Flashback Friday: Toto, I don't believe we're in Kansas anymore

It's Friday, and the 2nd Platinum Vinyl Awards are finished. That means it is time for another edition of flashback Friday. For those new to The Night Beat, Flashback Friday is where we go back in the time machine, and bring a new generation up to speed on some of the bands of the past. While for the most part we feature Christian Bands, this week we step into crossover territory.

In the 1970's in the Heartland of America a Progressive Rock band was formed by Dave Hope (Bass), Phil Ehart (Drums) and Kerry Livgren (Guitars, Keys, Synths). It was called Kansas. From the beginning the album was gold (or actually Platinum). One album in particular, Leftoverture (1976), was certified 5x Platinum in 2001. While that is a pretty good record, pardon the pun, by way of reference Evanescence debut Fallen is over 7x Platinum with only about half the time needed. Success is relative. The biggest single on Leftoverture was Carry On Wayward Son.

A Funny thing happened on the way to success. A few of Kansas "wayward sons", specifically Hope and Livgren, got saved. Beginning with Audio-Visions, Kansas entered a sort of Christian Phase. By the time Vinyl Confessions was being written things came to a head, and vocalist Steve Walsh quit after refusing to sing Crossfire.

Kansas had to quickly find a new vocalist and they hired John Elefante, who, in a bit of a surprise coincidence, also happened to be a Christian. Vinyl Confessions got a lot of airplay on WENC, but my favorite wasn't crossfire but instead Play the Game Tonight.

The Christian era of Kansas soon ended, and Livgren and Hope left the band and founded what was one of the most innovative Christian Rock bands of the era. AD. Officially they put out Three albums: Timeline, Art of The State, and Prime Mover. To most fans the second is the best. AD wasn't afraid to take on the issues of the day, but unlike most bands, they married the message to top notch production and music. In the Christian Music world this was as far apart as Kansas was from Oz.

This is Slow Motion Suicide from Timeline

And finally, this is Progress from Art of the State.

There aren't many bands like AD today, willing to take creative risks, on either side of the music aisle. Perhaps they were right. Progress is marching backward. Until next time, I am Awaiting Your Reply.

The Night Beat Summer Music Preview

It's Summer, at least in popular thinking. It being only in the 50's and 60's for most of this week here in the Northeast you have to forgive us if we think it's still Winter. Still, we have passed Memorial Day.

While you are out enjoying the warm weather (hopefully), you're going to need some fresh tunes to enjoy on your iPod. Though they aren't as fresh as the ones I will mention in the post, may I heartily recommend any of the Winners of the 2nd Platinum Vinyl Awards (look at 2011). If you want something a bit more Current, these albums will be released throughout the Summer months.

During the Rebecca St. James Transform tour, one of the opening acts was brother/sister duo LaRue (Consisting of Natalie and Phillip LaRue). While Phillip has had a career as a solo artist, we haven't heard from Natalie since the band broke up in 2002. That changes this month with an EP entitled Even Now. It's currently scheduled for release on the 19th of this month.

July brings a bunch of new releases, but none more anticipated by The Night Beat than a pair of re-releases for a new generation. Petra is one of the most well known and loved Christian Bands of all time, and to many could even be called the fathers of Christian Rock. Two of Petra's most loved releases (I don't know of one that is hated, though the first couple were definitely works in progress), More Power To Ya (1982) and This Means War (1987) are being released among milestone anniversaries. You read that right 30 and 25 years respectively. Clicking on the title links will bring you to the mp3 page on Amazon, where you can get some of the best Christian Rock ever made right now on your iPod or computer. The special anniversary Cd's will be released on July 3, right in time for your 4th of July cookout. I will say I got these albums when they originally came out. I know that makes me sound old.

Project 86 follows up their Platinum Vinyl Award Winning Live Album 15.Live, itself an anniversary release, with a new studio release to be titled Wait for the Siren. You'll have to wait for August for that one.

Finally, we will close out the Summer releases with a Plum of a release. Actually that's Plumb (aka Tiffany Arbuckle Lee) and the album will be called Faster Than a Speeding Bullet. Actually, the title itself is somewhat ironic since it has been anticipated for about a year now and is setting vaporware records. When it does come out (and the latest date is around Labor Day) it should be awesome. Nobody can do dance like Plumb.

