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*Garry Christian : lead vocals
*Roger Christian : vocals *Russell Christian : keyboards, saxophone, vocals *Henry Priestman : keyboards, guitars, vocals Though they never considered themselves professionals, if the opportunity for a paid performance arose they would get together under the name "Equal Temperament" (a most inappropriate name, as Garry laughingly admits these days, but it didn't stop them making a beautiful noise!). Also, in the early eighties, Garry and Russell had their own separate band "Joe Public" playing pubs and clubs etc.
Early in 1983 Liverpool manager Pete Fulwell (manager of The Mighty Wah, Black and It's Immaterial, and earlier on the co-owner of the mythical Liverpool late '70s punk club "Eric's") saw Equal Temperament perform an accapella version of the old standard "So in Love" on a regional TV show. Impressed with what he saw, he made a mental note to keep an eye out for them. A year later, suffering from a flat tyre, Pete took a cab to the garage for repairs. Vaguely recognizing the driver, he asked him whether he knew anything about the singing Christian brothers……the cabby turned out to be Mark Christian, the youngest of the five brothers.
Meanwhile, Pete Fulwell's link with future Christians member Henry Priestman was that Henry had once been in the afore-mentioned It's Immaterial, and still worked with them in the studio. Henry's musical history was tied up in the late '70s Liverpool new wave scene: originally in the Art College 7-piece band "Albert Dock" (who even supported the Sex Pistols on one of their infamous early gigs in 1976!), this outfit slimmed down and mutated into the group "Yachts" in 1977. In turn, in 1981, Henry and Yachts singer John Campbell formed It's Immaterial. In 1984, having no outlet for composition within the It's Immaterial set-up, Henry ceased to be a full-time member of the band, but continued to work with them as a session keyboard player, allowing more time for other ventures. One of these "ventures" was a period spent working as an recording engineer in Pete Fulwell's Benson Street studio. It was at one of these engineering sessions in 1985 that Henry first met Garry and Russell Christian.
All five Christian brothers had been invited to sing backing vocals on It's Immaterial future UK top 40 single "Ed's Funky Diner", and Henry was engineering at the demo session. At the end of the session he got chatting to Garry and Russell and plucked up courage to play them a few songs that he'd written.
This led to the three of them plus brother Roger getting together at weekends round at Henry's flat to work on a new batch of songs.By the end of 1985 they had decided to call themselves "The Christians" (as well as being the brother's surname it is, coincidentally, Henry's middle name!), and began sending out demo tapes. The Christians - brothers Garry, Russell and Roger together with Henry Priestman signed to Island Records in the summer of 1986 and soon began work on their first album with producer Laurie Latham. The first fruit of this partnership was their debut single "Forgotten Town", which was released to critical acclaim in January 1987 and earned the band their first UK top 30 hit, as well as alerting other parts of Europe to their brand of "socially-aware soul". Subsequent singles "Hooverville" and "When The Fingers Point" were also British hits, but the success was taking its toll on the hot-tempered band, and Roger had decided to leave the band to go solo before the latter single was released. Undeterred, Garry took on the mantle of sole lead singer (not that it was too much of a change, as he'd sung lead on most of the first two singles…and this was one of the factors that had led to Roger's departure). On the back of the 3 hits, the debut album "The Christians" was released in October 1987 and shot straight into the British charts at number 2, with all songs written or co-written by Henry (Henry's co-writer was former school-friend Mark Herman, who would, in the 1990s, achieve recognition as a film director/writer of such films as "Brassed Off" and "Little Voice"). Further singles "Ideal World" (UK #14) and "Born Again" (UK #25) were taken from the album, enabling it to go UK triple platinum and become Island Records' all-time biggest selling debut album with UK sales alone exceeding 1,000,000!
1988 saw the band touring extensively in UK and Europe, establishing itself as a major new UK act. Also, in the same year, the trio gained their highest UK chart placing (#8) with a charity cover version of the old Isley Brothers' song "Harvest For The World", which accompanied an award-winning animated video, put together by four of Britain's leading animation houses (including Aardman, famous for Nick Park's Oscar winning films). Another charity single was the 1989 release of "Ferry 'Cross The Mersey", recorded by The Christians, Paul McCartney, Holly Johnson and Gerry Marsden. This song topped the UK charts and raised funds for relatives of the victims of the Hillsborough Football Stadium disaster in May '89.
The band's 2nd Album "Colour" was released in 1990. Again produced by Laurie Latham, this effectively broke the band in Europe (going top 5 in six European countries as well as giving The Christians their first UK #1 album). The single "Words" (taken from "Colour") was also a huge success in Europe giving the band a #1 single in France, and paving the way for larger tours including Wembley Arena in the autumn of 1990. 1991 was spent consolidating the bands success on the live front and also in the studio writing and demo-ing songs for their 3rd album. "Happy in Hell"(1992) was a new departure for the Christians as it was more of a band effort, containing songs written, individually, by all three members, and indeed the LP was also produced or co-produced by the band and various respected UK producers (William Orbit, Laurie Latham, Mark Stent and Martin Philips). Whilst not as successful as previous LPs it still gained top 20 success in UK and France and was critically praised for the high standard of songwriting. Three stunning singles were released off the album: "What's In A Word", the epic ballad "Father" and finally in March 1993 a cover of Gil Scott-Heron's "The Bottle". The years 1993-1995 found the band touring extensively in UK and Europe, writing new material and also promoting their final album for Island Records "Best of The Christians", which contained one new song, their last single "Perfect Moment".
In 1995 the band played what would turn out to be their last performance before splitting up later that year: that gig took place at the Liverpool Black Awards and was somewhat a taste of things to come, as the band chose to perform totally "unplugged" and as a 3-piece. With The Christians no longer signed to Island Records, Garry Christian was offered a solo deal with East West records in France. Garry signed and moved to Paris in 1995 to begin work on his album, and this effectively caused the band to cease; however, the split was amicable and no announcements were made in the press so that the door was always left open for future re-unions.
After 4 years living in Paris, Garry Christian returned to Liverpool. Throughout his stay in France (one of the Christians' biggest markets) he was constantly being asked "when are you all going to get back together again", so it seemed a natural thing to do to start thinking about re-forming the band. He rang Henry, and initially a one-off reunion show was talked off. This then turned into a 36 date tour of Britain, but there would be a difference - this time the group would dispense with the customary "protective blanket" of session musicians and go out "unplugged", just Garry on vocals, Russell on piano, Henry on guitar and accordion, and a friend Paul Campbell on guitar.
The tour began on November 3 1999 with the set mostly being drawn from their three albums. Despite certain fears about how this "unplugged" venture would go down with the fans, and whether the songs would suffer, on the contrary, it was a huge success both with the audience and the band. Audiences enjoyed the informality of the gigs, and the fact that they could hear the harmonies unadorned with unnecessary musical embellishment, and the band relished being back on the road again and operating outside the jaded "music-biz"! Small is Beautiful… Due to other commitments the lads only managed to get together on a few occasions throughout 2000: a short spell in Spain in the Spring plus a support slot on some of James Brown's summer UK tour. But in the autumn they met up and rehearsed some new songs (including "No Pain, No Gain", and "When Tomorrow Comes") before embarking on another November acoustic tour. The new songs were greeted enthusiastically and the Christians realized that they must get a new album recorded as soon as possible. So, in between other commitments and occasional gigs they spent 7 months in 2001 working on their first album of new material in 10 years, to be called “Prodigal Sons”. "Prodigal Sons" was released on 15 September 2003, supported by a UK tour in October 2003. (adapted from thechristians.biz) |