Revelation

Description

Revelation is an album by the British songwriter and keyboardist Anthony Ray, independently released on Active Records in 1992, distributed by Kingsway Music. The album was produced by Nick Shillito and Steve Lee. Inspired by the Book of Revelation.

Featuring Anthony Ray on keyboards, Stephen Lee on guitars and vocals, as well as vocals by Steve Ancliffe, Hazel Walker, and Loraine Emmitt.

Every album tells a story. Here both the album’s theme, the book of Revelation no less, and the story behind Revelation’s recording are attention-grabbing enough to make even the most jaded reviewer take a second look and listen. Here’s the album’s background. Senior nursing officer Anthony Ray had been writing music for a hobby when, in 1990, after getting himself converted, he got the idea to write an album based on the book of Revelation (ambitious or what?). After several months researching this most mysterious of prophetic books, Anthony approached a large studio in Leeds and began recording, hiring in session musicians and singers and running up, by Christian music standards, a mega-bill of 10,000 smackers. Anthony was skint and the album was still only half finished, but such was the vision he’d managed to impart about the project that the studio took over financing it and when completed released it on their own label Active Records. But what about the music, you ask? To be honest, being no fan of Rick Wakeman-style pomp-rock, I viewed a 19-track concept CD with skant enthusiasm expecting all kinds of overblown excess. But what my ears heard delighted me, and by half way in I was reaching for the CD booklet. The songs, far from being as dense and inaccessible as John’s apocalyptic visions, are eminently access-able, full of punchy hooks, good melodies and catchy arrangements, while the bevy of vocalists used are outstanding (particularly Steve Ancliffe, Stephen Lee and Hazel Walker) as Anthony deftly takes us from the vision of «One Like A Son Of Man» to the breaking of «The Sixth Seal». If you’re looking for a musical with vastly more musical integrity than Andrew Lloyd Webber and one which will draw you into some stunning Biblical revelation, look no further. [Tony Cummings, Cross Rhythms, July 1992]

CD tracklist:

01. One Like A Son Of Man
02. Ephesus
03. Smyrna
04. Pergamum
05. Thyatira
06. Sardis
07. Philadelphia
08. Laodicea
09. The Throne In Heaven
10. The Scroll And The Lamb
11. The Seals

Note: Simultaneously released on cassette and CD.