VINYL CONFESSIONS (1982)
“How many times do I have to tell you that things just can't go on this way”1. Play The Game Tonight (Ehart, Flower, Frazier, Livgren, Williams) 3:27
2. Right Away (D. Elefante, J. Elefante) 4:07
3. Fair Exchange (Livgren) 5:02
4. Chasing Shadows (D. Elefante, J. Elefante) 3:22
5. Diamonds and Pearls (Livgren) 4:51
6. Face It (D. Elfante, J. Elefante) 4:18
7. Windows (Livgren) 3:32
8. Borderline (Livgren) 4:01
9. Play On (J. Elefante, Livgren) 3:34
10. Crossfire (Livgren) 6:35
The band had come to its first major crisis. The recent conversion to born-again Christianity of Kerry Livgren and Dave Hope had brought about a new focus within the band, especially from a lyrical standpoint, that Steve Walsh could not abide. Prior to work beginning on the next album, he made his departure from the band. Kansas therefore had lost a keyboard player, a lead vocalist, and a songwriter. Therefore, they not only had to search for a singer, but someone who could contribute to the music.
They searched through over 200 applicants (including Sammy Hagar and Doug Pinnick – and both of those conjure up visions of what could have been!), before narrowing it down to three choices: Warren Hamm, Michael Gleason, and John Elefante. They eventually chose Elefante, who played keyboards. Elefante was also a born-again Christian, although the band apparently didn’t know it at the time. His brother Dino collaborated on lyrics with John.
The album they produced thereafter was
Vinyl Confessions, which definitely had a different feel from their previous albums, even aside from the lyrics, which are definitely coming from a Christian perspective. There is much more “rock” and less “prog” on this album. Musicianship definitely still shines through, but it is different.
The album’s first track, “Play The Game Tonight,” isn’t bad. It has a nice hook, and a memorable lyrical melody. It is a pleasant song, for sure, but doesn’t compare to the greats of prior albums. It was released as the album’s first single, and hit # 4 on Billboard’s new Mainstream Rock chart and # 17 on the Pop Singles chart. It was the band’s first “hit” in several years.
The next song, “Right Away,” is a fairly straightforward rocker, although nothing particularly special. It was the album’s second single, making it to # 33 on Mainstream Rock but only # 73 on the Pop Singles chart.
“Fair Exchange” was a song that featured lyrics depicting life under the rule of the Anti-Christ, which is certainly uplifting material. Don’t care for it, sorry.
The album’s fourth track, “Chasing Shadows,” is a more mellow ballad, with nice vocal harmonies and a pleasant melody. Lyrically, it was about the folly of attempting to find truth and meaning anywhere outside of the Bible. This song was the album’s third and final single release, only making it to # 54 on the Mainstream Rock chart. Altogether, this is one of the best the album has to offer.
Up next is “Diamonds and Pearls.” This song is about the superiority of spiritual wealth to that of material wealth. For me, this song has perhaps the most interesting musical passages on the album, but the vocal melodies, especially on the chorus, are really dull and boring. Completely unsatisfying mixture for me.
“Face It” is another straightforward rock song (as are so many on this album). Lyrically, this is an evangelical outreach song (like so many on this album). And again, there is some interesting music on this song, but not in the chorus, which is uninspired. The instrumental section almost saves this song, but not quite.
The next track, “Windows,” is another evangelical outreach song. Again, uninspired delivery that comes across flat, with a more interesting instrumental section that can’t save the song.
Up next is “Borderline.” Stop me if you’ve heard this before: it’s a straightforward song with an ordinary arrangement, featuring lyrics coming from an evangelical viewpoint, where the chorus is by far the worst part of the song. This is getting discouraging.
“Play On” opens up with a drum fill and an almost prog-sounding intro, so hope is immediately raised, given the dreck we’ve had to slog through on this album. However, it’s not much better. The lyrics are somewhat better, with a somewhat different focus, but still not what we’re accustomed to.
At six and a half minutes, “Crossfire” is the album closing prog epic, right? Well, not quite. Another evangelically-driven song, even specifically mentioning “the One who rose,” the song definitely has an instrumental section that is pretty cool, and definitely the best part of the song (and one of the best on the album), featuring multiple movements and time signature changes, so this is really the biggest piece of prog on the album. But ultimately, we have another chorus that is unsatisfying (to me, at any rate), which eventually devalues the entire song.
All in all,
Vinyl Confessions is a huge disappointment. While there are a couple of bright spots (Play The Game Tonight, Chasing Shadows, Crossfire), there isn’t much musically to separate this from any other straightforward rock band out there, and the lyrical basis is not really the kind of separation you want to see. The album feels like the emphasis was on the lyrical content, and the music and melodies were largely afterthoughts. This album is much different in tone and feel from the existing Kansas body of work. I refer to this as the first album by KINO (Kansas In Name Only).
Although much of the existing fanbase was disappointed in the album, the lyrical content found the band a new audience in the growing Contemporary Christian Music market. Christian media and magazines loved the band’s new emphasis, and CCM Magazine named Vinyl Confessions as their Album of the Year for 1982. However, the album failed to make enough sales to reach Gold, which makes it a definite letdown.
When violinist Robbie Steinhardt learned that some Christian fans of the band were printing up religious tracts featuring lyrics from
Vinyl Confessions and distributing them before the band’s concerts, he became fed up with the band’s new direction and quit the band at the end of the tour, another deadly blow to the band.
Basically, I don’t like this album very much, and it doesn’t bear many repeat listens, other than the aforementioned bright spots. Anyone have a different opinion?
Topic: The Kansas Discography Thread - THAT'S ALL, FOLKS (For Now) (Read 45246 times)