If you grew up with '90s Christian music, you likely ran into the name John Elefante. He fronted the insanely popular rock group, Kansas, released several successful solo albums, and operated his own record label, Pakaderm. John, with his brother Dino, served as producers for some industry heavyweights, such as iconic rock band Petra.
Recently, John released new music in nearly a decade. It so happens that 2022 also marks the 40th anniversary of his joining the music industry as the new lead singer of Kansas in 1982 (he took over vocal duties for the previous frontman Steve Walsh). This means his first album with Kansas, Vinyl Confessions, turns 40 this year. And to celebrate his new album, The Amazing Grace, we look at his great career thus far.
In Kansas
Kansas achieved success in the early 1980s with several albums certified Gold or Platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America. Some legitimately legacy rock hits include "Dust in the Wind" and "Carry On Wayward Son."
During this time, one of the band's prominent members and main songwriter Kerry Livgren became a Christian, which eventually reflected strongly in the band's music. This led to tensions with other members who weren't on board with Kansas becoming a Christian rock band. When lead vocalist Steve Walsh left, the search was on to find a suitable replacement.
Enter John Elefante. Already a Christian before joining the band, he was on board to sing songs with a faith-based undertone, as well as contributing material of his own. The result was the album, Vinyl Confessions, which turns a whopping 40 years old this year.
The album includes the hit mainstream rock single, "Play the Game Tonight," which carries themes of selling your soul for fame and success. It became a legitimate hit on multiple charts and proved Kansas could navigate the change in lead singers. John helmed hits like the emotive "Chasing Shadows" and the rocking "Fight Fire With Fire." The latter proved to be one of the highest-charting songs of the group's career. While Kansas still wasn't necessarily a Christian rock band, they proved that there was room in the mainstream for music that pointed to something deeper.
Tensions within the band caused a hiatus that cut John's run with the band rather short. The few years of his fronting the band began a fruitful music career.
Mastedon
After Kansas, John and his brother--and frequent music collaborator--Dino formed the Christian metal band, Mastedon (not to be confused with the mainstream band with a similar name). The band was mainly geared as a studio project, with them performing only a handful of shows.
Several songs achieved success on Christian radio. The band's sound fitted well within the hard rock and metal sounds of the late 1980s. It further propelled the Elefante brothers into a household name in the Christian music industry.
While the band's initial run was again, comparatively short, they would return in the late 2000s with a new album and a more modern sound, serving as a sort of comeback album for John after a number of years away from the industry spotlight.
Producer Extraordinaire
Perhaps more so than for their own recordings, the Elefante brothers became known for their contributions to 1990s Christian music on the other side of the studio soundboard. From owning a slew of smaller record labels to being producers for some prominent names in Christian music at the time, John Elefante became a part of over a hundred albums in his career. John was all over the business in the 1990s: he produced music for smaller names like Nouveaux or Scott Springer and gave rock heavyweights like Petra or Guardian a hand developing their signature sound.
John has a unique signature songwriting style that's hard to put into words. But suffice to say, even when he wasn't the artist singing the tune, you can I grew to often recognize songs he had a hand in writing and producing just from the sound of it alone. (Not to mention, he could often be heard lending background vocals to many of these projects.)
John has a knack for memorable, emotional melodies. Melodies that will stir the soul and get stuck in your head. John can produce some juicy riff-driven guitar rock or rousing power ballads that can make any fan of mainstream '80s pop weep.
The Soloist
Starting in the mid-1990s, John Elefante began a successful run of solo albums that produced a number of notable hits for Christian radio. Starting with 1995's Windows of Heaven, John took more of a contemporary pop direction, with a definite '80s influence. His first album produced hits like "This Is What Love Is" and "That's Why God Made The Moon."
John continued the success with 1997's Corridors, which is celebrating its 25th anniversary this year. From this album, the title track and the Good Friday anthem "Not Just Any Other Day" found success. John's run peaked with 1999's Defying Gravity, which produced another slew of hits.
It was around this time that John's initial run began to slow down. Injuries sustained in an accident forced him to cancel a major concert tour. And the time away from his family also prompted John to step back from his recording and producing duties to focus on them. If he'd hung up his musical hat right there, he'd still have had quite a run. But music has a way of drawing an artist back.
The aforementioned comeback album for Mastedon positioned John well to transition into a new solo album. The album found John reuniting with former Kansas musicians on a track, as well as producing a viral music video for the song, "This Time," which told a controversial pro-life story about John's adopted daughter, who was only narrowly spared from being aborted. Ultimately, her birth mother put her up for adoption.
John again went fairly quiet after this release, occasionally popping out, releasing a Christmas EP, and playing some shows with the Jay Sekulow Band--until word came that John was working on a new album.
The Amazing Grace
Nearly a decade since his last full-length record, John has released new music. Partnered with Escape Music, John's new record, The Amazing Grace, finds the singer exploring a number of the genres that have made his career so epic. Whether it's some progressive style rock harkening back to his days in Kansas, ballads that are driven by his signature haunting vocals, or epic anthemic styles, John has packed a smorgasbord of influences into this new project.
Lead single "Stronger Now" treats listeners to a singable throwback hit that would've sounded greater on the radio in decades past. The title track fuses 2000s instrumentation coupled with John's 1980s power vocals to produce a unique and powerful atmospheric tune. Songs like "Time Machine" and "We Will Be Fine" use piano hooks to build into anthemic classic rock tracks. Fans of any era of John's work should find plenty to love from his latest work.
With a career that is going into its fifth decade, John Elefante has a prolific body of work between his own projects and projects he's produced. He's in an elite tier of musicians that is not very crowded. Whether you fancy the progressive classic rock stylings of his debut with Kansas that is turning 40 this year, the headbanging power metal of his Mastedon days, the contemporary beauty of his solo work, or the crisp sounds of his work as a producer, John Elefante has gifted the music industry a varied collection of musical treasures. And as his career looks toward a new decade with the release of his latest project, we hope that even more great chapters await us yet.
J.J. Francesco is a long-time contributor to the NRT Staff. He's published the novel 'Because of Austin' and regularly seeks new ways to engage faith, life, and community. He is currently working on releasing a brand new novel.
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