Halo

Said to be an acronym for "Heavenly Angelic Light Orchestra," Halo began in Alabama in 1980 when drummer Mike Graham, age 14 at the time, was introduced to vocalist and bass player Scott Springer and guitarist Keith Mims, both seven years older than Graham. Mims and Springer made it clear to Graham that their interest was in pursuing Christian music. Graham, who had already played drums in a Southern Gospel group for two years without taking up the Christian faith, had his reservations, but he liked the music Springer and Mims were playing and assumed he could play with them, just like he had in the Southern Gospel group, without any conflicts of interest.
After playing in Halo for only two years, Graham was won over to the Christian faith in January 1982, and, with a unified mission to be a Christian band with a ministry, it was at this point that the group really started to take form. Working to get their stride, Halo toured the Southern United States, performing mostly in Alabama, Tennessee, Florida and Georgia. While playing the circuit, Halo had the good fortune of meeting Bob Hartman, founder and guitarist for perennial favorites in the Christian music industry, Petra. Hartman acted as a mentor to Halo, providing advice on song-writing as well as sound equipment. Despite their efforts and advice, Halo was still unsigned after nine years of touring, and their performances were effectively equal to a diversion that consumed many hours.
In 1989, Springer announced that God was calling him to full-time ministry. Originally, it appeared that he was going to head off to seminary to become a youth pastor. However, around the same time, Bob Hartman told Graham that he had given a Halo demo tape, recorded in Hartman's studio, to brothers John Elefante and Dino Elefante, owners of Pakaderm Records in Los Alamos, CA and the producers of the last few Petra albums. Not long thereafter, Pakaderm offered Halo a recording contract
By 1990, Halo had released their self-titled debut album, featuring ten tracks written and played by Springer, Mims, Graham, and the Elefante brothers, with arrangements by Bob Hartman and session players, guitarist Tony Palacios (Guardian) and keyboardist John Andrew Schreiner (Carman, Steve Camp, Petra). Altogether, the album is said to exude the "sound of a cohesive power pop band", drawing likenesses to both secular and Christian artists, such as Foreigner, Journey, Kansas, Petra, and Mastedon.
In 1991, Halo released their second album with Pakaderm: Heaven Calling. Following work with Rick Cua, Barry Graul (later to become a frequent session player in the Christian music industry and member of MercyMe) replaced Keith Mims on guitar, and Scott Springer and John Elefante teamed up to write lyrics and music, respectively, for all the songs on Heaven Calling, except "It's Your Decision" and "Secret to Love", to which Mike Graham contributed. This musical pairing proved to be successful because on November 2, 1991, the title-cut, "Heaven Calling," debuted on Billboard's Top Contemporary Christian chart at No. 21. Additionally, online reports show that Halo had four number one Christian Rock hits in its career, and although no verification has been found at the time of this writing to prove it, high probability is that a majority of those hits came from Heaven Calling. The album also garnered success outside the U.S. In touring, Halo found an amazingly receptive audience in South America in places like Guatemala, where they played in Christmas 1991.
Halo's concerts were said to have included a powerful, aggressive, and energetic air; a compact sound and light system that was surprisingly impressive without overpowering the show; vocalist Scott Springer's comments about the songs' messages before playing them; sermons about living a pure life without sex and drugs; prayer; altar calls while getting the audience to join in praise choruses, and the distribution of Bibles. Despite the band's evangelistic tone, Springer was reported as humbly saying, at least once, that he could not force anyone to live a life of Christ, but that it must be a person's own decision.