Hailing from York, Pennsylvania, the group is comprised of Ed Kowalczyk (lead vocals & guitar), Chad Taylor (lead guitar), Patrick Dahlheimer (bass) and Chad Gracey (drums). Since approximately 1999, Live has toured with Ed’s younger brother, Adam Kowalczyk as a rhythm guitarist, and, previously, British keyboardist Michael “Railo” Railton.
Kowalczyk, Taylor, Dahlheimer, and Gracey first came together for a middle-school talent show in the Pennsylvania blue-collar town of York. The group remained together throughout high school, going through a handful of band names and new-wave covers before settling on the moniker Public Affection and recording a self-released cassette of originals, The Death of a Dictionary, in 1989. Frequent trips into New York to play at CBGB helped net the band a deal with Radioactive Records in 1991. With the new name Live, the band entered the studio with former Talking Heads keyboardist Jerry Harrison that year and began recording the EP Four Songs. The single “Operation spirit (the tyranny of tradition)” went to #9 on the Modern Rock chart, and paved the way for the band’s Harrison-produced, full-length debut, 1991’s Mental Jewelry (#73). The album lyrics, penned by Kowalczyk, were heavily inspired by Indian guru Jiddu Krishnamurti.
Fueled by heavy touring (including billing at Woodstock ‘94 and Peter Gabriel’s WOMAD tour) and a string of hit singles (“I Alone”, “All Over You” and the #1 Modern Rock hits “Selling the drama” and “Lightning crashes”), their next album, Throwing Copper, went to #1 in 1994. It is their best-selling, and often most highly regarded by fans and critics, album to date. The band was even asked to perform on Saturday Night Live where they performed their hits “I Alone” and “Selling the Drama” and to this day, they are the only band to receive a standing ovation at the party after the broadcast.[citation needed]
The momentum continued long enough to help 1997’s Secret Samadhi (coproduced by the band and Jay Healey) debut at #1. Deriving its name from a state of Hindu meditation, the album spawned four Modern Rock hit singles, but failed to match its predecessor’s success, with sales topping off at 2 million. The band performed “lakini’s juice” and “Heropsychodreamer” from this album on NBC’s Saturday Night Live.
Harrison came back on board as coproducer for 1999’s The Distance to Here, which debuted at #4 and featured the minor US hit single “The Dolphin’s Cry.”
In September 2001, the more experimental V (originally scheduled to be titled “Ecstatic Fanatic”) was issued to mixed reviews, preceded by “Simple creed” as the first single. However, with the events of 9/11—which occurred a week before V ‘s release—the melancholic “Overcome” began receiving significant airplay, superseding “Simple Creed” and becoming V’s selling point. Unfortunately, Live’s commercial stock—compounded by their petering radio airplay—had fallen further since The Distance to Here, with V merely reaching #22 at home, failing to reach gold status.
Birds of Pray appeared in May 2003, bolstered by the unexpected success of “Heaven”, Live’s first US Hot 100-placing since “The Dolphin’s Cry.” Reaching #28, Birds of Pray ultimately outsold V, although it too received mixed reviews and failed to reach gold status.
In November 2004, Live released Awake: The Best of Live, a career-spanning compilation that included “We deal in dreams”, a previously unreleased song from the Throwing Copper sessions, and a cover of Johnny Cash’s “I Walk The Line”, as well as Birds of Pray’s “Run Away”, re-imagined with Shelby Lynne on co-lead vocals.
In 2005, Live signed with Sony BMG Music Entertainment’s Epic label, and released a new album entitled Songs From Black Mountain in June 2006, preceded by “The river” as lead single. Thus far, while the album has achieved international success, it has proven Live’s lowest-seller yet domestically, only reaching #52 in the US before quickly disappearing from the charts.
While Live remain only moderately popular in terms of record sales in the United States, much of their current sales come from places in Europe, South Africa, Australia and New Zealand. Ed Kowalczyk has said that “Holland is the center of the Live universe” [citation needed].
The group made news in January 2006 as three band members (Chad Taylor, Patrick Dahlheimer and touring rhythm guitar Adam Kowalczyk) and two members of the band’s road crew were on a United Airlines flight when smoke filled the cabin, requiring the pilot to make an emergency landing.
On season 5 of American Idol, finalist Chris Daughtry was accused of performing Live’s rendition of Johnny Cash’s “I Walk the Line” and calling it his own. This angered some Live fans, but one week later Daughtry acknowledged it was not his own rendition, even saying Live was one of his favorite bands. In May 2006, Live appeared on The Howard Stern Show and addressed this issue.
On May 24, 2006, the band and Chris Daughtry performed “Mystery” on the season finale of American Idol, and on June 7, a new version of “Mystery” was released on the Friends of Live website featuring Chris Daughtry on guest vocals.
The members of Live announced in June 2009 that the band would be taking a two-year hiatus as they work on other projects. On November 30, 2009, guitarist Chad Taylor confirmed that the hiatus of the band was most likely a permanent rift. See the Wikipedia page for more. During the first European tour of the new band of Taylor, Gracey and Dahlheimer (The Gracious Few), Taylor commented both on stage and in post-show discussions that he believes Live may still come back together, though he also stated that the chances of Kowalczyk joining them in this effort may be very small. In an exclusive blogpost[1] on website The Comet, Taylor confirmed that the remaining members of the band would be working on new material for Live in Nashville early July 2011.
