I am writing a long overdue response to the devoted who wrote Icon and never received a reply, and to the many good friends that the band made during its travels, with whom we lost touch. Thanks for the support; sorry about being lame on the correspondence.
This CD represents the remaining music we made as a group while not on a major label, from 1986 to the present. Included is our 1987 independent, self-produced album, "A More Perfect Union" four additional songs written in that time period, two songs written in preparation for our third major label release, "Right Between The Eyes" (Megaforce/Atlantic, 1989), and a remake of the Christmas song, "Little Drummer Boy". All this material features our newest singer, Jerry Harrison, and Kevin Stroller, a great keyboardist.
Jerry added real songwriting and lyrical talent to Icon. The band had been highly criticized by Capitol Records for using an outside songwriter, Bob Halligan, on "Night Of The Crime" (Capitol, 1985)( Incidentally, "Night Of The Crime" wound up in Kerrang! magazine's 1988 top 50 hard rock albums of all time, coming in at #3 !). As a band we always strived to grow musically, refusing to make the same record twice. The addition of Jerry and Kevin brought big changes with respect to our musical style, some of which were a departure from my original vision. However, years later, "A More Perfect Union" still stands on its own as a legitimate, self-producedd work that I am proud of. It should also be noted that engineer Steve Escallier, whom I greatly respect, had a major hand in the production aspects of this material and without his help, this CD would not be what it is.
If you're wondering how this release came about, years later, the answer is simple...fans. Three in particular: Stephen Wilkinson, Roger Pamachena, and Larry Horn, who followed the band from back when we called ourselves "The Schoolboys". I have known Stephen since 1987 when he introduced himself as a fan. He kept in touch with the band, hung out at rehearsals, and always supported us. In February of 1994 he approached me with the idea of releasing "A More Perfect Union" on CD. With our first two albums, "ICON" and "Night Of The Crime" now available as Japanese import CD's, and "Right Between The Eyes" already on disc in the U.S., this album was needed in order to complete the ICON compact disc collection. Stephen, Roger, and Larry agreed to handle the manufacturing and distribution of this CD, as long as I provided finished masters of all necessary material. The three of them are affiliated with a retail record store, Rockaway Records in Mesa, Arizona. Rockaway has collected a fair amount of ICON collectable items and was the first to tell me about our Capitol releases on import CD. When Stephen and Roger played for me a horrible European bootleg reproduction of "Perfect Union", I agreed to do this project. After a lot of remixing, remastering, and reprinting, you now have a 17-song ICON CD.
"An Even More Perfect Union" is probably the last you will hear from ICON, as the band split up in 1990 after our UK tour. I don't see the band rejoining for one last hurrah, those things never work. Seeing a reunited band, years after their debut, is never as cool as what you remember. ICON had its 15 minutes, as Warhol would say, and it was a good 15 minutes. To this day we still get fan mail, complimenting us about different albums and tours. It is truly a good thing when work you have done leaves this sort of impression on others.
