Hit You Where You Live

[Michael]

Petra has never released a poorly-produced album. Some of them I like more than others personally, but they've never released "bad" music.

Michael, I don't think anyone was calling any of Petra's music "bad". As you know, their musical styles have changed over the years, and we all have our preferences. For example, just because someone doesn't like ballads doesn't mean they think "First Love" is a bad song.

I was referring to the mentions of "muffled quality" and "poop" mixing of the albums. I do not agre; I think Petra's production level has always been at 100%. Even on the first album, when they only spent like $300 recording the thing, it sounds great sonically (whether you like the music or not... I do ...but whether you do or not doesn't change that it sounds great for what it is!)

You guys have to keep in mind that Petra was ALREADY on top of the world when John came in.

I won't disagree with that, but they did get more popular under John's vocals and as the Elefantes began transforming the Petra sound. The Beyond Belief tour gave us some very sophisticated, very professional and top-notch concerts that were extremely impressive.

Maybe you've never seen the CITS video. Spectacular Petra concerts were not invented during the Elefante era. And I agree that Petra gained in popularity during that era, but I attribute that more to the rising acceptance of Christian Rock and CCM in general. When I was growing up in the 80's, many churches were burning Christian rock records and cassettes along with the mainstream rock records and cassettes. That started to change in the late 80's, and by the mid to late 90's Christian rock had become pretty much acceptable to the Church. 1983: teenagers go to churches that hate Christian rock and their parents won't let them buy the tape, so no Christian rock for them. 1993: teenagers go to churches whose youth pastors used to buy Christian rock tapes behind their parents' backs in the 80's, churches are hosting concerts and allowing rock praise and worship in their services, etc. and the parents are the ones buying the Christian rock CDs for the kids.

Now... maybe you're mistaking the muffled quality of John's voice on his first outing or two with Petra, with a muffled sound to the whole album? John was quite a bit out of shape, especially when recording Back to the Street... after that he started getting in shape real quick (a couple hundred concerts a year'll do that for ya), but compare his performance on BTTS to later CDs and yep, there is a difference. It's not a bad mix as much as a slightly hoarse lead singer.

[LexingtonPethead]

Well, I don't know how else to describe the "muffled" recordings. It's very noticeable, and it has nothing to do with John's voice. I still say it has more to do with the technology of the time.

When these technologies were evolving, I was always more prone to buy CDs with "ADD" or "DDD" on the label because they always sounded better than AAD. I think recording companies stopped labeling their CDs like that just so people wouldn't know the difference and buy the AAD CDs anyway.

Like I said before, mainly just the big name artists and bands were putting out CDs with ADD and DDD quality early on, which coincides with when John started with Petra and when the Elefantes began producing their recordings. That's why I say there is validity to the arguement that a lot of the Elefante CDs are muffled.

An interesting note: Beyond Belief is labeled as ADD; yet it too sounds a bit muffled to me. Maybe that's just the way it is unless the recording is also digital and not just the mixing and mastering elements.

[Kirkman]

I believe that if Petra and the Elefantes had not parted ways, Petra's decline would not have necessarily begun with "Wake Up Call". Petra came back with another great but underrated CD with "No Doubt" which was again produced by the Elefantes and once more they parted ways. In addition to Bob's absence from Petra, the absence of the Elefantes was the next biggest contributing factor to Petras big decline in the mid-90s.

You're mistaken on this. Other than Wake-Up Call, every Petra album from 1990-2000 was produced by the Elefantes. "Double Take" was the last album they did for Petra. It wasn't until Petra switched to Inpop Records in 2001 that the Elefantes and the band permanently split.

Some may disagree with this - I don't care. It wasn't just one factor (the Elefantes), but out of all the factors (Bob's hiatus, a revolving door for band members, the toning down of *rock*, etc...) the absence of the Elefantes, in my opinion, kept Petra from growing their fanbase with new fans.

