Goodbye, Farewell

Last Sunday, Larry Norman died. He was 60 years old. Larry is often considered the Father of Christian Rock - or somesuch... He was a pioneer, no doubt about that. There was a lot of controversy that surrounded him - maybe he was hard to work with, I don't know.

I've heard that some in the "CCM Industry" who would laud him publicly (and, you know, record his songs and stuff) would criticize him privately. He made some pretty wild accusations, no doubt about that (apparently Larry wrote a song called The Tune that somehow he says Bill Gaither ripped off in the song "God Gave the Song" - okay, maybe he took the CONCEPT, but, really, listen to "The Tune" above, and then listen to this - Bill Gaither talking about "God Gave the Song" - which sounds like, if something was done it was done by Ron Huff...but I digress. I mean, yeah, it's got a lot in common - but...well, I don't know... Larry says that it was Gaither's biggest hit to date - and it was - but it was just supposed to be a demo for a musical that they had written...so, anyway, rip off or not, I'll take Larry's version over B&G's any day).

When I saw him at the Creation festival in the late 90s (I think) he seemed...a little paranoid. There was a helicopter flying overhead and he kept talking to it...

Two things from that performance stand out in my memory. He had some great things to say. Like there were all these, I'll call them, "Christian Rip Off" t-shirts being sold and worn. You know, "This Blood's For You" or something about Star Wars, I don't remember. But he (rightly) railed, "Why do we have to imitate the world? Can't Christians be creative?" (I'm paraphrasing from memory, of course). But he was right. He talked about all the tattoos and piercings and said something to the effect of, "I'd feel a whole lot better about it if WE had done it first and the world was following US."

The second thing was what an amazing performer he was. Just him and a beat up acoustic guitar but he held us. Yeah, we sang along with a lot of the songs. And yes he cut "I Wish We'd All Been Ready" short (because we were singing along????). Heh - the funniest moment I remember was when he sang the lead guitar part in a song...

I'm not proud of what the CCM industry has become - and I can't blame Larry for spawning it, really. But when I want to hear honest songs about Jesus, I'll put in Larry's music, sit back and close my eyes and remember the day Tim Casey lent me his prize original vinyl copies of Street Level, Only Visiting This Planet, So Long Ago The Garden, In Another Land. I immediately made tape copies (they were long since out of print and NOBODY was going to re-release Larry's stuff - but no worries, I've got 'em on CD now, thanks to http://www.larrynorman.com/) and wore them out.

As a singer I put his vocals in line with Tom Petty, Bob Dylan and Bruce Springsteen (these days, especially) - though much higher generally. That is to say, um, his singing isn't that good. But his songs are classics (much like, well, Tom and Bob and Bruce).

Here's a video tribute to Larry: