The Prayer Chain
Yorba Linda, California9 reviews across 4 releases
The Prayer Chain was a Southern California Christian alternative-rock band formed in 1990 from members of Laughing Boy and Tapestry. Its early sound combined grunge force with minor-key melodies, driving drums, swirling guitar, and urgent vocals. The 1992 debut Whirlpool was short, noisy, and propelled by live-band energy, though its lyrics were often blunt rather than metaphorical. Shawl expanded the group into a twelve-song album, tightening its songwriting while retaining the attack and absorbing traces of U2, Pearl Jam, and The Seventy Sevens. The band then moved toward slower, heavier, more spacious music on Mercury, where bass and drums carried more of the weight and long songs left room for feedback and atmosphere. Caryn Colbert took the lead vocal on "Manta Ray," one sign of the broader arrangement.
After Mercury appeared on Rode Dog Records in 1995, The Prayer Chain broke up following years of touring and internal strain. The members reunited for a Chicago show in 1998, appeared at a Gene Eugene tribute in 2000, and returned to Cornerstone Festival in 2003 after six years away. The independent Here Comes the Rust accompanied that return with a seventeen-song retrospective, including a live "Dig Dug" and rare later material rather than a new studio album. The group also played reunion dates in 2003 at the Flevo Festival in the Netherlands. In 2015, a Kickstarter funded a double-vinyl reissue of Mercury. The Prayer Chain reunited again in 2018 for shows marking the twenty-fifth anniversary of Shawl.
4 releases reviewed
Whirlpool
Shawl
