Early life and career of Larry Norman

The early life and career of Larry Norman focuses on the period of American Christian rock pioneer Norman's life from his birth on April 8, 1947^[1] until just before the December 1969 release of his first solo album, Upon This Rock, "the first commercially released Jesus rock album".^[2] It covers Norman's involvement with the Back Country Seven, his first professional release in 1967 on Capitol, and his first album, I Love You, recorded when he was one of the lead singers for the group People!, which was released in 1968. In this period People!'s cover version of The Zombies song of the same name reached number 14 on Billboard magazine's top twenty list in 1968 as a single.^[3] Norman left People! in July 1968.^[4]

Early life

Larry Norman was born in Corpus Christi, Texas,^[5] the oldest son of Joe Hendrex "Joe Billy" Norman (9 December 1923 – 28 April 1999),^[6] who had served as a sergeant in the US Army Air Corps during World War II^[7] and worked at the Southern Pacific Railroad^[8] while studying to become a teacher,^[9] and his wife, Margaret Evelyn "Marge" Stout (born in 1925 in Nebraska).^[10][11]

In 1950 Norman and his parents moved to San Francisco, California.^[12] In 1960 Joe Norman accepted an offer to teach in San José, California. The Norman family lived in Campbell, California,^[13] In 1961 Norman entered Campbell High School,^[14] and graduated in 1965.^[15][16] While still a junior at Campbell High School, Norman became the youngest member to be voted into the Edwin Markham Poetry Society,^[17] and won first place in the Edwin Markham Poetry Society's Student Poetry Contest,^[18] and received his award at the Villa Montalvo Mansion in Saratoga, California.^[19] As part of his prize Norman had breakfast with a drunken William Golding.^[20] Just prior to his graduation from high school, Norman's younger brother, Charles was born.

Norman won an academic scholarship to major in English at San Jose State College.^[21] By the fall of 1965 Norman left the family home and rented an apartment^[22] in Downtown San Jose. After one semester, Norman "flunked out of college and lost [his] scholarship".^[23] While Norman was able to play a variety of musical instruments, he never learned to write or read music.^[24]

Religious background

Soon after Norman's birth his parents became Christians and became part of the Southern Baptist church,^[25] which prohibited dancing, going to the cinema, and "almost everything that didn't occur inside of our Southern Baptist church".^[26] After moving to San Francisco, Norman and his parents attended an Black American Pentecostal church,^[27] but later they attended the First Baptist Church at 22 Waller Street, in San Francisco,^[28] where Norman became a Christian in 1952 at the age of five.^[29][30] In 1956 Norman stopped attending church as he explained: "I went to Church but it was destroying me because the people yelled and screamed from the pulpit and at a Sunday School they baby-talked me.... I walked out of the church when I was nine years old. I didn't like the hymns and couldn't stand the singing any more.... I lived outside the Church and was kinda' on my own but I'm glad Jesus came to me then and pulled me out of what might have been an unhappy childhood."^[31] However, by 1967 Norman attended the Foothill Covenant Church in Los Altos, California.^[32]

Musical influences and beginnings

Musical ancestry and influences

Norman had a pedigree of musical and theatrical ancestors, including his maternal grandfather who was a vaudeville actor,^[33][18] a cousin, actress Frances Rafferty,^[8] an aunt who was a professional pianist who toured America and Europe,^[18][34] and an uncle who had performed internationally as a professional clown.^[18][35][36] Unknown to Norman and his siblings his father had a weekly radio program when he was ten, playing an over-sized 16 hole 64 tone chromatic harmonica, backed by Norman's grandfather, Joseph Norman, who played guitar.^[8] When Norman's parents became Christians, their Southern Baptist church taught that show business was "worldly", and that Christians should eschew any involvement with it,^[8] and also "the belief that most music was from the devil".^[18]

