Password: 2016
Tracks:
- Adrian Snell - I Was A Stranger (4:53)
- Adrian Snell - Song For John (6:20)
- Adrian Snell - My Soul Alive (4:44)
- Adrian Snell - This Is The Time To Say (5:18)
- Adrian Snell - Making Me Real (4:31)
- Adrian Snell - Gethsemane (4:29)
- Adrian Snell - Judas Song (3:43)
- Adrian Snell - Simon Carry My Cross (5:48)
- Adrian Snell - Gotgotha (2:50)
- Adrian Snell - Jesus--Alive!! (4:23)
Thank you. Excellent album.
ReplyDeleteThanks KJ
ReplyDeleteHere's a text file for the LP
Adrian Snell - Fireflake (Dovetail DOVE 34) 1975
01. I Was A Stranger (4:53)
02. Song For John (6:20)
03. My Soul Alive (4:44)
04. This Is The Time To Say (5:18)
05. Making Me Real (4:31)
06. Gethsemane (4:29)
07. Judas Song (3:43)
08. Simon Carry My Cross (5:48)
09. Gotgotha (2:50)
10. Jesus--Alive!! (4:23)
In the summer if 1975 Adrian began recording his debut album 'Fireflake'. "We did some of the stuff with a string quartet" remembered Adrian. "There were songs like 'My Soul Alive' a very introspective guitar-based ballad type thing and 'This Is The Time To Say' which I'd written for a friend who had recently died. We did it for £1000, or maybe £ 1500, what you could do for that then would be impossible now."
The release of 'Fireflake' by Dove Records of MGO created an immediate impact on the insular British Christian music scene. Buzz magazine predicted that "Adrian will be a really influential personality and that 'Fireflake' will be a runaway best seller". In December 1975 Adrian played songs from it at Nairobi Cathedral at the 5th Assembly of the World Council of Churches and by 1976 he was touring: a slim, rather callow youth with lank, long hair and a characteristic leather headband. Remembers Adrian "My first ever serious tour was organised by MGO after the release of 'Fireflake'. It was an incredible hotchpotch, from colleges and universities to youth groups and church halls. They were the headband days. That was a shock to people, what on earth was this guy turning up with long hair and a headband with a little 'peace' sign at the front. At several places they felt I was from the States, from California but then I'd say something with this nice middle class accent. And they'd think 'what!?' All these things - the headband and the coloured waistcoats - were a serious statement. Although part of me laughs, part of me says 'no, it was serious'. It was a statement I wanted to make about who I was. I didn't feel I fitted, even in the college situation I was in, there was this real conflict of wanting to be known there, to be a Christian with the desire to apply the Christian faith to all of my life, but not having very much confidence in how to do that. So I tended to be overt - I wore a cross round my neck and I had a briefcase with stickers on it. That was my way of saying 'I'm a Christian'. I don't see myself therefore as a better individual than you but when you talk to me, please be aware of that. I was not confident enough for that to come out in a much less overt way as I would be now."
Money was very, very tight. "Just about none of my income was from royalties. Then even 3,000 sales was considered big. I remember the press releases saying 'He's sold 3000 albums in X months' - as if 'wow Michael Jackson eat your heart out!'. My main income was through concerts, though there were still many conflicts over the whole issue of charging for my work. Earnings from concerts would be very unstable and inconsistent. The rest of my earnings came through 'gifts. I had low expenses - living in digs - and I'd recorded my album before the end of college so I had my grant. My family helped me. I didn't need very much."