While that is not the entire list, it is all I will go into detail on. Summer is also the time we will get releases from Toby Mac, P.O.D., The Museum, and Kerrie Roberts. Most of the artists will be on tour at the many Music Festivals throughout the country this Summer. Of course, that's another post. Until next time, I am Awaiting Your Reply.

Night Beat Rewind: May 2012

We're almost caught up. This is great, I managed to get the Platinum Vinyl Awards out this weekend (well, Thursday to Sunday) and I may get May wrapped up within the first week in June. WOO HOO!!!

For those new on The Night Beat, each month I put out a "quick hits" post wrapping up the releases of the past month and assigning an Emerald Rating to each. Let's get to it for May.

Missing The Mark

• Karen Davis - Songs In The Dark 3.75 Emeralds
• Jennie Lee Riddle - People and Songs, Opus 1 Collective 3.75 Emeralds
• Switchfoot - Vice Re-Verses 3.75 Emeralds

If you've read my rewind posts, you know I don't hold back on the attitude. Sometimes it gains me a little notoriety. Sometimes even the artists themselves comment. With the case of Karen Davis, I think the phrase "Hillsong in Hebrew" should suffice. Even though the majority of the songs were in Hebrew, the sound reeked of Hillsong, which is good for itself, but not in all situations. For someone whose experience in Messianic Music is Lamb and the Liberated Wailing Wall, I expected better.  For Riddle, I was unimpressed with the Opus. Sometimes it was too country, sometimes good. I thought it was uneven. I will save my biggest criticism for Switchfoot. WHY?? I loved Vice Verses, I gave it a perfect rating, but this. I usually love remixes because it makes it Techno, and I love techno. No to the remix in this case. Stick with the original.

Pure Platinum

• Lara Landon - Overcome 5 Emeralds

One Perfect album this month. What a voice. I still have my fantasy concert lineup of Lara Landon backed by Denver and The Mile High Orchestra in a speakeasy. I mean, the girls got pipes, and a voice that melts ice. Look up Torch singer and you'll find her picture. Buy Overcome or Beloved on Amazon by clicking on the links.

Semi-Precious Metal

• Bluetree - Kingdom 4.5 Emeralds
• Ben Cantelon - Everything In 4.25 Emeralds
• The Choir - The Loudest Sound Ever Heard 4.75 Emeralds
• Coopertheband - Kings 4.25 Emeralds
• Patrick Dopson - Open The Heavens 4.5 Emeralds
• Family Force Five - III.V 4.5 Emeralds
• For Today - Immortal 4.25 Emeralds
• Deitrick Haddon - A Beautiful Soul 4.75 Emeralds
• Brandon Heath - Give Me Your Eyes (The Acoustic Sessions) 4.5 Emeralds
• Mat Kearney - Young Love (Deluxe Edition) 4.5 Emeralds
• The Letter Black - Hanging On By A Remix 4.75 Emeralds
• Martha's Trouble - A Little Heart Like You 4.5 Emeralds
• Mary Mary - Go Get It 4.5 Emeralds
• Jon McLaughlin - Promising Promises 4.5 Emeralds
• Mewithoutyou - Ten Stories 4.5 Emeralds
• Mercy Me - The Hurt and The Healer 4.75 Emeralds
• Owl City - Shooting Star EP 4.5 Emeralds
• Phillips, Craig and Dean - Here I am to Worship 4.25 Emeralds
• Point of Grace - A Thousand Little Things 4.5 Emeralds
• John Schlitt - The Greater Cause 4.5 Emeralds
• To Speak of Wolves - Find Your Worth, Come Home 4.5 Emeralds
• Rita Springer - The Playlist 4.5 Emeralds
• Stuart Townend - Ultimate Collection 4.5 Emeralds
• 12 Stones - Beneath The Scars 4.75 Emeralds
• Various Artists - Mighty To Save 4.5 Emeralds
• The Washington Projects - Space Time Continuum: The Remixes 4.75 Emeralds
• Phil Wickham - Singalong 2 4.5 Emeralds

That's it, I am officially caught up. The June releases await. Until next time I am Awaiting Your Reply.

