Forty years ago this summer, a band named Chalice hit Jamaican charts for the first time with a ballad called I Still Love You. It was written by Wayne Armond, its guitarist, who also sang the yearning hit.
Armond is still with the band, though their latest single, It’s Alright, is done as Chalice Featuring Wayne Armond. Released in June, it is arranged, produced and written by the veteran musician.
Now based in South Florida, Armond makes it clear he is still a member of Chalice. Like many musicians who have been part of a band for years, he just felt it was time to do his own thing.
“In the last two or three years I have been writing songs that are personal to me. It might be about my mother, my first girlfriend, my children,” he said. “I just felt that if I wanted to take up my acoustic guitar and create something, it wouldn’t be Chalice; it would be me expressing myself.”
Since it was released, Armond said It’s Alright has been doing well in Jamaica, and west African countries like Ghana and Nigeria.
“It’s not getting played like a Drake or a (Vybz) Kartel but it’s doing its thing,” he joked.
Armond has done projects before outside of Chalice which formed in 1979. He did an instrumental album of Burt Bacharach songs; recorded and toured with Jimmy Cliff and Monty Alexander and played on Glory to God, a massive hit in 2018 for singer Wayne Marshall.
I Still Love You, which had a feel similar to blue-eyed soul bands like Ambrosia, was number one in Jamaica for several weeks. For the next 10 years, Chalice was a fixture on the country’s charts with songs like Stew Peas, Good to be There and Revival Time.
They have also had their share of tragedy with the deaths of keyboardist Michael Wallace, singer/guitarist Trevor Roper and founder/singer Robbie Peart.
Armond is recording another album of instrumentals, this time a tribute to rocksteady legend Alton Ellis. He hopes to release that set in 2021.
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