ABOUT THE ALBUM "GLOW IN THE DARK"

"Glow in the Dark" was my second solo album. As I was preparing to record this album, I noticed in the selecting of the songs that a pattern was emerging. My first solo album "Chuck Girard" had purposefully been rather safe, consisting of songs that were not controversial in nature, just positive songs. This actually was intentional, since I was making the transition from being a group member to a solo artist, a very difficult thing to do. I had purposely planned to make a non-confrontational album, choosing not to "rock the boat" so that I could establish a successful solo identity. But this second album contains several songs that could be considered confrontational, and the pattern which emerged, consciously or unconsciously, was that during my career/ministry it turned out that I made what I called a "safe" album followed by an album containing more controversial songs. Songs such as "Return", "I Remember" and "Something Supernatural" were songs which dealt with issues that all Christians face, but songs are not always written about these kind of themes. "Glow In The Dark" was a comparatively uneven album in some ways, in yet held together. Over the years, the songs that seem to get the most requests are "Something Supernatural", and "Old Dan Cotton". The song that I perform the most from this album is "So Thankful".

ABOUT THE SONGS

ANTHEM

This little piece was never planned as a song. It occurred accidentally as one day I had the track up for the song "When I Was Ready To Listen". Just by chance the tracks containing the background vocals were the only tracks that came up in the mix. These background vocals were on this section at the end of the song where I sing the name "Jesus". I had put quite a few overdubs of background vocals on this section and had never felt comfortable about them. They seemed to disturb the serenity of the track at that point, and I had planned to just get rid of them. But they sounded so nice as they came up acapella, that I decided to do something else with them. I transferred them onto another piece of the two-inch master tape, and layered them with additional parts. It just sounded cool, so I opened the album with these vocals. Many people even today comment on how they enjoyed these vocals. . .

CALLIN' YOU

"If I have ever had something which became a cliché in my lyric themes, it would be the theme of salvation. This theme pops up in so many of my songs, and especially in my earlier songs, where this was/is the theme of most importance. These lyrics reflect different aspects of the theme of needing Jesus in your life and hopefully prompting the listener to respond. I have had many people testify to having been saved as a direct or indirect result of having listened to one of my evangelistic songs. What an honor. "Callin' You" is another evangelistic song that was really more about the music than the lyric. This does not minimize the importance of the lyric, but some songs are more about framing interesting music around the lyric, while maybe the thought of the lyric has been stated already in other songs. Therefore, the lyric becomes an extension of a theme already stated, while the music is something I haven't done before.

To me, "Callin' You" was a great little pop song. Good hook, good lyric, and a fun song to begin an album.

I REMEMBER

Contrary to the title I don't remember exactly how I got the inspiration for this song. Sometimes themes just emerge, and you make sense out of them as you go along. Sometimes the challenge is in determining what it is that the Lord wants to say through the song. You get the germ of an idea without really knowing where it's going sometimes, and get the sense of it as you go along. This song is from the viewpoint of a non-Christian. He is singing the lyric to a friend who has confessed to be a Christian, but is not living his life up to the expectation of the non-Christian. He is questioning some of the hypocritical things that he sees in the lifestyle of the supposed Christian. In the end of the song he is so turned off that he doesn't even want to try Christianity. Obviously I was trying to get people to see the importance of "walking what we talk", and being a good witness to the people around us. I suppose this approach was a little off center from what people were used to, but I think most people got it and I never heard any negative comments about it.

Production note: The idea for the Jon Linn guitar solos at the end was inspired from a passage in the Beatles album "Abbey Road". Near the end of that Beatle album, there is a guitar solo section which is part of the tune called "The End", where they overdubbed George Harrison guitar solos on different tracks. The sound of the guitar and even possibly the amplifiers changed with each lick, and I thought that was a cool effect. We duplicated the technique on the end of "I Remember", having Jon change even the guitar he used on every passage. It was fun to be able to use such an admired technique on one of my own albums.

RETURN

This song was written as "Return To Your First Love". Regrettably, I shortened the title to "Return", not wanting to give away the punch line in the title. Since then, I realized how insignificant this would have been, and wish I had stuck with the longer title. This song was a little more directly confrontational. It is directly based on a scripture, but the scenario was derived from the different things that I had personally experienced in my own walk and from observing some of the things that I heard other people say and do regarding their Christian walk. I think the main theme here is the shifting of blame.

It is a cynical or sarcastic look at some of the excuses we make to justify some of the failure in our Christian life instead of owning up to the real reason, which is that we've personally strayed from God. We tend to look for scapegoats, to try and pin the blame anywhere but on ourselves. I felt that it was a rather successful lyric, that rather bitingly confronted this issue. I'm sure that this reflected a personal need for this message in my own life as well.

I KNOW A LADY

Obviously written for my wife, this was a love song of thanks to the Lord for finding the right mate. Again, my knowledge of gospel music was minimal, and I didn't really consider my music to be gospel in the strict sense anyway. So to write a love song to my wife and God seemed quite natural. Production Note: One of my favorite albums as a young man was an album by jazz greats Bud Shank and Bob Cooper called "Flute and Oboe". It was a thrill to book Bob Cooper to play the oboe solo on this song and get to work with a musical legend.