Because of his religious convictions, Norman's father discouraged any interest in music by his children.^[37] Norman noted, "We were poor and I had no children's records in Texas. But I listened to my parents' radio whenever they turned it on. I developed an appreciation for swing music, big band arrangements and solo singers like Frank Sinatra and Bing Crosby".^[38] Also from an early age, Norman listened to the "blues and Negro spirituals on 78s his grandfather [Burl W. Stout] had collected".^[39] Other musical influences that Norman later acknowledged include gospel singer Mahalia Jackson,^[38] Belgian jazz musician Django Reinhardt,^[40] American concert singer Paul Robeson,^[40] and Black comedian Bert Williams.^[38][40] Norman was strongly influenced also by classical music, jazz, blues music, and black gospel music,^[38] but "didn't like country and western ... because of the nasal, twangy vocals", or "some kinds of fast-paced jazz".^[38]

Beginnings

At the age of two Norman began singing, and learned to play a toy piano at the age of four.^[40] At the age of five Norman found a tenor ukelele in the back of his father's closet, and practiced it each day when his father was at work.^[41] Eventually his father discovered him playing the ukelele and allowed him to keep it,^[18] but later refused to buy him a guitar or a trumpet.^[37] Norman recalled in 1985: "Except for singing for my parents or for my relatives at Christmas I didn't really think about music as something you do for others. Until I was nine I really did music for my own pleasure".^[8]

In 1952, Norman began composing songs.^[18] Norman indicated: "I started to write music when I was four or five and didn't realise I was composing tonally because I was simply using the piano".^[8] Norman remembers: "When I was five I wrote a song about the rain because I loved the San Francisco drizzles, and later I wrote about a dog because I couldn't have one, and a clown because my uncle was a circus performer,^[42] and when I was eight I wrote a song ["Riding in the Saddle"]^[43] about a cowboy in the desert watching the stars at night and thinking about God because I often looked at the stars and tried to picture Heaven",^[44] which was inpired "after seeing Roy Rogers at the civic auditorium and hearing Dale Evans give her testimony.^[18] Other early songs include "Barbara's My Girl".

On his ninth birthday Norman's music was recorded for the first time due to the efforts of his aunt Nina Moore.^[21] From 1956 Norman was fascinated with the music of Elvis Presley.^[29] However, according to Norman, his father banned him from listening to rock and roll music on the radio.^[29] As a child, Norman frequently accompanied his father on Christian missions to prisons and hospitals. Despite his father's admonitions, at the age of nine, he began writing and performing original rock and roll songs at school,^[29] experimenting with incorporating a spiritual message into his music. Norman indicated in an interview in Contemporary Musicians: "The kids at school seemed impressed with Elvis, [but] none of them accepted my invitations to go to church. So one day I brought church to them, walking around from bench to bench singing".^[45][30] In 1959, Norman performed on Ted Mack's syndicated CBS television show The Original Amateur Hour.^[21]

By the time he entered Campbell High School in 1961, Norman "was writing musicals, staging and directing a yearly school presentation of his works".^[21] By the age of sixteen Norman had written more than 500 songs.^[46] Among his earliest songs was "Lonely Boy",^[47] which was written in 1956;^[48] "The Man From Galilee",^[49] also written in 1956, that "was inspired by Sunday School stories",^[50] but not released until 1986;^[51] the unreleased "Bopping With My Girl"; "My Feet are on the Rock", written in 1958, but not released until 1989;^[52] "The Thanksgiving Song",^[53] written in 1959;^[54] "Country Church, Country People", was written in 1959 for his grandmother,^[55] Lena.

Career

Back Country Seven (1964–1965)

While still a high school student, Norman formed a group called The Back Country Seven, which included his sister, Nancy Jo;^[56] Mark A. Ebner (born 22 August 1948),^[57] and high school friend, Gene Mason,^[58] who was later to be (alongside Norman) one of the lead singers of People!. The Back Country Seven played at hootenannies held at Campbell High and throughout San José.^[13] After graduating from high school, Norman became involved in the local rock music scene in San José, opening for both The Doors and Jimi Hendrix.^[45][46]

People! (1965–1968)

In 1966 Norman opened a concert for People! at the Asilomar Conference Grounds in Pacific Grove near Monterey, California According to a foundation member of People!, John Riolo:

