The Kingsmen – New Life (1993)
The year leading up to this latest recording was filled with lots of impactful changes within the Kingsmen. As a quick recap, Gary Dillard left towards the end of 1991, then Anthony Burger left in February/March of 1993, with Garry Sheppard departing a few months later in June. The Kingsmen opted not to replace Gary Dillard immediately, and they traveled for about a year or so with just a 3-piece band. The Kingsmen hired 2 excellent musicians to replace Gary and Anthony…Randy Matthews on piano, who came to the Kingsmen from the Singing Americans, and Randy Miller playing guitars and harmonica. Anthony was a true showman, whereas Randy Matthews had a very different personality from Anthony, but he was an outstanding piano player and was just what the Kingsmen needed. Randy Miller was amazing on the guitar, dobro and harmonica and was a very unique and soulful singer. Garry Sheppard’s departure left some massive shoes to fill, and instead of trying to fill those shoes, the Kingsmen opted to go a different direction vocally, and hired 18-year-old, Chris Collins to sing tenor. Chris grew up singing with his family, and when he graduated high school in June of 1993, the very next week, he moved from Florida to Asheville, NC and hopped on the Kingsmen’s bus as their new tenor. With the new group in place, the Kingsmen began a “new life” with their new line-up and immediately went into the studio to work on this latest recording, aptly titled, “New Life”, which was released just in time for NQC in September 1993.
Production credits for “New Life” were broken down a bit differently than previous recordings had been, and it lists Eldridge Fox and Jeff Collins as producing the music tracks, and vocals being produced by Eldridge Fox, Tim Surrett and Jim Hamill. For strings, they went in a different direction than the last few studio recordings, and enlisted the services of the ultra-talented Art Bain, who expertly and tastefully arranged the strings for this recording. Contrary to most of the Kingsmen’s recordings from the last few years, the Kingsmen band aren’t the prominent players for “New Life”, with the exception of Tim Surrett who plays bass guitar for the entire recording. Newest members, Randy Matthews and Randy Miller do lend their talents on a few songs playing piano and harmonica, respectively, but most of the music is being supplied by Jeff Collins (piano/keyboards), David Johnson (acoustic guitar, fiddle, steel guitar, dobro and banjo), Tony Creaseman (drums/percussion) and Roger Fortner (guitars and bass guitar) along with some additional assistance by Tony Rice (world renowned guitarist in the bluegrass field) playing guitar on a couple of songs. Also, a couple of songs include additional background vocals by Jeff Collins, Debbie Pegg and Greg Bentley.
With its warm feel and nicely accented with strings, newest member, Chris Collins takes the lead on the title song, “A New Life”. Written by Gayle Cox, this was a great song for Chris and perfectly highlighted his unique voice, and also really highlights the operatic side of Tim Surrett at times. I especially loved hearing them do this song live, as I really enjoyed Chris’ interpretation of the lyric in a live setting. It’s truly a magnificent song that showed a very sweet-sounding side of the Kingsmen that we don’t often get to hear!
With its light Jazz undertones and Texas Swing vibe, the tempo picks up for the Squire Parsons penned, “Gonna Keep Holding On”. This was Hamill’s only feature on the entire recording, and it’s only one verse, as Ray is the one featured prominently throughout the song, as he solo’s the second verse, as well as having multiple step-out lines on the chorus. This was such a fun song and one of my personal favorites from this recording. I love the overall feel of the song, plus the guitar work at the beginning is exceptional as well. With this being Hamill’s only song, it really shows that with all the changes within the group, Hamill took the opportunity to really take a major step back. In fact, many times when they staged this song in concert, Tim Surrett would sing Hamill’s verse. Make no mistake though, Hamill still managed the stage like a sergeant, but was content to let the younger and newer members of the Kingsmen shine. As time went on, Parker began taking on more and more of the emcee duties. In fact, over the course of the next few years, I noticed Hamill would handle the first half, and by the time the second half of the concert rolled around, Hamill would many times have Parker handle the stage. It was actually a great way for Hamill to slowly and methodically transfer those duties as seamlessly as possible.
Speaking of Parker, as they slow the pace back down, he is featured on the dramatic, Easter themed power ballad, “That Third Day”, which was written by Mark Lanier. Nicely accented with strings and featuring some really nice guitar work, the song has a feel that is a cross between “The Judgement” and “The Cross Has Won Again”. Parker does a great job interpreting the lyric, and Ray absolutely nails that last low note!
With its Contemporary/Inspirational feel, Tim and Ray are featured on the encouraging, “Friend of Mine”, which was written by former Kingsmen tenor, Garry Sheppard along with Bruce Carroll. This was the second single from the recording, and though it was very different for the Kingsmen, it did quite well for the group, peaking at #10 in the February 1995 Singing News chart.
