Michael Tait
Born: May 18, 1966
Place of Birth: Washington, DC
Zodiac Sign: Taurus
Michael DeWayne Tait is a contemporary Christian music artist. Michael Tait met Toby McKeehan in 1984 when he was in high school. Toby and Michael met Kevin Max while attending Liberty University in the late 1980s, and together they formed the four-time Grammy-winning band DC Talk, with whom Michael Tait has released five acclaimed studio albums.
Tait is the current lead singer of Newsboys and one-third of the Christian rock group DC Talk (though the group has been on hiatus since 2000). Tait also has succeeded in his solo career, founding a band called Tait in 1997. He toured as a solo act until 2007.
He became the lead singer of the Christian pop rock band Newsboys in 2009, and though Peter Furler was the lead vocalist on the album In the Hands of God, Tait provided supporting vocals on the project. Aside from singing, Tait is also a self-taught guitar player. Tait also has a sister Lynda Randle, a Southern Gospel singer.
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Michael Tait met Toby McKeehan in 1984 while he was in high school in the Washington DC area, and together they began creating some music. Michael Tait and Toby McKeehan met Kevin Max while attending Liberty University in the mid-1980s.
Together, all three formed the four-time Grammy-winning band DC Talk and released 5 acclaimed studio albums. In 2000, the band announced a hiatus with the release of Intermission: The Greatest Hits while all three members devoted themselves to solo projects. The band has not toured together since 2001 (except for one time in Redmond, Washington, in 2005 and when TobyMac made a surprise guest appearance at Winter Jam in 2010 in Nashville and sang "Jesus Freak" with Tait). DC Talk has recorded 3 songs together since the hiatus announcement, including the remix of "Atmosphere" on TobyMac's 2004 album Welcome to Diverse City and a cover of the Prince song "The Cross" on Kevin Max's 2007 album The Blood. The band also recorded a song entitled "Let's Roll" following the September 11, 2001 attacks.
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After DC Talk's hiatus was announced, Tait dedicated more time to his band Tait (which he named after his father, Nathel). Tait had partially formed this band around 1997. One of the original members was guitarist Pete Stewart (from the hard rock band Grammatrain), who featured on the first album but was absent from the second one because he left the band to work on his own solo projects. In 2006, Tait announced that they were working on a Loveology album.
Michael is now touring as frontman for the Newsboys, but he still plans to release Loveology. In an interview with John Dibiase of Jesusfreakhideout.com, he stated that Loveology is still in the works and will be a separate project from the Newsboys.
In the interview, Michael said, "Loveology is going to become something we will write about very soon. I can't tell you now, but it's a project with the boys, me, and Ben Moody, another whole music project."
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An official statement was released on March 9, 2009, that announced Michael Tait as the new lead singer of Newsboys. Coincidentally, Tait's former group, DC Talk, toured with Newsboys in the 1990s.
On March 7, 2009, Tait surprised the crowd by performing as Newsboys' lead singer for the first time and announcing that he would be the band's new lead singer.
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Former Newsboys lead singer Peter Furler still provided lead vocals on the 2009 album In the Hands of God, though Michael Tait provided supporting vocals, along with Jamie Rowe of Guardian.
Furler's last performance as lead vocalist took place during a performance at Disney's Night of Joy 2009. Michael performed lead vocals for most of the songs, but Peter came out to sing lead on "Breakfast."
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In 2010, the reborn Newsboys announced information about their 15th studio album (and first with Tait on lead vocals), Born Again, released on July 13. Christmas followed that! A Newsboys Holiday, including a previously recorded Tait song.
In 2011, God's Not Dead and the live follow-up, Newsboys Live in Concert: God's Not Dead in 2012, Restart in 2013, and Hallelujah for the Cross in 2014.
Tait has also starred as Hero in ! Hero. He also contributed to various books, including the popular Jesus Freaks and Jesus Freaks II books. He recently contributed to the books Under God and Living Under God with DC Talk bandmate TobyMac.
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He has seven siblings, one of whom, Lynda Randle, was a gospel singer with the Gaither Homecoming Series.
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