Hot on the heels of releasing the album “Touring that City”, the Inspirations quickly found themselves back in the studio to record a new album titled, “When I Wake Up (To Sleep No More)”. If my timeline is correct, “Touring That City” had not even been out for a month quite yet, but after the Inspirations heard the song “When I Wake Up”, they knew it had the potential to be a massive hit, and rather than wait a few months and risk someone else snatching it up, they hurried back into the studio to record this album. The RCA studios were completely booked up, so the Inspirations traveled to Greenville, South Carolina and recorded the album at Mark V Studios. Likely recorded in October/November 1973, the album was released right at the end of the year, and judging from the catalog numbers, “When I Wake Up” (CAS-9747) was released right at the same time as the Kingsmen’s “Big & Live” album (CAS-9749), which boasted the Kingsmen’s own lively performance of “When I Wake Up” as well!

The Inspirations first 4 albums with Canaan had been recorded at the famed RCA Studios in Nashville, utilizing the A-list team of studio musicians, thus giving those albums that distinct “Nashville Sound”. With the change in studios, there is a marked difference with the overall production and musical aspects of this latest album. In fact, comparing “Touring that City”, which had a nice, slick sound to it, “When I Wake Up” has a very rustic, acoustical feel. Also, since “When I Wake Up” was quickly prepped and recorded, not a lot of time was spent working out neat little musical or vocal arrangements, which you hear a lot of on “Touring that City”.

The bright cover shot was taken along Highway 441 going up to Newfound Gap in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park. If you notice the coat sleeves on Mike’s suit are a little short, it’s because Mike is wearing Marlin Shubert’s old suit! Martin Cook wanted to use the white suits for the cover, so Mike appeased his boss by pulling out this suit, despite being just a tad too small!

The album kicks off with the campmeeting feel of the title song, “When I Wake Up (To Sleep No More)”, which was written by Marion Easterling in 1944 and published by the Stamps-Baxter Music Company. Easterling was an outstanding songwriter penning many classics over the years such as “Standing By the River”, “Rainbow of Love”, “When They Ring the Bells of Heaven” and my personal favorite, “When He Reached Down His Hand”. The Inspirations discovered the song through the Singing Echoes (who were good friends with the Inspirations), who had recorded it and released the album a few months prior. Though the song was a hugely popular song for the Singing Echoes, the Inspirations were the group who ultimately made the song a smashing success, hitting the #1 spot for 7 months between April through October 1974 and then once more in December! The story goes that the Inspirations were driving through Cleveland, TN, and Gary Epperson, of the Singing Echoes, was sitting at a local gas station that his dad, Max Epperson owned, waiting for the Inspirations bus to come barreling through, as they trekked through town almost every week. Gary follows the bus in hot pursuit and manages to get the Inspirations to pull over. He gives them the Singing Echoes’ latest record with this song on it and tells the guys that they really need to record this song. They took the album and listened to it when they got to the office, and immediately decided they needed to record it. The back-to-back release and subsequent hits of the songs “Touring that City” and “When I Wake Up” was truly a defining moment for the Inspirations, as both songs dominated the top of the charts for almost 2 solid years! As I alluded to a bit earlier, the Kingsmen also had a hit with their exciting performance of the song as well, peaking at #5 in November 1974.

The soulful feel of “One Day I Will”, slows the pace down and the verses are excellently handled by Archie. This is one of my favorite songs from this era, and it was recorded by several artists during this time including the Hemphills, Sego Brothers & Naomi, Jimmie Davis and JD Sumner & the Stamps. The song was written by Walt Mills and John Stallings (writer of the classic song, “Learning to Lean”), and was originally recorded by Walt Mills on his 1973 solo album, “Show a Little Love”.

One of the most haunting and poignant songs beckoning the sinner to come home is the song, “God’s Last Altar Call”, which features Jack, and is probably my all-time favorite Jack Laws feature. A striking and cleverly written song, Jimmie Davis also recorded it in 1973 as well. The song was written by Eddie Miller, who was a country music songwriter, famous for writing such classics as “Release Me” and “There She Goes”. After Miller was saved, he turned his talents to write songs about Jesus, even re-writing his country hit “Release Me” as “Please Release Me (From My Sins)”, which was a hugely popular song for the Blackwood Brothers during the early and mid-70’s.

Picking up the tempo, we come to the classic Stamps-Baxter favorite “I’m Winging My Way Back Home”, which was a fun song allowing everyone a chance to be featured. Featuring a nice acoustic feel, the song was written by James B. Coats, and just about every quartet sang and recorded this song back in the day including the Blackwood Brothers, Chuck Wagon Gang, Oak Ridge Boys, Dixie Echoes, Cathedrals, LeFevres, etc.

