Rehearsal 4 Reality

Description

Rehearsal 4 Reality is a compilation album by the American singer and songwriter Larry Norman, released on the Swedish gospel label Royal Music in 1986. The album was producer by Larry Norman. Featuring a cover of “More Than A Dream”, a song written by Steve Scott.

The first release in the 30 Years Series begins herewith 12 recordings which were demos or rough mixes of songs destined for other official albums… which never saw the light of day. «Why Can’t You Be Good», «Woman Of God» and «It’s Only Today That Counts» all stand out as being very good even in their demo form while «If You Don’t Love The Lord, You’ll Fall» sports some epic drum machines and ace guitar sounds and cool vocoder effects. Five instrumentals pad out the proceedings (including the catchy «Voices In The Night» where Larry and Charly can only remember the words to the chorus). Larry descends to the level of Shakin’ Stevens on the rambling ’50s-style rocker «Gonna Write A Song About You For The Radio» and Steve Scott goes uncredited as the composer of «More Than A Dream». Larry later blamed the owner of Royal Music for this turn of events: “When this song first came out on ‘Rehearsal For Reality’ in Europe, the man who owned the company took Steve’s name off as composer and put Larry’s name on it so he could keep all of the royalties… The man also took Charles’ name off all his co-writing credits.” [Dougie Adam, Cross Rhythms, May 2001]

Woman of God, from the album ‘Rehearsal For Reality’, Royal Music 1986

It appears that wherever Larry goes, Sweden, Australia, you-name-it, he travels with a case full of master tapes. Then at any opportunity he’ll pop into the nearest studio, mix something, record something fresh, or overdub something old, and maybe, from time to time, pass out tapes for release, sometimes by ‘proper’ record companies, sometimes by himself. This discographer’s nightmare will probably never be completely unravelled. One of its legacies for any fan approaching Larry’s vast output of albums is that some songs have been recorded several different times with decidedly mixed results. This is the version of this wonderful song you want. Beware of imitators. Here the drum sound is monstrous, the harmonies perfect; while the hook (“I’m looking for a woman of God, a woman with a righteous heart”) comes from one of most brilliant crafters of pop song contemporary music has produced. The fact that the pop music world doesn’t know that shows just how unfair showbiz can be. [Tony Cummings, Cross Rhythms, August 2017]

> iTunes (https://music.apple.com/zm/album/rehearsal-4-reality/367950804)

LP tracklist:

Side One
A1. “Why Can’t You Be Good” (From Down Under (But Not Out), US album version) – 4:08
A2. “I Feel Like Dyin'” (From Something New Under The Son) – 1:45
A3. “More Than A Dream” (Previously unreleased) – 3:35
A4. “Zimmy Finds His Father” (Instrumental) – 2:15
A5. “Broken Bonds, Fallen Friendship” (Instrumental) – 2:07
A6. “If You Don’t Love The Lord, You’ll Fall” (Previously unreleased) – 5:20

Side Two
B1. “Woman Of God” (First and shorter release on Back To America) – 3:26
B2. “Voices In The Night” (Previously unreleased) – 4:40
B3. “A Dream Come True” (Instrumental) – 3:03
B4. “Gonna Write A Song About You For The Radio” (From Down Under (But Not Out)) – 3:17
B5. “It’s Only Today That Counts” (Same as the Back To America version) – 3:22
B6. “Galaxy” (From Down Under (But Not Out)) – 4:38

Note: Re-issued on CD by the Royal Music sub-label MEP in 2008. Available at Bandcamp: https://larrynorman.bandcamp.com/album/rehearsal-for-reality

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