The band returned from their nearly three-year hiatus on March 12, 2012, with Chris Shinn, formerly of Unified Theory, as their new lead singer. The new line-up performed before an invited audience at the Strand-Capitol Performing Arts Center in York. The band performed as a six-piece with The Gracious Few's Sean Hennesy on guitar and Alexander Lefever on keyboards
[1]: http://thecomet.com/posts/exclusive_blog_chad_taylor_talks_the_gracious_few_and_live
There's another band with the same name:
2. Live was a 70s-era Progressive Rock group from Germany. Formed in 1971, the outfit appeared to be a strangely named band indeed.
In October 1972 their guitarist Martin Knaden went to Curly Curve. Throughout their history only one member has remained, the multi-talented keyboards and flute player Norbert Aufmhof. Although in existence for a decade Live never got to record a proper studio album, or gain a contract, which surely they should have. Maybe the band name was a bit of a jinx?!
Their earlier history was originally just documented by a single. Only more recently did an LP surface collecting 1974 recordings. Quite obviously a collection of rehearsal session tapes, the LP reveals a band with promise albeit rather grottily recorded with often barely understandable muffled lyrics in English. Musically, there are nods to early Satin Whale and Jane, but with lots of classical touches, notably Grieg and Bach, and a penchant to meander rather nicely during the instrumentals.
Based on the ROCK OFFERS track "Sea Fever", they had blossomed and changed focus somewhat, as a much more sophisticated symphonic progressive of the Pancake and Jane type, typical of the mid/late-1970's.
In all, during their history, three different versions of Live existed, but eventually the band split in 1976. A full history of the band is included in the GEVELSBERG CD, which documents other oddments, sessions, and a live recording!
The Beauty Of Gray
Live Lyrics
Jump to: Overall Meaning ↴ Line by Line Meaning ↴
We could reminisce
Then you would go about your day
If i said you ought to give him
Some of your water
You'd shake your canteen and walk away
The perception that divides you from him
For some reason you never asked why
This is not a black and white world
You can't afford to believe in your side
This is not a black and white world
To be alive
I say the colours must swirl
And I believe
That maybe today
We will all get to appreciate
The beauty of gray!
If I told you she was your mother
We could analyse the situation and be gone
If I said you ought to give her
Some of your water
Your eyes would light up like the dawn
The perception that divides you from her
Is a lie
For some reason you never asked why
This is not a black and white world
You can't afford to believe in your side
This is not a black and white world
To be alive
I say the colours must swirl
And I believe
That maybe today
We will all get to appreciate
Yes we will all get to appreciate
The beauty of gray (x3)
Look into your eyes
No daylight
New day now
Its not a black and white world
To be alive
I say the colours must swirl
And I believe
That maybe today
We will appreciate the beauty of gray
Its not a black and white world
To be alive
I say the colours must swirl
And I believe
That maybe today
We will all get to appreciate
Yes we will all get to appreciate
The Beauty of Gray! (x10)
The song "The Beauty of Gray" by Live is a powerful message about unity and the beauty of diversity in our world. The lyrics describe a situation where a person is urging someone else to put aside their prejudices and see beyond the surface level differences that separate them from others. The first two verses talk about a situation where the person is encouraging another to see someone else as a brother or mother, and to share their resources with them. In both cases, the other person is hesitant to do so, as they see a barrier between themselves and the person being described.
However, the chorus of the song is a powerful message that this barrier, this perception that divides us, is a lie. The world is not black and white, but rather made up of a spectrum of colors and experiences that are all beautiful in their own way. The singer implores us to appreciate the beauty of gray, the complexity and diversity of the world, and to discard our simplistic notions of who is "us" and who is "them."
The song's message is both timeless and timely, as it speaks to the human struggle to overcome our own prejudices and biases in order to see the humanity in those we might otherwise dismiss. It reminds us that we are all part of the same world, and that our differences are what make our experiences richer and more rewarding.
Line by Line Meaning
If i told you he was your brother
Imagine if I told you that he was your brother.
We could reminisce
We could talk about the old times.
Then you would go about your day
But then you would move on to your daily life.
If i said you ought to give him
Some of your water
You'd shake your canteen and walk away
If I suggested that you share your water with him, you would refuse and leave.
The perception that divides you from him
Is a lie
For some reason you never asked why
The perception that separates you from him is false, but you never questioned it.
This is not a black and white world
You can't afford to believe in your side
The world is not simply black and white, and you can't only support your own perspective.
This is not a black and white world
To be alive
I say the colours must swirl
And I believe
That maybe today
We will all get to appreciate
The world is not black and white, and we need to embrace the diversity and complexity of life. Today, we have the opportunity to appreciate it all.
If I told you she was your mother
We could analyse the situation and be gone
If I told you that she was your mother, we could analyze the situation and move on.
Your eyes would light up like the dawn
But you would be happy to hear the news.
Look into your eyes
No daylight
New day now
Looking into your eyes, I see that you are closed off from new ideas, but it is a new day, and there is hope for change.
And I believe
That maybe today
We will appreciate the beauty of gray
I hope that today, we will finally appreciate the beauty of complexity and diversity.
Lyrics © Universal Music Publishing Group
Written by: CHAD ALAN GRACEY, CHAD DAVID TAYLOR, EDWARD JOEL KOWALCZYK, PATRICK DAHLHEIMER
Lyrics Licensed & Provided by LyricFind