Degarmo and Key

DeGarmo & Key's 1978 debut, This Time Through, and the albums in the late '70s and early '80s that followed it, established the group's trademark classic rock sound, combining the progressive art rock of early Genesis with the classic Southern stylings of Lynyrd Skynyrd and the Allman Brothers Band. Given the fact that, by the mid-'80s, the group had essentially abandoned its bluesy rock sound for the keyboard-dominated synth pop of artists like Thomas Dolby and the Human League, the D&K album in 1987 was a return to form of sorts for the Memphis-based group. Dana Key's able guitar work is once again pushed to the front of the mix, and his solos are particularly impressive, alternating easily between quick and swaggering ("Out of the Danger Zone") and slow and languishing ("Teenage Suicide"). And Eddie DeGarmo's keyboards are equally admirable, adding a subdued, soulful framework for the songs to build upon, rather than actually carrying the melody lines, as they did on the mid-'80s releases.

While the musical texture on the album may have been a return to the band's late-'70s sound, the word crafting was a virtual template for late-'80s contemporary Christian rock music. Song titles such as "Brother Against Brother (It Ain't Right)" and "War with the World" pretty much summarized their respective themes, and the lyrics themselves were nearly always bold evangelistic statements to the world at large — a stark contrast to the majority of '90s Christian rock music, which tends toward clever song titles and mostly introspective lyrics. But, even though the song titles and lyrics seem decidedly dated 11 years after the album's release, it was nonetheless a solid addition to the fledgling CCM genre at the time of its release. To be sure, the D&K album rocks harder than anything else the group did in the '80s and was a welcome return to the gutsy, well-executed Southern rock that made the group's first few releases so compelling.