Contrasting the more contemporary feel of the previous song, country sounds abound as Foxie sings the expectant message of, “More Over Yonder”, which he co-wrote with Sandy Knight in honor of his mom, who had recently passed away. Sandy had been a highly sought after writer since the mid-80’s having songs previously recorded by Gold City, Inspirations, Nelons, Karen Peck & New River, Singing Cookes and Perfect Heart. This would be her first cut with the Kingsmen, and over the forthcoming years, the Kingsmen would record and find much success in several of Sandy’s songs.
With Randy Miller blowing the harmonica, the peppy, “Look on the Brighter Side” kicks off the second half of the recording, recalling that classic Kingsmen feel. Featuring Parker and written by Ronny Hinson, this became one of my personal favorites from this recording from day one, and it’s still one of my “go to” songs from this recording.
The Vep Ellis classic, “The Love of God” and its very traditional feel, was perfectly suited for Chris and is a highlight of the recording. Nicely accented with strings, Hamill used this song to really introduce Chris to their fans and Chris always hit a home run with this song in concert.
With its haunting acoustic feel, Tim is featured on the classic hymn, “Wayfaring Stranger”, which also features Becky and Sonya from the Isaacs. This has always been one of my favorite hymns, and Tim, along with Becky and Sonya, do a marvelous job interpreting the lyric, and the musical break before the second verse featuring the talents of David Johnson (viola, mandolin & acoustic guitar) and Tony Rice (lead guitar) is absolutely mesmerizing!
By complete contrast, the tempo picks up as Randy Miller belts out the soulful tune, “Some Things Never Change”, which was written by a wonderful writer named, Denny Livingston. Randy gave the Kingsmen a very exciting and soulful dynamic to their sound, and he brought the crowd to their feet numerous times with his stirring rendition of his sugar stick, “I’ve Never Been This Homesick Before”, which typically left the crowd clamoring for more!
The recording finishes out with the exciting country feel of the song, “Safe Now”, which was written by Danny Ledbetter and features Tim. Danny was an outstanding young songwriter who grew up singing with his legendary family, the Singing Ledbetters. I absolutely adored this song and it was one I would crank up as loud as I could in my car, and it’s still my favorite song from this recording. This song was actually originally pitched to Gold City, who passed on the song, thus making its way to the Kingsmen, who enjoyed great success with the song, shooting up to #5 in the Singing News chart for July 1994. I also need to add, that as one who truly appreciates the musicality of a song, the instrumental break in the song just before the final chorus is a marvelous piece of ear candy featuring the dobro, fiddle and guitar. Also, for the last 30+ years, I have assumed that was Jim Hamill kicking off the final chorus singing, “Hmmmm…I’m safe now…”, but I recently discovered that it was actually Parker Jonathan, who was channeling his inner Hamill!
With all the changes within the group during this time, the Kingsmen tried to re-invent themselves a bit, in an effort to enjoy a “New Life”, and compete in the ever changing musical landscape. Nonetheless, this was a difficult time of transition for the Kingsmen, and finding material for this recording presented a new set of challenges and opportunities for the Kingsmen, as they worked to balance their new sound, while also remaining connected with the classic Kingsmen sound, and they utilized a lot of new and different writers for this recording that they had not previously utilized. Musically, “New Life” had a very nice and warm feel to it, and vocally, the Kingsmen had a very smooth sound and blend, which wasn’t something they were known for. The Kingsmen always had a certain “bite” to their sound, which I always loved; so, this “new life” version of the Kingsmen took me some getting used to. Chris Collins was a very different tenor than Johnny Parrack, Ernie Phillips and Garry Sheppard had been, and Chris gave the Kingsmen a different blend, allowing the Kingsmen to try some new things musically that would have likely never worked with previous Kingsmen tenors. I bought this recording from a local bookstore immediately after it was released, and as a true Kingsmen fan, I listened to it with a very critical ear and my initial reaction was with mixed emotions…I really liked what I heard, but it wasn’t the Kingsmen I was accustomed to, and I felt I was not listening to the “real” Kingsmen, but rather a totally new and different group, who just happened to sound a little “like” the Kingsmen…if that makes any sense! But I was able to see the Kingsmen quite a few times during that first year or so, and I came to love the new version of the group pretty quickly, and I eventually came to really love this recording as well!
Despite the changes (we all know how finicky Southern Gospel fans can be!), the Kingsmen enjoyed 2 additional wins during the 1993 Singing News Fan Awards, as Parker took home “Favorite Baritone” for the second year in a row, and the band walked away once again with the “Favorite Band” trophy as well. The “new” Kingsmen would spend the next year continuing the gel as a cohesive unit, and by the time they would record a new mainline album the following year, they would show they had made tremendous strides both individually and as a team, and would very soon be “Ridin’ High” once again as the “Mighty” Kingsmen!
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