Petra (band)
Petra is an American music group regarded as a pioneer of the Christian rock and contemporary Christian music genres and was, for many years, regarded as the "world's most popular Christian rock band". Formed in 1972, the band took its name from the Greek word for "rock". Though it disbanded formally in 2006, incarnations have played reunion shows in the years since and released two albums in November 2010, and in November 2017. In 2013, it reformed with a new drummer, Cristian Borneo, and recorded a new song titled "Holy is Your Name", before going back on tour.
With a style initially similar to The Eagles and Lynyrd Skynyrd, Petra's sound evolved into a more energetic, driving rock sound in the early 1980s akin to Foreigner, Styx and Journey. Throughout the 1980s and into the early 1990s, Petra was one of the world's most popular Christian rock bands, with each of its albums during that period selling hundreds of thousands of copies while the band sold-out arenas and regularly placed songs at the top of Christian radio charts. With its lyrics, music and style, Petra influenced numerous other artists at a time when Christian rock experienced strong opposition from many conservative pastors and churches.
In more than three decades, the band experienced numerous lineup changes yet released 20 studio albums, as well as two Spanish-language and two live albums, selling nearly 10 million copies while being nominated for 13 Grammy Awards, winning four, and winning 10 Dove Awards. Its biggest hit, "The Coloring Song", reached the top position on three Christian radio charts simultaneously, and at its peak, the band's tours rivaled Amy Grant's in popularity among Christian audiences. Petra was the first rock band inducted into the Gospel Music Hall of Fame and the first Christian band whose memorabilia was included in the Hard Rock Cafe restaurant chain.
The band announced its retirement in 2005, launching a farewell tour that was recorded for release on CD and DVD. Petra's 33-year career ended with a performance in the early hours of January 1, 2006, in Murphy, North Carolina. However, the band has continued to perform sporadically since then. In November 2010, an incarnation of the band's mid-1980s lineup surfaced under the name Classic Petra. It released an album, Back to the Rock, featuring one new song, one song taken from Greg X. Volz's 2009 album God Only Knows, as well as re-recordings of hits from that era. The band released a companion live CD and DVD in 2011. In 2023, the band celebrated its 50th anniversary with a US and world tour.
Musical style
Petra's style changed significantly over the decades in an effort to remain relevant to the youth it was trying to reach but remained within the rock genre implied by its name. At its inception, the band's style was eclectic, borrowing from musical influences as diverse as The Eagles, Lynyrd Skynyrd and Kansas. Early albums featured electric double-guitar leads reminiscent of the Allman Brothers Band.In the 1980s, the band began using keyboards and synthesizers to complement its guitar-based rock. Early in the decade, Petra produced a straightforward pop/rock sound reminiscent of Foreigner and Styx while increasingly using synthesizers and electronic effects as the decade progressed. By the late 1980s, Petra used a change in vocalists to embrace a guitar-based hard rock style similar to Def Leppard, Aerosmith and Journey – a style that, along with the growing popularity of Christian rock as a whole, led to Petra's peak success.
With the rise of alternative rock in the mid-1990s, the band's albums subsequently featured an increasing reliance on acoustic guitars and mellower tunes, including a fully acoustic album. Petra returned to its roots with a hard rock album in 2003, while the 2010 Classic Petra reunion was billed as an effort to re-record some of the band's early 1980s hits "with a modern edge". It included two new songs that fit within the guitar- and keyboard-based rock style that marked much of the band's early career.
History
1972–1979: Inception
In the early 1970s, songwriter and guitarist Bob Hartman met bassist John DeGroff and formed the band Dove, which he quickly disbanded when DeGroff left to attend a Bible school in Fort Wayne, Indiana, known as the Christian Training Center. Hartman soon followed, and in 1972 he and DeGroff joined two classmates, guitarist Greg Hough and drummer Bill Glover, to form Petra. The band played small Midwest venues such as churches, coffeehouses and parks, to share the message of Christianity with concertgoers. Glover said on an interview "we weren't picky and we wanted to get God's Word out to our peers. We would set up in parking lots, parks, college campuses, coffee houses, etc." A frequent venue was a Fort Wayne Christian-themed coffeehouse named The Adam's Apple.This mix of evangelism with rock placed Petra among the early pioneers of Jesus Music, part of the larger counterculture Jesus Movement of the late 1960s and early 1970s. Church authorities struggled with and frequently opposed the use of churches for rock concerts, and few Christian radio stations, with the exception of some college-based signals, would play the band's songs. Petra was criticized for its rock sound, a hint of the opposition it would experience as its popularity grew.
