God Fixation

God Fixation is the seventeenth studio album of the Christian rock band, Petra. It was released on April 21, 1998.

The album features 3 new members: guitarist Pete Orta guitarist/keyboardist Kevin Brandow and bassist Lonnie Chapin. All new members worked on the music and lyrics of the new songs contributing heavily to the sound of this album, which is more modern and less driving than most of their previous work.

Album background

God Fixation came to be after another major lineup change within the band. After the departure of guitarist David Lichens and keyboardist Jim Cooper, lead singer John Schlitt recruited guitarists Pete Orta and Kevin Brandow, who had been playing with him on his solo tour. They joined new bassist Lonnie Chapin in the recording of the album. According to Schlitt, the three new members worked closely with band founder Bob Hartman in the writing and recording of the album for six weeks.

Hartman, who handled most of the songwriting, was open to collaborations from the new members. Schlitt said in an interview with HM that "the music has been totally affected by the three new guys and [drummer] Louie [Weaver]. They came in with ideas, and they showed Bob, and Bob said, 'Great, I don't have to write songs anymore... All I gotta do is come up with the words.' So there were a lot of ideas from the new guys." As a result, most of the music was written by Orta, Brandow, and Chapin, along with musician Brian Wooten and producer John Elefante.