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| Evolving in the early seventies from local acts Kansas, White Clover, and The Eagles, Kansas soon made it's name as a hard rocking if rather eclectic outfit throughout the midwest. Taking their cues from the Art Rock of English troupes such as Greenslade and Emerson Lake and |
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Evolving in the early seventies from local acts Kansas, White Clover, and The Eagles, Kansas soon made it's name as a hard rocking if rather eclectic outfit throughout the midwest. Taking their cues from the Art Rock of English troupes such as Greenslade and Emerson Lake and Palmer rather than the usual American influences, they became a big enough concert draw to begin to attract the attention of Major Record Labels. Having established their core as Phil Ehart (Drums), Kerry Livgren (Guitars, Keyboards), Steve Walsh (Keyboards, Lead Vocals), Dave Hope (Bass) Robbie Steinhardt (Violin, Lead Vocals) and Rich Williams (Lead Guitar), they signed to Epic and released their debut eponymously titled album in 1974. It barely dented the charts, peaking on the Billboard listing at #174 and taking over twenty years to be certified a gold record. Rather than going back to the drawing board, the band toured harder and refined what they did. The result, 1975's Song For America, was a marked improvement. The heavy touring had done it's job in raising the band's profile, and the album got to #57 without the help of a hit single. The band were on a roll, and managed to release another album, Masque, the same year. Hardcore fans noticed a slight softening in song structure going on, with a couple of songs seeming to have been constructed to garner airplay. The gamble failed, the album limped to #70 (although it only took a couple of years to go gold!)and to the eyes of many outsiders, the band looked to have stalled.
As Phil Ehart was later to recall,"we went into the studio for what was to become Leftoverture in a lot of trouble.Steve [Walsh] had hit a writers block and as we were due to start recording we were a couple of songs short. Then Kerry [Livgren] told us he had a new song..."
The new song turned out to be 'Carry On Wayward Son' and Kansas' place in the Pantheon of American Hard Rock Legends was assured. That song even became a minor hit in England a couple of years later, but for the time being Kansas was only worried about the US. The single just failed to make the top ten, but there was no stopping the album as Leftoverture peaked at #5 and went on to sell in excess of four million copies. The album's follow up, 'Point Of Know Return' did the same and spawned what for many was the quintessential Kansas track- 'Dust In The Wind'. Not even deemed good enough to be the lead off single on the album (that honour fell to the title track which ran out of steam somewhere outside the top 20), 'DITW' has become one of THOSE songs, or as Steve Walsh puts it, 'a career song'. But, whilst you can still here that song on radios around the world to this day, it marked the peak of the band as a commercial force.
Now touring harder than ever due to the success of two monster albums, Kansas put out a stopgap double live effort in 1978s 'Two For The Show'. A largely disappointing album, it still made it to #32 in the US and tided hungry fans over until the release of a new studio release. Walsh's muse had returned and he took more of a hand in the writing of 1979's Monolith. But the album bombed in commercial terms, reaching only #10 and failing to ship platinum. It's single, the appalling disco-lite of People Of The South Wind also failed to ignite the imagination of the buying public.
By now cracks were beginning to show: Livgren aand Hope were finding it increasingly difficult to reconcile their Christian values with the lifestyle they were leading. Walsh's more 'rock n'roll' leanings were also causing a strain and the classic lineup's swansong, 1980s Audio Visions, was an uneven amalgamation of the two camps. It's best song,Hold On, was seen as a lukewarm revisiting of Dust In The Wind and the band had a bona fide failure on it's hands. Walsh left to pursue solo ideas, later forming the ill- fated Streets. He was replaced by Christian rocker John Elefante, a man with a great voice and the religious credentials to match Livgren's vision.The first fruits of their labour, 1982s Vinyl Confessions, was a definite return to form and is something of a forgotten classic. The genral public seemed to like it, buying enough copies to send it to #16 whilst the single, Play The Game Tonight, also made the top 20. The band was evolving a sleeker, less complex sound more geared to FM radio, a style more suited to the Steve Perryesque vocals of Elefante. Steinhardt didn't like what he heard and followed Walsh out the door. 1983s Kansas offering, the bombastic Drastic Measures, was seemingly a vindication of the violinist's decision. An unmitigated disaster, it became the first Kansas record to fail to chart. Livgren called proceedings to a halt (he became a lay minister and formed a rather fine outfit, Kerry Livgren AD, Epic dropped the band and put out a greatest hits album and once again things looked bleak.
But Phil Ehart kept the faith, and after a 3 year sabbatical persuaded Steve Walsh that there was an interest in new Kansas music. MCA Records seemed to agree and offered the band a deal. In a move that stunned longtime fans, Ehart obtained the services of Dixie Dregs guitar maestro Steve Morse as a replacement for Livgren,and outside writers were enlisted for the first time in a decade (the result was the band's first top twenty single for four years), and Power was born. A great record, it fused all the elements previously appreciated by Kansas fans (most importantly the return of Walsh on Vocals) and seemed to herald a healthy future for the band. But MCA lost interest, withdrew support in favour of Teen sensation Tiffany and left the band once more high and dry after the release of the majestic In The Spirit Of Things. Things were again on the brink. Years of indulgence had left Walsh's pipes on the verge of collapse and the band was sustained for a while by touring USAAF bases in the US and Europe. Morse left to join Deep Purple but the band soldiered on with sidemen David Ragsdale and Greg Robert filling the empty spaces. An appalling live album recorded at The Whiskey in Los Angeles followed, and seemed to be an unsuitable epitaph to a once great band. But again they refused to die: 1995 saw the release of the understatedly brilliant Freaks Of Nature, where Ragsdale's incendiary violin work really evoked the bands Glory days; So much so that they elected to offload him and regroup with a rejeuvenated Steinhardt. By now Livgren was flitting in and out of the picture (he'd contributed a new song for inclusion in a retrospective box set released by Legacy in 1994) and the band had become a live staple on the County Fair circuit. But the magic was effectively over: The band continues to write and record, even Dave Hope returned to play on 2000s Somewhere To Elsewher; but the continued diminution of Walsh's vocal powers leads one to think that the legend should probably be laid to rest sometime soon.
Bio written by: Hammerheart |
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