''Petra'' (1974)
Petra's blend of style and message attracted the attention of the newly created Myrrh Records' Paul Craig Paino, who convinced the label's founder, Billy Ray Hearn, to attend one of the band's concerts at The Adam's Apple. Hearn signed Petra in 1973 to record its debut album, which Hearn produced. Hearn later said he knew Petra was "the most radical thing around... as far out as anything that had come out until that time."With no lead vocalist, Hartman and Hough shared singing duties on the self-titled debut, which was released in 1974. Featuring "tight, Allman Brothers-type dual guitar lines and riffs", Petra also featured the comical country tune "Lucas McGraw", which became something of a cult classic, and the seminal "Backslidin' Blues", the first contemporary Christian blues song put on vinyl. The rarity of being a Christian rock band led to larger concerts and greater popularity, and Myrrh asked Petra to record a second album aimed principally at non-Christians, reflecting the evangelistic nature of the band's shows.
''Come and Join Us'' (1977)
In 1976, Glover had resigned from the band. He was replaced by a string of drummers which included a childhood friend of Hough, Bob Rickman, and Glover's cousin, Mark Richards. However, by the time their record deal for the second album went through, Richards had already left, and Petra decided to hire Glover as a studio musician.By Hartman's admission, his vocal style did not match well with the band's genre, and Petra brought in a number of guest vocalists for the second record, among them former e vocalist Greg X. Volz. Volz took the lead vocals on two songs and backed up several others. Among Volz's songs was a cover of the Argent anthem "God Gave Rock and Roll to You", which Myrrh had hoped to release as a radio single to the secular market. The song was immediately controversial – and revolutionary. "It was the boldest statement anyone in Christian music had made until that time," said Ambassador Artist Agency president Wes Yoder. "This was a radical notion, especially in the minds of the leaders of conservative churches." Other guest singers featured in the album were Steve Camp, Karen Morrison, and Austin Roberts.
The recording process also was marked by disputes: the label refused Hartman's request to name the album God Gave Rock and Roll to You while a bluesy, crowd-favorite track written by Hartman about rejecting the pre-Christian self, "Killing My Old Man", was deemed too controversial and cut from the album. With a harder-edged sound reminiscent of Led Zeppelin and Deep Purple, Come and Join Us was released in 1977. It failed to sell well, however, and Myrrh dropped Petra from its label.
''Washes Whiter Than'' (1979)
The next year, the band experienced the first of its numerous lineup changes, as Hough left to form his own band, and DeGroff followed suit, leaving Hartman and newly hired guitarist/keyboardist/vocalist Rob Frazier. The duo began work on the band's third album despite the lack of a record deal. Not having a steady drummer at the time, Hartman turned to Volz for drumming and vocal help. Already entertaining an offer from REO Speedwagon to be that band's lead singer, Volz accepted Hartman's offer instead. With a band intact, touring continuing and writing begun for a new record, Petra found itself at a crossroads: Its Christian lyrics limited the number of non-Christians attending its concerts, while its hard edge likewise limited its Christian audience.Petra's performances soon attracted the notice of another newly formed label, Star Song Records, which inked the band for its third album. Recording began after a nine-month sabbatical during which its members considered what direction Petra should take. Upon returning, Hartman, Frazier and Volz worked with a host of studio musicians to record Washes Whiter Than, a ballad-heavy soft-rock album that drew criticism from fans of the band's previous hard-edged style when it was released in 1979. Lyrically, the band shifted from overt evangelism to encouraging the young Christians who made up the bulk of its audience. The album resulted in the band's first radio hit, "Why Should the Father Bother?" Along with garnering Petra radio success for the first time, Washes Whiter Than's musical depth established the band's artistic credibility, proving Petra could play multiple styles of music and appeal to more than just the "radicals" in Christiandom.
1980–1985: The Greg X. Volz era
Though the band had scored a hit – "Why Should the Father Bother?" was the 16th-biggest Christian radio single of 1979 – Washes Whiter Than was not a big seller, thanks largely to distribution problems that left many copies of the record out of stores until demand for the product had subsided. Still in search of a breakthrough record and restricted by finances from touring nationally, Frazier left the band, leaving just Hartman and Volz, whom Hartman had hired as the full-time lead vocalist. With no record sales, no way to promote the albums nationally and barely any band, Hartman considered breaking up Petra.Instead Hartman met Mark Kelly, a former lead vocalist and bassist for the band One Accord, and keyboardist John Slick at a Bible study and, after setting up a jam session, hired them to join him and Volz. Yet the two most important additions Petra made in 1980 did not play an instrument or sing a note for the band.
With Petra having established its radio bona fides and refocused its lyrical message, Star Song looked for a producer who could take the band's fourth album back to its hard rock roots, hiring Jonathan David Brown, who had successfully produced albums with radio hits by fellow Jesus Music bands Daniel Amos, Sweet Comfort Band and Parable. Additionally, Petra hired Mark Hollingsworth, who had experience in the secular music industry, to manage and promote the band.