Canter Bridge

This oddly named female band opened their Big Career with this eponymous 1993 release. It was of course not all that they would become, but it was an audacious start.

The tight harmonies and soaring soprano embellishment of the opening track, ‘I’ll Be Believing’, served notice of what was to come. Both of these shape the Point of Grace signature.

It was hard not to like this sound from the beginning. PoG have always made their unusual artistry sound easy although the standard they’ve set represents anything but a facile leap. The odds that this sound was to become a one-hit wonder were perhaps one-in-three a few months after the 1993 release of their debut. Yet the foursome, even through a change of personnel, have been an enduring phenomenon.

This may be as much about the way in which they’ve preserved a certain genuine look and sound even while working within a very highly produced musical genre.

But all of this is looking far ahead of this first disc. Back in 1993, the harmonies seemed astounding, as indeed they were. If any of these tracks hinted at the large sound that was to become associated—unlikely enough—with a girls’ foursome, it is ‘Living the Legacy’. It’s march-esque, in-your-face rhythm combined with a truly worthy story line and sung at full pipery showed an early PoG listener that more interesting things were likely to be forthcoming. Thoughts of pan-flashing dissipated every so quietly.

One could mount an argument that the following song, ‘Jesus will still be there’, sends out the same artistic promissory note by a very different route, although one must take care not to be misunderstood: the ladies’ intent is no doubt more pastoral than professional. Yet it is fair to look from this distance at the artistic base from which their very spiritual labors were to be conducted, here at an early stage of construction.

Arguably the most compelling piece is the final one, ‘This Day’. Form and content merge exquisitely in a moving statement of our ephemeral, fragile, moment on this earth.

A remarkable album at the beginning of an astonishing musical trajectory.