It turned out that he was the hardest act the group ever had to follow. He was such a great entertainer and he looked wonderful, was animated, made the audience laugh, told clever stories, clowned around etc., and most of all sang very well. Larry and his beautiful singing could melt your tender heart one moment and burn down the barn the next. His comedy, acting pranks, and obvious show biz wizardry were irresistable (sic) to all present. Geoff [Levin] made Larry an offer to join the group several days after this chance meeting. Larry Norman wanted Gene Mason in the group also since they had grown up together dreaming of becoming singers like The Righteous Brothers and had also honed their skills in a popular local folk group. They were hired as dual lead singers which would allow PEOPLE! to cover almost any of the top hits. Gene and Larry could dance, sing, switch off vocal duties, and put on an amazing show.^[59]

Norman became the band's principal songwriter, sharing lead vocals with Gene M. Mason (born 26 July 1947).^[60] Riolo soon left because as a senior high school student he could not commit to full-time involvement,^[61] and was replaced on drums by San Jose State College student Dennis Allen "Denny" Fridkin (born 16 December 1946 in Los Angeles),^[62] who had been recruited by Norman.^[63] People! rehearsed up to six hours a day five days a week.^[64]

Capitol Records (1966–1968)

After Carl Engleman, head of A&R at Capitol Records, heard them play at the Whatsit Club, a youth club, People! was signed to Capitol Records at the beginning of 1966.^[65] As Norman was legally underage, he required parental permission and court approval to sign.^[66] Norman recalled in 1974:

I was still in my teens so my parents had to go to court and assure the judge that they were in accord with the agreement about to be signed. Of course, they were fearful of the while(sic) enterprise. They were pretty sure that the road to rock led to ruin, but when they saw that I would have no other life, they decided to give me their legal permission, withhold their personal blessing, and hope that when this treacherous course had been run I would return to the fold in one piece.^[67]

People! performed about 200 concerts a year, on Fridays and Saturdays, and often including other days of the week (except Sunday and Tuesday),^[68] including appearing with Van Morrison and Them, The Animals, The Dave Clark Five, Paul Revere & the Raiders, The Doors, The Who, Janis Joplin, Jimi Hendrix, Moby Grape, and San Jose bands Syndicate of Sound, and Count Five.^[69]

Each night People! performed the rock opera "L'Epoque de Dieu" ("The Epic"), a thirteen minute piece co-written by Norman and Fridkin in 1966, which used allegory to tell the story of the Incarnation and spiritual warfare. Norman claimed The Epic was "the first rock opera ever written."^[70] Rock historian Walter Rasmussen claims Pete Townshend has acknowledged as the inspiration for The Who's Tommy, providing him with both the basic idea of "rock opera" and also an essential plot line (involving a misunderstood messianic leader)."^[71] Further, according to David Di Sabatino: "There's shards of that that are might be true. One of the guys in People, bassist Robbie Levin – who didn't like Larry – says he operated a lodge, and Townsend came to stay once, and he asked him point blank, and Townsend corroborated that it was true."^[72] In 1966 Norman wrote and People! performed Vox Populi, a dystopian rock musical "about the end of the world, the spirit of the anti-Christ arising from the people, and the second coming of Christ".^[73] Believing the changing times were more conducive, in 1978 Norman and his brother, Charly, would work to produce an updated version of Vox Populi.

In 1967 Capitol released People!'s first single "Organ Grinder/Riding High", with both songs co-written by Norman and Mason,^[74] and produced by their manager, Mikel Hunter "Captain Mikey" Herrington. While many considered "Riding High" to be about drugs, it was a Christian song "about survival and redemption",^[75] "about riding high above this world's cares through the power of the Holy Spirit".^[21] However, this single failed to chart,^[66] due to a lack of promotion by Capitol.^[76] Other songs written by Norman and Fridkin in 1967, but refused release by Capitol, were "Floor Talk", "The Ice Cream Man", and "The End of the Road" for an almost completed but unreleased People! album.^[77] In 1968 Norman wrote "I am the Six O'Clock News", but Capitol refused to release it as a single, as Alan W. Livingston,^[78] then "the head of Capitol was pro-Vietnam, like most middle-class Americans".^[79]