Music Video Monday: Run and Don't Stop

It's Monday, and that means that it is time for Music Video Monday, where we at The Night Beat Share the Best Christian and GRAC Music Videos out there. Before we begin today, I wish to give a shout out to all my friends on Triberr for bearing with me as the Platinum Vinyl Awards commenced. You all helped make it a big success. I guess I should also give a shout out to the google blogger team for fixing the scheduled post issue in time. Never mind last years marathon posting, even this could have been a disaster.

We're going to start out with a fresh video. Bryce Avery (aka The Rocket Summer), is coming out with a new album tomorrow entitled Life Will Write The Words. As a matter of full disclosure The WENC Night beat is an Amazon Associate, and if you click the highlighted link above and purchase the CD or downloads, a portion of the sale will come back to help The Night Beat. Thank You for your support. Here is the music video for Run and Don't Stop.

One More fresh video, though shorter. Write This Down releases Lost Weekend tomorrow, and this is the album teaser, just like in the movies.

You can listen to Lost Weekend in its entirety this week on AOL Music

Now onto the regularly scheduled videos. First up is Eisley, which recently released the Deep Space EP, which will be considered for a Platinum Vinyl Award next year. This is a live performance of Deep Space.

For King and Country is next. This is Joel & Luke Smallbone, RS James Brothers. This is the music video of Missing.

Sarah Macintosh came out with Current in March, and Oh what an album. Perfection. These are live studio videos. I would love to share them all, but I will chose Damaged.

And finally, we close it out with Sidewalk Prophets. This is the Video of the Title Cut of their new album, Live Like That.

That concludes this edition of Music Video Monday. Until next Monday, I am Awaiting Your Reply.

The Elpy's: Album of The Year

We are closing in on the end. Only five more awards to be handed out. This year has been a bit more hectic, but the results are much more enjoyable.

We continue with some General Field Awards with the awarding of the Elpy for Group of The Year, which this year, the Elpy goes to: The Devil Wears Prada

Best New Artist is the next to be awarded. This year the Elpy goes to: Icon For Hire

The Artist of The Year Elpy for 2011 goes to: The Civil Wars.

Song of The Year is next, and the nominee list was long. The Nominees were:

• Are You Ready?, Destiny, Beckah Shae
• As For Me and My House, As For Me and My House, John Waller
• Children of God, Move, Third Day
• Hymn for The Missing, Until We Have Faces, Red
• This Love Is Free, Weights and Measures, Hyland
• Manifesto, Introducing The City Harmonic, The City Harmonic
• Poison and Wine, Barton Hollow, The Civil Wars
• Who But You, Music Inspired By The Story, Mark Hall and Megan Garrett
• Window, Dominionaire, Canton Jones

And the Elpy for Song of The Year goes to: Manifesto by The City Harmonic

The Final Award. Album of The Year. The Nominees:

• Barton Hollow, The Civil Wars
• Destiny, Beckah Shae
• Dream With Me, Jackie Evancho
• Music Inspired by The Story, Various Artists
• This Time Around, Heather Williams
• Until We Have Faces, Red
• Vice Verses, Switchfoot
• What if We Were Real?, Mandisa

And the Elpy for Album of The Year for 2011 goes to (drumroll): Barton Hollow by The Civil Wars. Congratulations to them and to all the nominees and winners for making this second awards a great one. We'll see you again next year. Goodnight.

The Elpy's: Part Three

Welcome to Part Three of the WENC Night Beat's exclusive coverage of the 2011 Platinum Vinyl Awards, also known now as the 2nd Elpy's (The Nickname is due to quirks with Triberr and Twitter). These next two posts will be a bit more detailed, since we have only 10 more categories to go, but they are some of the biggies.

In our inaugural year last year, which could be dated PT (that's pre triberr, though not social media, since the results were tweeted), an abundance of rock entries necessitated a split of the category into Rock and Hard Rock/Metal. 2011's entry pool confirmed that I made a good choice and 2012 is turning out that way as well. Right now it's just for the Album of the Year Awards. Song of the Year is still combined Rock and Metal.

