I will be sharing more in days to come, but for now, I am posting this interview I scanned from an old ragged publication that turned up recently. This interview appeared just before the release of my first solo album in 1975. Some of you will really enjoy this.
CHUCK GIRARD INTERVIEW WITH “LODESTONE” MAGAZINE, CIRCA 1974
*What are you doing now, lately?….
My main energies are being concentrated on a solo album with which I’m about 80% finished and hope to have out by the end of the year. I’ve been doing a lot of weekend type ministry. A lot of “continent-jumping”. I’ve been getting to the East coast for example, often for 3-4 days at a time, then home. Doing some local things too, you know….just enough o keep my family supported and to stay in it, because I really want to continue to enjoy the ministry end of things, not just concentrate on the record 100%. I do feel, however, that the record is my main thrust for the Lord right now. I feel that the lord will use the record to re-establish me if you will, because right now, the group has been disbanded for over 10 months and I think it’s important that people know what I’m doing on my own. The record will have a lot to do with establishing the solo ministry.
*What’s this record going to be called?….
Well, I think “Rock and Roll Preacher”. There’s a tune on it by that title, sort of an autobiographical tune. Since my main thrust in cutting records is for non-Christians, I figure that the title would be a curious one, and might arouse some questions and curiosity and ……
*Under what label will this one be issued?…
This will also be on Good News Records, the same one as Love Song albums. It’s distributed by Myrrh Records.
*Let’s backtrack a little and talk about Love Song. The “Final Touch” album came out recently. How has the reaction to it been?…
As far as sales go, it’s been very good. There’s been something in the neighborhood of 40,000 copies in the first 3 or 4 weeks, which is really good. It had the highest pre-sale in the history of Word records, the parent firm of Myrrh. The reactions to it have been varied. Some people have said they like it better than the first album, others say they don’t like it as well. The main criticism that people have is that they feel the music overpowers the words a little. I am inclined tom agree to a degree. Just varied reactions, you know…
*How do you think it compares to the first album?…
(pause)….I don’t know. I am sort of partial to the first album. It’s possibly a little warmer. I think they are really different, considering the material was written around the same time as the first. The first one has a little more innocence in it, maybe. I think I lean towards the first one
*It’s amazing that the sales have been so good, seeing that there haven’t been any promotional tours at all because the group actually disbanded several months before the release of the album....
You know, it’s sort of funny because during the two years that the album was due to come out, it sort of built a “mystique” about it, sort of like “when’s it coming out?”, or “is it really coming out?”, and “is there really a second Love Song album, or is it a myth?”. So, when it came out, a lot of people were really excited about it. That has helped maintain the interest in the album.
*You’ve been to our area several times, and been well received. Do you plan to come up as a solo performer?…
Well, I have no concrete plans. The way I feel about my ministry right now does not include a band of any kind, is that I’m really waiting on the Lord. I feel that my music demands a band situation to really bring it out. It’s not really the kind of folk music you can do with just a guitar. It’s been received well, the way I’ve been doing it with guitar and piano backing, but I kind of look forward to having a band again someday. I’m not rushing into it.
As far as coming to Vancouver again, I have no immediate plan to do so, but if there was an interest there, I would probably make arrangements to come. It would be fun, but I’d rather have a band when I do.
*Let’s talk about your background, your conversion, and maybe even a little of your life before you met the Lord. Do you come from California? What kind of things were you into?…
I’m a native. How much time do we have? (laughter). I was born in (L.A.), and raised in a denominational background from which I didn’t receive any kind of feeling of knowing God, so I rejected the church when I was about sixteen. I’m thirty-one now, so when I was a teenager, there was no drug scene. We just drank. For about eight years, I was involved in the whole drinking alcohol trip.
*Were you performing as a musician then?…
Yeah, I was about fifteen when I started drinking, and about eighteen when I got into show business. After about five years, I got involved with drugs as a natural progression. I was very curious because I had read a lot about drugs and was just smoking marijuana for about a year. Then I started reading about the hippies and the L.S.D. movement. I was curious and began taking L.S.D. That was what got me interested in spiritual things, really. There is a pseudo-spiritual thing which happens on L.S.D. and I like to point out to people that it is very easy to feel you have made contact with some kind of spiritual realm. I believe that if you have never tasted of the Holy Spirit, it's very easy to accept anything that seems spiritual as being God, even though it's very ordained of Satan -- the type of experience that you have L.S.D. I was very deceived, you know; I never saw demons coming out of the walls or anything, -- it was very subtle --spiritual pride; thinking that I was someone. I was reading books on Buddhism and even the Bible. There were about 8 of us on this spiritual quest. We were constantly looking forward to the next level -- you know there's a lot of level-seeking in L-S.D., and we were slowly but surely starting to eliminate some things. I think the Holy Spirit was using the situation to draw us toward Jesus . You know, when you jump off a bridge and break your leg that isn't really God's will for you to do that, but He can use that situation to speak to you.