There's a million reasons, and probably no *definitive* one reason. Personally I think it was their toned-down sound and the lack of marketing support after Word's management changed.

[LexingtonPethead]

I believe that if Petra and the Elefantes had not parted ways, Petra's decline would not have necessarily begun with "Wake Up Call". Petra came back with another great but underrated CD with "No Doubt" which was again produced by the Elefantes and once more they parted ways. In addition to Bob's absence from Petra, the absence of the Elefantes was the next biggest contributing factor to Petras big decline in the mid-90s.

You're mistaken on this. Other than Wake-Up Call, every Petra album from 1990-2000 was produced by the Elefantes. "Double Take" was the last album they did for Petra. It wasn't until Petra switched to Inpop Records in 2001 that the Elefantes and the band permanently split.

Really? My mistake. I was sure that I had read that the Elefantes were back only for No Doubt, after which there was another parting. But I stand corrected. I wouldn't have made that mistake if I actually had PP2, God Fixation and Double Take. That's what I get for relying on memory!

There's a million reasons, and probably no *definitive* one reason. Personally I think it was their toned-down sound and the lack of marketing support after Word's management changed.

I agree with this 100%

[Michael]

Hehe... I said "poop"! In case you were wondering, that was a mistake.

[petrafan]

for a long time, hit you where you live was for me the heaviest, most powerful, menacing, rocking, thnderous Petra song.
now i'm not so sure, but it still ranks up to the top 3.
wish i could see Petra opening a concert with this song.... oh man....

[LexingtonPethead]

for a long time, hit you where you live was for me the heaviest, most powerful, menacing, rocking, thnderous Petra song.
now i'm not so sure, but it still ranks up to the top 3.
wish i could see Petra opening a concert with this song.... oh man....

Oh absolutely!! It has the Elefantes stamped all over it. It would be awesome to see Petra perform it live!!

[seichu kaisho]

Kind of as I opinionated once already, if I were in charge of the Petra concert set lists I would swap "Lord I Lift" and "Noise We Make" for a couple classic rockers. "Hit You Where..." and "All Fired Up" would be excellent choices! Maybe even "I Love the Lord" from Petra Praise.

So A stands for analog and D stands for digital? I remember learning what "analog" meant but now I forgot. I know it has something to do with cassette recording.

[LexingtonPethead]

Yeah, those would be great choices.

Since my original post in this thread, "Hit You Where You Live" is still stuck in my head most of the time. I'd have to say that for right now anyway, it's my favorite Petra song. It's got everything you'd ever want in a Petra song: John's ad-lib "You know what I'm talkin about - Hey, On Fire!!", shrieks, guitar riffs, guitar solos - it's got it all.

I think it would be cool if John did more ad-libs. His ad-lib line in HYWYL is one of my favorite parts of that song and the entire CD.

"On Fire" simply ROCKS.

[petrafan]

definitely. the first time i heard that ad lib on hit you where you live, it gave me the goosebumps and a chill up my spine. the second time, i had called a friend to listen to Petra's new album at the time, and when he heard the ad lib, he was like "wow man did you hear that!"

[PetfanInCt]

Hi Everyone,

I think On Fire is one of the best if not the best Christian Rock album to be put out by any Christian rock band. Of course I'm biased but I've heard my share of music and albums and I think On Fire is mint.

I like the sound and the production quality. John nails the vocals, Louie nails the skins, Lawry nails the keys, Ronny nails the bass, Bob nails the guitar work and the lyrics . They just nail it on every song. I Love the message in the songs. The whole album is solid straight up Jesus rock and roll. Rock for the Rock. This lineup in my opinion is Petra at its best.



In Christ
Rich

[seichu kaisho]

Speaking of John's "aside" lyrics, my favorite is "Are you ready? You better check your oil!" from "Midnight Oil."

On "I Am On the Rock" I can't get enough of those sweet backgrounds "hey hey" and John's wailing of "are you read-eeeeyyyy?"