The Nominees for Best Hard Rock Album were:

• Celestial Completion by Becoming the Archetype
• The Covering by Stryper
• Dead Throne by The Devil Wears Prada
• Disambiguation by Underoath
• Dynasty by As They Sleep
• Thegodmachine by Phinehas
• Until We Have Faces by Red

And the Elpy for Best Hard Rock Album Goes to: Celestial Completion by Becoming the Archetype. Congratulations.

Next up is Rock Song, and it was quite a field. The Nominees were:

• Beautiful Ashes, Beautiful Ashes, Eowyn
• Beautiful Things, This Time Around, Heather Williams
• The Cheval Glass, We Do What We Want, Emery
• Dark Horses, Vice Verses, Switchfoot
• Destroy/Savior, Love Riot, Worth Dying For
• Faceless, Until We Have Faces, Red
• Gone, Move, Third Day
• Illuminator, Disambiguation, Underoath
• The Magnetic Sky, Celestial Completion, Becoming The Archetype
• Make A Move, Scripted, Icon For Hire
• Mammoth, Dead Throne, The Devil Wears Prada
• Through Your Eyes (feat. Trevor McNevan), Love Riot, Worth Dying For

And the Elpy for Best Rock Song goes to: Beautiful Ashes by Eowyn.

Best Rock Album is next, the nominees were

• Beautiful Ashes by Eowyn
• Love Riot by Worth Dying For
• Move by Third Day
• Scripted by Icon for Hire
• This Time Around by Heather Williams
• Vice Verses by Switchfoot
• We Do What We Want by Emery

And the Elpy for Best Rock Album goes to: Beautiful Ashes by Eowyn. It never hurts an award when a Beautiful Woman has to come on stage twice in a row to accept the award. (We can dream).

Next up is the Award for Male Vocalist of the Year. And the Elpy Goes to: Canton Jones

Finally, for this post, the Elpy for Female Vocalist of the Year goes to: Ginny Owens.

One more post to go. Keep it locked here. Until next time, I am Awaiting Your Reply.

Flashback Friday: Special Elpy Edition

It's never good to rush things. While rushing a bit yesterday I hit publish instead of save and my first Platinum Vinyl Award/Elpy (still not sure about the nickname, but since it avoids my post being flagged as promotional, I'll go with it until I find a better one). Needless to say, though I did my best, I'm no Apple when it comes to corporate secrecy, and the cat is out of the bag (will someone please tell me why the cat was in the bag, who put him or her in it in the first place). My regular Flashback Friday will return next week, and I will continue today with Platinum Vinyl Award Coverage.

In the Category of Best Dance/Electronica Song (all song categories are new this year) there were eight nominees

• Hero (The Legion of Doom Remix), Awake and Remixed, Skillet
• Kamikaze, All Things Bright and Beautiful, Owl City
• Let it Out, World Anthem, Press Play
• Music, Destiny, Beckah Shae
• Not Enough (Remix by Paradoxx), Time and Space, Miss Angie
• One Girl, One Girl, Katelynne Cox
• #putyourloveglasseson, Destiny, Beckah Shae
• Sleep to Dream, Water Colours, Swimming With Dolphins

And the Elpy went to: Not Enough (Remix by Paradox) by Miss Angie.

The Best Dance/Electronica Album went to Beckah Shae for Destiny.

The Best Hip Hop/Rap Song had seven nominees this year

• Alive (Remix), The Whole Truth, DA Truth
• Bet Ya House, Neveroddoreven, Shonlock
• Just Like You feat J. Paul, Rehab (Deluxe Edition), Lecrae
• Regenerated feat E.Tizz and Guvna B, The Still Living Mixtape, Jehaziel
• Revolution, My Time, Byron "Mr. Talkbox" Chambers
• Riot, Blacklight, Tedashii
• Surrender feat V. Rose, Captured, Flame

And the Elpy went to: Just like You feat J. Paul by Lecrae

The Best Hip Hop/Rap Album went to: Neveroddoreven by Shonlock

That concludes the second post of the 2nd Annual Elpy's also known as the Platinum Vinyl Awards. I will finish things off with a post on Saturday and Sunday. Keep it tuned here and I am awaiting your comments on the awards.