Description
Hear the Light is the full-length debut album by the American hard rock band Barnabas, originally released on the Canadian label Tunesmith Records in 1980. Re-issued in the US by Light Records in 1984, featuring new cover artwork. The album was produced by David Storrs.
Barnabas started when bass player Gary Mann and guitarist Monte Cooley hooked up in Santa Monica, California, 1977. Forming a band together that year, the lineup would eventually settle to include Nancy Jo Mann on lead vocals and Kris Klingensmith on drums. Quickly getting things organized, Barnabas recorded a demo tape featuring “Directory Assistance” on the A-side with “Nicodemus” on the flip-side. The band shopped these demos around, but everyone rejected them except for a small Canadian label called Tunesmith Records. And thus, the band’s full-length debut album, Hear the Light, was released on Tunesmith in 1980.
What do you call a band who releases an album with nine New Wave tunes and one folk song? A band with a female lead singer who blasts through the tunes with all the delicacy of a jack hammer? A band on a Christian label with poorly mixed songs all directed at unbelievers? Barnabus. [CCM (Records – What’s New), January 1981]
Hear the Light (Legends Remastered)
Barnabas was one of those bands that just had a special “something” that set them apart from the pack. Sure, you could point at individual contributions like the killer guitar work, pounding drums, intricate bass work, talented songwriting, or soaring vocals… but they still seemed to surpass many other bands that also have all of that. Somehow, the combination of all the parts made a special whole that the lucky few that have heard them through the years have really latched onto.
Rumors of re-issues of Barnabas’ five albums have swirled for years, but they came to be late in 2017 through the tireless efforts of Retroactive Records. Each album will be reviewed in order, starting with the debut Hear the Light from 1980 originally on Tunesmith Records.
Hear the Light is often described as the sound of a band still finding its footing in style and songwriting. Much of that is true, but don’t let that description sell you short on this album and skip it. The style does dip into punk and blues rock at times (and there are a few almost misfires in songwriting that will have disappeared by the time they hit their classic albums), but this is still a quality hard rock/borderline metal album. This quality is obvious from the killer riff that opens the album with «Savior». The next song («There’s a New World Coming») is probably the closest they get to punk, and probably the closest they come to a misstep in song writing. But don’t let that fool you, because the heavy metal awesomeness of «Operator Assistance» is next – a track that totally rips your face off and takes no prisoners. This is followed by what I refer to as a gothic rockabilly tune that serves as a great balance to the riffage before it – «Little Faith». Some might see it as a bit out of place, but I love the balance it brings. «He Loves You» and «B.C.» bring the rock back, while «Playin’ for Him» is a keyboard heavy song that is more on the rock than metal side. «No More Blues» is (obviously) a blues rock tune that is pretty good, but needs a bit more convincing guitar leads to pull it off. «Father of Lies» returns to more of the rollicking rockabillly-esque music, while «It’s Up to You» close up with a hard rock jam session.
The re-issue itself is high quality total package that finally gives this album it’s due. The sound was re-mastered from vinyl (as the source tapes are long gone), but the end product was well balanced to not sound like an old record playing through your speakers. The sound on each song as well as the individual instruments really shine. The booklet is full of lyrics, essays, and band pictures. A few more details would have been nice – like why are there two different covers and some band photos with less band members than others? Most fans know this is because the album was re-issued a few years after it’s initial release with a new cover – and not all of the same band members were still in band. Also, the guitarist for this album is only mentioned in the essay and not in the credits, but the historical details provided in this essay make it well worth the read. Overall, this is a high quality re-issue of the first album by a band that was just getting warmed up… [Matt Crosslin, The Phantom Tollbooth, January 13, 2018]
LP tracklist:
Side One
A1. “Saviour” – 3:02
A2. “There’s A New World Coming” – 2:35
A3. “Directory Assistance” – 3:55
A4. “Little Faith” – 2:54
A5. “He Loves You” – 3:20
Side Two
B1. “B.C.” – 2:22
B2. “Playin’ For Him” – 3:33
B3. “No More Blues” – 7:28
B4. “Father Of Lies (A Song About The Other Guy)” – 2:30
B5. “It’s Up To You” – 3:00
Note: Re-issued by Light Records in 1984 on both cassette and 12-inch vinyl LP, featuring new cover artwork. Released as a Limited Edition CD by Millenium Eight Records featuring both Hear The Light and Find Your Heart A Home. All five albums were remastered by Rob Colwell at Bombworks Sound and re-issued on CD by Retroactive Records in 2017, packaged in jewel cases with 12-page booklet inserts. (All albums were remastered from virgin sealed vinyl or cassette because all master tapes have been destroyed and are unavailable.)