NO, NO, YOU'RE NOT AFRAID

I had just learned some of the more unusual chords on the guitar when I wrote this (in this case diminished chords), and was exploring possibilities for using them in a song. Lyrically, I was thinking about the profound changes that surrendering to Jesus bring, and primarily the fact that when we do, we see the world for the first time through a greatly expanded vision, and an eternal perspective. No longer are we wondering why the world seems to be spiraling out of control, or why times are so profoundly evil and confusing. The bible, written thousands of years ago, tells us about all of the phenomena we are now experiencing, and even though the outcome is not positive in the natural perspective, we see supernaturally that all is unfolding as it should, and God is in control. This brings a great peace to the Christian, and ultimately, abolishes the fear in which much of the secular world lives. Musically, I wanted to create a simple, moody piece, reinforced by beautiful harmonies which would deliver this message, and allow me to use my new-found chords! These chords suggested a kind of French or European flavor to me. Maybe reminiscent of "Michelle" by the Beatles? The lyric once again, more served the melody, although I really like what it says. I really enjoy creating something that is so different from my usual style of writing.

SOMETHIN' SUPERNATURAL

My only really blues based song in all my albums. As a teenager I enjoyed the music of Jimmy Reed, where every song had a variation of the same rhythm guitar idea, where Jimmy sang these great bluesy lyrics about the trials of life. One day I was fooling around on the guitar with a like chord and rhythm pattern, and I thought about what I could appropriately communicate in this musical format. I thought that the perfect union of words and music would be to have this song also come from the perspective of a non-Christian, as I had done in "I Remember". I thought about how strange it is for a friend of a convert to cope with the changes that so suddenly occur in the life of an old friend who becomes a Christian. Turnabout is often 180, and I wanted to project the wonder that must occur on the part of that friend who knows that his old friend is really not capable of such a profound change in their behavior, at least in the natural. The change is often dramatic, and must be disconcerting to the friend who has watched his buddy indulge in all the vices the world has to offer, and then all of a sudden in a matter of an instant, want nothing to do with these same weaknesses. This lyric may well have been the first "R" rated Christian lyric, containing references to Playboy Magazine, alcohol, and other vices, as well as the line "Try to get it on": a reference to sexual involvement. Interestingly, I never personally received one negative comment in regard to this song.

Musically this track was straight-ahead blues. I wanted to find a really great blues harp player for this song, and really didn't know of anyone. My engineer, Tom Trefethen, knew a guy who played great blues harp, but had NEVER recorded. I took a chance, and this guy walks in with a little Fender amp. and an old microphone that he used in live performances. The technical instinct is to mic him with a professional mic straight into the board, but I knew this guy had a sound, and so I let him set up his way. We recorded him direct out of his little amp and let him use his own "cheapo" microphone. The sound was great, and he blew most other harmonica players out of the water. I had never heard of him before, and never heard that he ever did anything after this session, but he did a great job.

WHEN I WAS READY TO LISTEN

This is a straightforward evangelistic song, simply saying how empty my life was before meeting Jesus, and how fulfilling it has been since. This song was more about the music, incorporating several movements, to create a sort of mini "rock opera". Beginning with a long slowly building instrumental, it breaks after a crescendo to the first vocalized line. It builds in the minor mode until it breaks into the first almost about face change, where I sing a new melody in a major mode. It then goes out with the most profound portion of the lyric; the name of Jesus, sung several times with great reverence.

SO THANKFUL

This song was actually written backstage at an Easter sunrise service in Naples, Florida. I was to play a short set for the service, and I had arrived early for sound check, etc. The venue was a kind of "bowl" affair, outdoors with an amphitheater kind of feel. After sound check, I was waiting for the event to begin, and I wandered backstage, where I found an upright piano. I sat down at the piano, and began to think about what this holiday really meant, and a great sense of gratitude overwhelmed me. I thought about what Jesus had done at the cross, and then about the glory of the Resurrection, and ultimately what that means to the born again believer. Jesus actually lives in us! The words poured quickly onto the page, and I went out that morning and performed the song for the first time. It has not gone down in my history as one of the most popular or requested songs, but I feel a great affection for it, and believe it to be one of my best.

OL' DAN COTTON

Wow, what an unusual song. Occasionally there comes a song so unique that you can't actually pinpoint it's inspiration or creation. This is such a song. I remember getting the first half of the lyric, which was already of considerable length, and wondering how I was going to ever finish it without it becoming a 10 minute epic, ala Don McLean's "American Pie". I really didn't want to create a song of such length, and wondered where to go next with this lyric, which at this time had only tracked the progress of the old man up to the point where he went off "to the hills alone". I put the song on the shelf, waiting for an opportunity to approach it with fresh perspective. A while later I was on a flight to Barrington College, in Rhode Island, when I took the lyric out again. I felt the Holy Spirit prompt me to that most famous of rock and roll music adages, "less is more". I realized that I was trying to be too linear with the lyric, and that if I left out some obvious and insignificant details, the audience would be able to fill in the blanks. So with this idea firmly in motion, the rest of the lyric unfolded seamlessly, and the song was finished. I really wasn't sure what the scriptural message was, it just seemed to be a story about an old man. But over the years, many have come to me to share how the song brought reassurance to them about the death of a grandfather or some such, and I guess that God has used the song in the way He wanted to over the years. I actually cut 2 tracks to this song. One rhythm section of very famous and competent players never really jelled, and I had the luxury of cutting the tune another time with a different group of players. This version made the cut.