Initiate (Mervyn Spence album)

Initiate is the second solo album by the Northern Irish singer Mervyn Spence, once again released under the pseudonym "O'Ryan", in 1995.

Initiate contains no original material, instead solely consisting of ten covers of various tracks from Tom Galley's Phenomena project (which Spence was involved with during its initial stages, and held the rights to at the time), and three re-recorded songs from Spence's debut album, Something Strong.

The recordings of "Still the Night", "Did It All for Love" and "No Retreat - No Surrender" found on Initiate would later be included on the Phenomena compilation boxset released in 2006, 'The Complete Works'.

In 2023, Cherry Red Records released a new version of the album, 'Phenomena Recovered', with 2 new covers of Phenomena songs, "Dance with the devil" and "Rock my soul".

Personnel

 * Mervyn Spence - lead & backing vocals, bass programming, additional guitar
 * Jason Fillingham - keyboards, drum programming
 * Huwie Lucas - lead & rhythm guitars
 * Martin Taylor - classical guitar
 * "Midi Man" - drums
 * Carl Brazil - percussion
 * Tracey Riggan - backing vocals

Production personnel

 * Mervyn Spence - production
 * Jason Fillingham - production, engineering
 * Simon Hanhart - mixing