On 2 February 1968 Capitol released People!'s second single,^[80] also produced by Captain Mikey,^[81] an extended cover version of The Zombies' non-chart song "I Love You",^[82] written by Chris White, backed by "Somebody Tell Me My Name", a song co-written by Geoff Levin and Fridkin, for the rock musical Vox Populi.^[83] After extensive promotion by the band and its manager,^[76] and industry advertising by Capitol,^[84] including the creation of a promotional film that appeared on Dick Clark's American Bandstand on 27 April 1968,^[85] "I Love You" quickly became a hit single, selling more than one million copies, and reaching a peak of #14 on the Billboard Hot 100 on 14 June 1968,^[86] and reaching #13 on the Cash Box Top 100 Singles Chart on 29 June 1968,^[87] and became a #1 single in several markets, including Italy, Israel, and Japan.^[4][88] After the release of their single "I Love You", People! toured extensively, appearing three times on Dick Clark's American Bandstand, including an appearance on 15 June 1968,^[89] and also on Johnny Carson's Tonight Show.^[90] Despite the success of "I Love You", People!'s heavy touring schedule, a promotional film of the group performing the song which aired on American Bandstand,^[91] and despite favorable reviews,^[92] the subsequent album, which was named after their hit single, was released by 13 July 1968,^[93] but only reached No. 138 on the Billboard album charts on 10 August 1968.^[94] In August 1968 Capitol released People!'s third single "Apple Cider (credited to People! and from the rock 1968 musical Alison), backed with "Ashes of Me" (written by Al Ribisi and from the 1966 rock musical Vox Populi), which was produced also by Captain Mikey,^[95] but it failed to chart.

Departure from People! (1968)

A series of disputes, both between the band members and between the band and their record label, resulted in Norman leaving People!.^[96] By the time the I Love You album was released and the band undertook its first major tour of the USA in the summer of 1968 Norman had left People!. Subsequently People! appeared on Dick Clark's American Bandstand and Johnny Carson's Tonight Show.^[67]

Norman's last concert with this incarnation of People! for almost forty years was at the Avalon Ballroom in San Francisco on the night that the I Love You album was released in July 1968.^[97] After Norman's departure, the band's second album Both Sides of People (1969), which included unused songs from the I Love You sessions, featured Norman's vocals and three of his compositions out of the eight tracks, the songs "I've Got You On My Mind", "She's A Dancer", and "Hasty Heart",^[98] which was written in 1967, and which Norman claimed was "probably the first country-rock song ever released".^[99]

Norman and Mason reunited in 1974 for a benefit concert for Israel at UCLA, later released in 1980 as the live album Larry Norman and People!—The Israel Tapes—1974 A.D. Norman, Fridkin and Mason came together in August 2006 for a People! reunion concert in the G. Herbert Smith Auditorium on the Willamette University campus in Salem, Oregon.^[66] This concert was later released on a CD titled "People! The Reunion Concert 2006", and on two DVDs, Larry Norman Live at the Smith, The Solo Set and Live at the Smith: The Band Set. Soon after, Fridkin decided to move in with Norman to look after him due to Norman's declining health and Norman's son's impending marriage to Tiffany.^[66] All of the original members of People! came together for a final mini concert on 19 October 2007, where they were later inducted into the San Jose Rocks Hall of Fame.^[4][88]

Hollywood street ministry (1968–1969)

Soon after Norman left People!, he had "a powerful spiritual encounter that threw him into a frenzy of indecision about his life [and] for the first time in his life, he received what he understood to be the Holy Spirit".^[100] Norman moved back home to live with his parents, with no plans for his future. In answer to his father's inquiry, Norman responded: "My plans? Oh, I've got great plans. I'm going to sit down in the middle of my life and I'm not moving until God comes and gets me".^[101] Norman was offered a position with Youth For Christ, and a week later was invited by Herb Hendler to come to Hollywood to write musicals for Capitol Records.^[102] Norman recalled in 2007 that he "just prayed and prayed and prayed. And I had no peace about joining YFC. And a lot of peace about Hollywood. But God was silent".^[101]

In July 1968, Norman moved to Los Angeles and rented "a tiny, one-room, flophouse apartment, with the rent paid on a monthly basis and no lease, water or electricity costs required"^[103] at Apartment 406 at 1140 North Gower Street, Hollywood.^[104] near the corner with Santa Monica Boulevard, across the street from the Hollywood Memorial Cemetery.^[105]

