As Kansas Rocks On, Steve Walsh Makes New Album

This is not really an album review.  It's more of an observation.  However, fans of former Kansas singer Steve Walsh should get his new CD, Black Butterfly.  You won't be disappointed.

When Steve Walsh retired as lead singer of Kansas a few years ago, nobody could really say they were surprised. He said it himself. It was time. Other than his brief stint fronting his own band called Streets, Steve had been lead singer of Kansas from the start.

He left Streets shortly after recording Crimes In Mind because Phil Ehart and Richard Williams were all that was left of Kansas at that point. From then on, they only recorded four studio albums of all new songs, the last of which Steve had no part in writing. He simply added his vocals as he was in the middle of recording his second solo album, Glossolalia.

If you listen to the Kansas album of the time, Somewhere To Elsewhere, and Glossolalia, you can hear the difference. Steve brought much more passion to his solo work. That's not to say he phoned it in on his last Kansas album, but you could hear where his heart was.

To be fair, his solo work was decidedly different. He went to darker places. His voice had changed so much, but it worked for his solo material. Maybe this is because you are not able to compare it to a CD of him singing those songs 20 years earlier. These were brand new songs.

Creatively, it's obvious Steve still had something to say, but it didn't fit the Kansas mold. I've often wondered since I've learned a bit about the Kansas creative process how many songs Steve brought to them through the years that were rejected.

Williams has said in interviews that the band could be hard on their song writers at times, and that included songs brought to them by Kerry Livgren.  

It's not difficult to think that it would bother Walsh more than Livgren. Livgren simply left the band and recorded numerous albums while offering up new songs for Kansas to record or reject. During their prime years, Walsh quit the band and was talked out of it.

Steve's third solo CD was released five years later. Shadowman continued his exciting new direction. However, he decided that he was retired from recording after that. Part of this was due to his frustration with album sales and probably the industry itself.

The band wanted to record new material, but Steve refused to write or record. Maybe because of Livgren's health or because they didn't want to ask him, the other four members thought about it and created their own CD under the title Native Window.

When you make it as long as Kansas has, you are a fortunate band. Not every group has been lucky enough to create songs so popular that fans want to see them performed live 40 years later. Carry On Wayward Son and Dust In The Wind are in the elite category among some of the greatest songs ever recorded.

There has been very little down time for the band since it began almost 45 years ago, though their lineup has changed. They keep going, and they recorded an album of all new material two years ago called The Prelude Implicit. They just released the live CD called Leftoverture Live And Beyond.

Ronnie Platt jumped on board as lead singer not long after Steve left, and there was already talk of new music. It was the gig of a lifetime for a man who had played some of those Kansas hits live as a part of a regional cover band.

Ehart asked former Kansas lead singer John Elefante to come back, because he knew the band couldn't have just any singer. Elefante declined in a public statement on Facebook. Platt's voice is still there, where you could hear Walsh struggle to hit some notes.

Make no mistake, Walsh still brought a passion to those lyrics and you could hear it. There is a knock on Platt, fairly or unfairly, that he could bring a bit more passion to those songs than what he does.

However, the band sounds great musically, and Platt's vocals don't really take away from that. Kansas is sill getting great reviews, and word is that they are already planning another new album.

When you consider how Walsh walked away from Kansas, it was almost a sad note. Most fans probably thought he was done, but Steve surprised them with the release of his fourth studio album, Black Butterfly.

Musically, it continues the direction in which he left off with Shadowman, but he's taking chances musically and vocally. He also hands vocals off to Jerome Mazza on three songs and shares them on another track.

What's really nice is you can hear the passion in his voice. He's singing new songs that he believes in. It's great to hear him singing again. Hopefully, he continues as a solo artist, because Steve Walsh still has something to contribute to the musical world.