M C
Caseley 2008
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