In 1969 Norman auditioned for a role in the Los Angeles production of the rock musical Hair,^[76][102] which was playing at the Aquarius Theatre at 6230 Sunset Boulevard,^[106] and which was directed by Tom O'Horgan and produced by Michael Butler and the Smothers Brothers.^[107] As co-creators James Rado and Gerome Ragni and half of the cast were leaving the production to join the Acapulco production,^[108] Norman and his friend, Teddy Neeley, were offered the replacement parts as George Berger and Claude Bukowski respectively.^[109] Norman indicated in a July 2007 interview, "When I got [to Los Angeles], there were auditions for Hair. And I thought, I'm going to try out for Hair just to see if I have what it takes. Because maybe I'm just some lame person and I shouldn't be in music at all. So I tried out for Hair, and they gave me a callback and they said 'You're it. Come down on Saturday, there's a contract waiting for you to sign'.^[110] Believing God had something more important for him to do,^[102] and that "Jesus is the only personal, social and political answer for this generation or any other",^[109] Norman rejected the role because "of its glorification of drugs and free sex as the answers to today's problems".^[109] Norman decided "I couldn't do it when I found out what it was about. I just didn't agree with what it had to say. So I turned it down".^[76] Neeley accepted the role of Claude,^[108] but the role offered to Norman eventually went to Ben Vereen.^[107] Norman, who was broke, went home to his apartment, locked his guitar in the closet, and cried.^[111]

At this time Norman considered retiring from music. Norman's song "Nightmare #49 (Part 1)" describes this period of his life,^[112] and is based on what Norman describes as a near death experience at this time. Norman's song "Soul on Fire" refers to this experience:

One day a light from above shown down on my face.

And lifted me up to a heavenly place

I heard voices of angels on distant shores

And Jesus healed me and brought me back to life once more.^[113]

Norman's song "Ha Ha World", also describes this experience, which Norman says refers to when he was "All alone in Hollywood – without a single friend – this is how I felt in 1968 after the near-death experience",^[114] as does "I Dream That I Died", a version of which was released for the first time in 2011.^[115]

Years later Norman would recall that "It was a beautiful time of my life because it was just me and Jesus. And I had to depend on him, which I wanted to, because nothing else was happening. I wasn't performing, I'd given up music. 'Cause I wanted to be pure".^[116] In 2006 Norman recalled: "Even after one of my recordings had charted, I continued to live a spartan existence, slept on the floor, got my teeth fixed without a shot of Novocaine, chose to have no car and walked everywhere – trying to toughen myself for whatever vicissitudes the future might bring. I wasn't concerned with the ephemeral, wasn't really emotionally geared up for wide public acceptance; I was busy getting ready for the end of the world."^[117] According to Norman, about this time he wrote his most covered song, "I Wish We'd All Been Ready",^[118] "right after I gave up music completely so I could talk to people on the streets. I felt that rock music and love and peace was all a big lie".^[119] In a 2001 interview, Norman indicated: "The Bible says we should go into prisons and hospitals and witness to people and also bring them encouragement. ... I wanted to go out into the streets and witness to the people on Hollywood & Sunset Boulevard whether they were prostitutes or homosexuals or drug users and bring them into the kingdom. I remember getting a lot of irritated responses because they thought I wanted to turn the church into a half-way house. No I didn't – I wanted to turn the church into a house that brought people all the way through to the kingdom".^[120] Norman recalled: "One night I was singing on stage and Janis Joplin was sitting behind the front curtain watching the concert with a bottle of Southern Comfort in one hand and she was sipping whiskey from a paper cup. She was drunk and really unhappy. And every now and then, she would start yelling at me. I wrote "Why Don't You Look Into Jesus" about Janis. I felt really sad for her. I felt sad for all of them. They seemed so unhappy and so lost. I couldn't easily break through the haze of drugs by using music. I felt like the only time I had any real effectiveness was in personal conversations. At one point I even felt that maybe music was of no use at all. So I gave it up. All I did was street witness."^[121]