Original Cover Artwork, Tunesmith Records, 1980
Re-issue Cover Artwork, Light Records, 1984
A full-page advertisement for Light Records’ reissue of Barnabas’ first two albums as well as Approaching Light Speed, the band’s third release, was featured in the June 1984 issue of CCM Magazine.
[youtube_sc url=”9kpbsTUXfgM” playlist=”” title=”Barnabas – Directory Assistance (2017 Retroactive Records Remaster)” autohide=”1″ rel=”0″]
[youtube_sc url=”_MkGh8AATPc” playlist=”” title=”BARNABAS (band) live in concert – May 17, 1980″ autohide=”1″ rel=”0″]Barnabas, Live in Concert, May 17, 1980 (Christ the King Lutheran Church, Torrance, California).
Barnabas started when bass player Gary Mann and guitarist Monte Cooley hooked up in Santa Monica, California, in 1977. Forming a band together that year, the lineup would eventually settle to include Nancy Jo Mann (vocals) and Kris Klingensmith (drums).
“I was living east of L.A.,” remembers Klingensmith, “and I had put an ad in a local rag called The Recycler. Musicians use it to find gigs and sell equipment. Monte found my ad looking for other players, and he invited me to come audition for Barnabas.”
[Kris Klingensmith: I auditioned for Dick Greenburg in a garage in Baldwin Park or Azusa, can’t remember for certain. This was a few years post-Agape and if I recall correctly he had a band called Sunrise for awhile; he was putting another act together and I took a shot at it. All the players were very polite, I played my tail off and they suggested I keep practicing. I did and it turns out that was the last audition I didn’t get. The next one was Barnabas and I got that one.]
Quickly getting things organized, Barnabas recorded a demo tape featuring «Directory Assistance» with «Nicodemus» on the B-side. “We shopped these demos around,” Klingensmith says. “Everyone rejected them because it was too ridiculous, too outlandish to everyone except for a small Canadian label called Tunesmith, a part of Praise [Industries].” The band’s first album, Hear the Light, was released in 1980.
On the advice of fellow rock artists Servant and its Highway Missionary Society, Barnabas hightailed it out of L.A. in 1981. After a few weeks of living in the Jesus People, USA community in Chicago, the band set up shop in Schaumburg, Illinois. “The move was prompted so we would be more accessible to tour,” says Nancy Jo. It was the first of many moves for this transient pack of musicians.
Founding member Cooley left the band and returned to L.A. before the second Barnabas record was recorded. Find Your Heart a Home found Barnabas living in Des Moines, Iowa. On the next album, 1983’s Approaching Light Speed on Light Records, the band replaced Donner and Brauninger with guitarist Brian Belew, forming the line-up most people envision as Barnabas.
The Manns, Klingensmith and Belew created 1984’s Feel the Fire and then moved to Edmond, OK where the members would go on to release their final album, Little Foxes, in 1986. Though plagued by constant change in location or personnel, Barnabas richly contributed to Christian music’s emerging diverse landscape.
“There really wasn’t a whole lot of that type of smashmouth music going on,” Klingensmith says, “particularly when Monte formed the band with Gary back in L.A. It was all sort of Chuck Girard [acoustic] sounding. [Our sound] was new, and it bothered a lot of people. The stage presence overwhelmed them. We had our share of detractors, that’s for sure.”
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