With Mike taking the lead on the chorus and Archie tackling the second verse, we come to the Ila Knight penned, “The First Look”, which is one of the few “original” songs included on this album. This song did very well for the Inspirations in the Singing News chart, peaking at #10 in August 1974, and remained a fan favorite for years to come. The song was not originally written as a bass feature, but the Inspirations re-arranged the song to fit them, and became one of Ila’s best loved songs. This was actually the very first song Ila was inspired to write back in 1970, but it took her 3 years to complete the song. Ila’s mother’s youngest brother passed away at the young age of 34 years old, and as he lay on his deathbed, he looked up into Heaven and told everyone what he was seeing, and this song is a depiction of that vision. At the time of his passing, Ila was 27 years old, and due to the two being so close in age, they were very close, and his passing was very hard for Ila. As I mentioned in my last article, I did not hear this album until the mid-90’s, but I was already very familiar with this song, as the first version I remember hearing was by the Blackwood Brothers on their 1975 album, “What a Beautiful Day (For the Lord to Come Again), but my personal favorite version comes from the Hoppers’ exciting performance on their 1974 live album, “A’Live and A’Singin’”. A wonderfully descriptive tune, I truly believe this song is best experienced “live”, and I always wished the Inspirations had included it on their 1976 live album, “A Night of Inspiration”, but I digress…

Before the first side concludes, we come to the song “Longing for Home”, which was written by, and features Eddie Dietz. This was the first song the Inspirations recorded that Eddie had written, and though Eddie wrote several songs over the years, it is one of only a couple of songs that the Inspirations recorded of his.

The enjoyable convention classic, “When I Got Saved”, gets the second side underway, and is a highlight of the recording. With Mike taking the lead on the chorus, the song was a perfect match with the Inspirations’ style. Written by Vep Ellis, though the Inspirations’ version is the first version I recall hearing of this song, it was another classic tune that was popular back in the 50’s and 60’s for such groups as the Statesmen and the LeFevres.

Slowing the tempo slightly, we come to the classic Inspirations sounding tune, “When I Step Off on the Beautiful Shore”. With Archie taking the lead, the song was written by Jake Lambert and was another tune that the guys got from the Singing Echoes, who recorded it on the same album they had recorded, “When I Wake Up”. I remember singing this song in our little church choir when I was in high school in the late 80’s, as we tended to sing a lot of Inspirations tunes from the 70’s.

Slowing the tempo down further and featuring some nice steel guitar and piano highlights, Troy sings the second verse, while he and Archie trade off the melody on the chorus on the song, “Long, Long Journey”. Written by Jimmie Davis and originally recorded on his 1959 album, “Suppertime”, this song is an often-overlooked gem by the guys, which charted for a few months in 1974, but never broke into the Top 20.

My favorite song from this album is the tune, “Revival Days”, which features Eddie. Written by Jimmy Jones and originally recorded by the LeFevres on their 1965 album, “Sing the Gospel”, the song was brought to the Inspirations by a lady named Jesse Talley. This campmeeting tune was written in the spirit of the classic JD Sumner penned song, “The Old Country Church”, which features unique verses, but each chorus features the refrain of some classic hymn. Jack joins in on the song as well, and by the time we come to the final choruses, you can’t help but be enthralled by the excitement and spirit of it all, and you just hate to see it end! I find myself listening to this song over and over again, and I imagine this was a great song performed live.

During the time this album was recorded, one of the most popular songs in the country was “There is a River”, as recorded by Jimmy Swaggart. Swaggart’s version of the song spent about 30 months in the Top 5 alone between mid-1972 through early 1975, peaking at the #1 position for 4 non-consecutive months in 1972 and 1973. Along with the Inspirations, several other groups recorded the song during this time, including the Cathedrals, Sego Brothers & Naomi and Jimmie Davis. Featuring Troy, I never felt the song quite fit the Inspirations’ style, and when looking at this album as a collection of songs, this tune really seems to stick out from the others on this album, and it’s the only song that really feels like a “filler song”.

The unassuming medium tempo, “He Brought Me Out” rounds out the recording nicely. With Troy handling the melody, the song is a group effort and doesn’t feature anyone, but it’s a really good song, and is one I have always enjoyed from this album.

While I don’t have the emotional connection with this album as I do “Touring that City”, this was an outstanding recording and one I have thoroughly enjoyed listening to over the years. Given the swiftness these guys pulled songs together to fill an album in record time, speaks volumes of their tenacity and creativity, as the album doesn’t come across as a rush job. Due to the short time they had to pull it all together, there are several cover tunes on the album, and with the exception of “There is a River”, they all bare the indelible trademark Inspirations’ sound. For the most part, rather than try to make the Inspirations fit the song, they made the song fit the Inspirations.

The Inspirations capped off a highly successful year by winning 3 individual awards during the 1973 Singing News Fan Awards…Archie, once again took home “Favorite Tenor”, Eddie walked away with “Favorite Baritone” and Martin won “Favorite Musician”. 1973 was a very satisfying and successful year for the Inspirations. The release of both, “Touring that City” and “When I Wake Up” albums, along with the amazing success of their respective title songs, it paved the way for an astounding year in 1974, as the Inspirations held the #1 position in the Singing News chart for the entire year, save one month when the Thrasher Brothers took the #1 spot for November 1974 with, “One Day at a Time”. Nonetheless, this was a highly fruitful and exciting season for the Inspirations…with much, much more to come!

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