After Norman moved to Los Angeles in 1968,^[122] he "spent time sharing the gospel on the streets of Los Angeles",^[123] especially along Hollywood Boulevard.^[124] Norman described his street witnessing: "When I left my band in 1968 and moved to Los Angeles, I didn't feel awkward about witnessing anymore – I felt directed. I chose my ground and worked my beat. I walked up and down Hollywood Boulevard several times a day; at first alone, then with Richard Gerstle and later Sarah Finch, witnessing to businessmen and hippies, and to whomever the Spirit led me. I spent all of my Capitol Records' royalties starting a halfway house and buying clothes and food for new converts. Each Friday and Saturday I borrowed cars and drove almost 150 miles to pick up certain kids and take them to a church in a home in Santa Ana. Our meetings usually lasted five hours on Friday and eight hours on Sunday.^[125]

After he moved to Los Angeles in 1968, Norman was associated initially with the First Presbyterian Church of Hollywood, California,^[126] and its Salt Company coffee shop outreach ministry, which operated in the upstairs loft of a converted apartment building located behind the Hollywood Presbyterian Church.^[127] Glenn D. Kittle believes that "rock-gospel music was born at the Salt Company Coffeehouse" by Norman.^[128] According to Don Williams, who founded the Salt Company coffeehouse in the summer of 1968, Norman "heard ‘The Agape,’^[129] a hard rock Christian group, play songs about Jesus", which "convinced Larry that he could use his rock music to communicate the gospel".^[130]

After several months of musical inactivity, Norman began writing songs again. He recalled: "And months later the music started coming to me in my sleep. And I realized that somehow, perhaps because I was willing to give it up, the music had changed."^[121] One of those songs was "I've Searched All Around the World", which Norman says was "written in 1968 after walking up and down Hollywood Boulevard almost every day for a year talking to the runaways, pushers, bikers, prostitutes and homeless winos".^[131] According to Philip Cooney: "Norman's songs often contain a series of self-contained vignettes that (he hoped) would give the passers-by something to think about, or that might hook them in to hear more of the gospel message. The audience for these songs was not those already saved, it was those to whom church was a foreign language. He understood the ability of music to get behind people's gates, to draw them in with a beautiful melody and good words, to make people drop their defensive position to the gospel—even if for a short time—and allow God to speak to them in that moment....Norman's songs sought to have a relevance to life on the street, establishing a rapport with the musical and social culture around him, and leading his listeners to look to Jesus for the answers in their search for meaning."^[124]

Norman had a "passion for the pavement [and] he took his signature voice and his beat-up nylon-string guitar to festivals, coffee shops, and major theaters",^[132] including concerts at The Troubador and The Hollywood Bowl, "witnessing before and after the performances on the streets during the day and to the customers after the gigs."^[117] Norman appeared with the Salt Company band in a concert at the Vogue Theater in 1970.^[133]

Musicals (1968–1969)

Continuing from earlier efforts to write rock musicals while with People!, during this period Norman wrote songs for several rock musicals.^[134] In 1968 Norman wrote several songs for Alison,^[135] (as in Alice in Wonderland), which was "about the sub-culture of the bohemian group referred to in the press as 'The Hippies'",^[136] which was staged first in Los Angeles,^[137] with a "cast of unknown actors",^[138] including Norman, Teddy Neeley, Richard Hatch and Kay Cole (born 13 January 1948).^[139]

During 1968 Norman was also involved in writing songs for Birthday for Shakespeare,^[140] another rock musical that, like Alison, "explored the hippie life of San Francisco, satirizing rather than celebrating the psychedelic counterculture".^[141] Birthday for Shakespeare was staged at the Oxford Theater (now the MET Theatre), a 99-seat venue, at 1089 N. Oxford Avenue, Los Angeles,^[142] and starred Norman, Gary Richard Tigerman,^[143] Teddy Neeley, Richard Hatch, and Kay Cole.^[144] Soon after Birthday for Shakespeare was performed, Norman decided to produce his own works, explaining in 1985:

"My career as an actor and a playwright seemed to be taking off but I became aware of the battle you have with producers who want you to make the script as broad as possible. I also came to realize what a limited audience you reach....When I left the theater it was because there was too much censorship from the producers and the audience consisted of out-of-towners and convention delegates who weren't really prepared to listen. I felt that it was an unnatural platform for a message. So after "Alison" and "Birthday for Shakespeare" were staged I took over the production control for "Love at Haight Street" and "Lion's Breath" and went back to performing as a singer because it's a more intimate way of communicating the Christian message. It doesn't require a stage full of actors who might not share my beliefs and a producer who's only interested in the box office receipts."^[145]

In 1969 Norman was involved writing the rock opera Lion's Breath,^[146] described as a "surrealistic satire which examines our social, political, and spiritual ethics", which spoke "uncompromisingly of the need for America to reshape its priorities and turn to God".^[109] Norman's work on Lion's Breath "caught Capitol's attention and they lured him back in 1969, promising him total control over his next album, Upon This Rock".^[144] Norman's next musical was Love on Haight Street,^[146] which was written in 1969, and tells the story of The Flies, an anti-social hippie rock band, who, like many "flower people" of that time, despite claiming to be anti-materialistic and feigning indifference to applause, desire fame and wealth.^[147] Without Norman's prior knowledge, in 1969 Capitol Records released "I Got a Letter from the President",^[148] backed with "Blow in My Ear and I'll Follow You Anywhere"^[149] from the rock musical Alison, and credited it to The Flies, which included Norman, his sister Nancy, and some pickup musicians. However, this single failed to chart.^[66] Another project that involved Norman was Bailey;^[150] Some songs from these unreleased musicals appeared later on various albums.^[146]

Discography

Albums

Album	Year of release
I Love You (with People!)	1968
Both Sides of People! (with People!)	1969

Works

• The Long Road Home: Vaudeville, Dancing and How My Mother Met My Father. Salem, OR: Solid Rock Rublications, 2007.

Notes and references

Further reading

• Alfonso, Barry (2002). The Billboard Guide to Contemporary Christian Music. New York: Billboard Books. ISBN 978-0823077182. 
• Beaujon, Andrew. "God Only Knows: The Legacy of Larry Norman". Spin 24:5 (May 2008):120.
• Carpenter, Bil. Uncloudy Days: The Gospel Music Encyclopedia. Backbeat Books, 2005.
• Cusic, Don. "Larry Norman". In Encyclopedia of Contemporary Christian Music: Pop, Rock, and Worship, ed. Don Cusic (ABC-CLIO, 2009):311–315.
• Eskridge, Larry. "'One Way': Billy Graham, the Jesus Generation, and the Idea of an Evangelical Youth Culture", Church History 67:1 (March 1998):83–106.
• Howard, Jay R. "Contemporary Christian Music: Where Rock Meets Religion". The Journal of Popular Culture 26:1 (5 March 2004):123 – 130.
• Howard, Jay R. and John M. Streck. "The Splintered Art World of Contemporary Christian Music". Popular Music 15:1 (January 1996):37–53.
• Platt, Karen Marie. "The Original Christian Street Rocker: Larry Norman." Contemporary Christian Music 3:9 (March 1981): 8–11, 25.
• Price, Deborah Evans. "Larry Norman 1947–2008". Billboard 120:10 (8 March 2008):22.
• Stowe, David W. No Sympathy for the Devil: Christian Pop Music and the Transformation of American Evangelicalism. UNC Press Books, 2011.
• Styll, John W. "Trials, Tribulations and Happy Endings". CCM 3:9 (March 1981):5.

See also

• Larry Norman
• List of songs recorded by Larry Norman

External links

• Official website
• Official British Site
• Obituary in The Times, 7 March 2008

Larry Norman Discography · Songs Studio albums Bootleg (1972)  · Home at Last (1989)  · Something New Under the Son (1981)  · Stranded in Babylon (1991)  · Streams of White Light (1977)  · Tourniquet (2001)  · Upon This Rock (1969) Live albums Street Level (1970) Trilogy Only Visiting This Planet (1972)  · So Long Ago the Garden (1973)  · In Another Land (1976) Record labels One Way Records · Phydeaux Records · Solid Rock Records · Street Level Records Related topics Early life and career · Later life and career Musicals · List of Larry Norman songs · People! · Relationship with Randy Stonehill Category