*Right…
I really try to make it clear that I'm not by any means trying to build up the drug situation, but that He will use it to speak to us, just like He'll use any situation. He was starting to get us to eliminate more wrong things. I was really honest in my search. I really wanted to find God, and I would do anything to find Him. We were getting into the Beatles at that time and they put out Sgt. Pepper then. We thought that there was a lot of spiritual revelation on that album. They (the Beatles) were going to visit the Maharishi in India about that time. We thought the Beatles were locked into it. We really thought they knew what was going on spiritually, and they were sort of a 'messiah-type' Then 'Magical Mystery Tour’ came out and there were more songs with spiritual connotations to them. We just knew the next album after 'Magical Mystery Tour’ would tell us who God was. The next album was the “white album” (Note: called simply 'The Beatles') and it had such spiritual songs on it as 'Rocky Raccoon', “Why Don’t We Do It In The Road”, and you know ••• (laughter)
*Yeah, right ... (laughter)
We got kind of blown out with that and felt kind of ripped off. At this time, we were reading the Bible a lot and getting distorted ideas about what scripture meant. We were reading Revelations, and had devised this theory that the New Jerusalem would be the island of Kauai in Hawaii. We sold all of our possessions and went there to wait for the rest of the world to burn itself out with wars and social and economic disasters. We believed we were actually going to be the people who would start the Millennium Period. We had a lot of the stuff in a semi-perspective, but it was just distorted enough to where we really didn't have it together at all •••
It was funny because we really did go over to Hawaii, sell all of our possessions and everything; and met other people there whom we didn't know before who had had the same revelation. I really feel personally, that there was a massive effort which was involving conspiracy in the high places of evil to really come down on a whole generation of people who were involved in drugs. There were many people who were seeking God through the drug experience and I think Satan was attacking those people going through the same changes at the same time. We got over to Kauai and became impatient waiting for God. After a couple of months, we returned to the mainland and started to get into trouble with the law. This is where God started to deal with us in a new way, because we felt like we had learned about all we could from taking drugs, but we couldn't stop taking them. We were kind of psychologically addicted to them.
*Were you living in this area at the time?…(Southern California)
I was living in Laguna Beach at that time. A bunch of us were awaiting trial on different drug charges. Three of us were arrested in Las Vegas -- that's a pretty heavy place in which to get arrested. God was using this period of our lives to really bare down on us and get us to listen. At this time, we heard about Calvary Chapel ~ We finally got invited to attend a service there. I was very skeptical and didn't know what to expect. The night I attended was unbelievably heavy because I thought everything (in the service) was just for me. It was such an experience. First of all, the music got me. The people were just praising the Lord. The Word of God says that He inhabits the praises of His People and He really did there! I could feel Him in the room. I could feel that the people did have a communication with God and I felt on the outside of it, but yet I was spiritually proud. Still, God was breaking down my walls. Looking back on it, I could see a tremendous spiritual battle going on in me because Satan was trying to keep me from receiving. Such a conflict was going on in me during the service. When the pastor got up to speak, he gently shared the love of Jesus. I had never had that kind of an experience where someone just simply explained to me who Jesus was, how He related to me, and the 'love' aspects of it more than the kind of preaching: "repent or you are gonna go to Hell" and a real fear-trip. It was the first time I realized that God wasn't sitting "up there" with a big whip, ready to crack it over my head every time I made a mistake. It all made sense to me. I committed my life to the Lord that night, and about 3 days later, a friend prayed for me and I received a full experience of the Love of God. That really cleared things up for me. I felt God's Presence in a heavy way.
Then, being musicians, we began writing tunes about our experiences with no idea of starting any new music or anything. Before long, it turned into the Love Song ministry which hadn't been planned. It just happened. We didn't change the style of music we liked--we just added meaningful lyrics to it. It turned out to be the fore-runner of what is now called "Jesus Rock" I never thought about it being anything different.
*How long was Love Song in existence? …
Well, it was right from the beginning when we were saved. About two weeks after, we started participating in services on a regular basis and being invited out to other churches and things. We were together a little over 3 1/2 years, I'd say.
*Did the original members appear on both albums?…
No. There was one guitarist who was with us for about 1 1/2 years and he left the group just before we started getting into the first album. In fact, he co-wrote a lot of the tunes on the two albums. You'll see his name on many of the songs because he and I wrote a lot of them together. His name is Fred Field.
•And he was replaced by Bob Wall?…
Right..
*And Bob was replaced by Phil Keaggy?…
Right. We had a lot of traveling guitar players. (Laughter)
• Tell us where the (members) have gone*
Phil went back to 0hio and the last I heard, he's back with the Scott Ross Ministry in Freeville, New York. Scott, as you probably know, has that syndicated Jesus Radio Program. Phil has a playing partner, Peter York; and I think he's doing some things with Paul Clark. Paul put out the 'Songs from the Savior' albums.
The remaining nucleus members: the drummer, John Mehler, the bass player, Jay Truax, and the rhythm guitar player, Tom Coomes, have started a new group with
*And you are operating as a solo performer...
Yeah, I'm really open to the Lord. I'm not sure what the future will bring, except that I know I'm trying to cut the very best album I can.
*Okay, we'll look for that around the. beginning of next year...
Hopefully, the end of this year, I'd like to have it out by Christmas. That's my goal, Lord willing •••
Great to read this interview again.
ReplyDeleteI LOVED the first solo album-those 1st couple of tracks on Side One really lit up the old turntable.(and I remember reading who was playing on those tracks and being REALLY impressed!)The 'ballad' tracks were superb as well. All in all a beautifully 'balanced' album.