The Supreme Angels – Reloaded (Malaco 2009)

The Supreme Angels
Reloaded
Malaco 2009
www.malaco.com

When legendary quartet leader Rev. Howard “Slim” Hunt of Slim and the Supreme Angels made his transition from labor to reward in 2007, the inevitable question was: what will happen to the Supreme Angels? Hunt was the heart and soul of a group that was active for more than a half-century.

Hunt solved that problem in advance by grooming his son, Quincy King, to be his vocal successor. On the quartet’s latest project, the appropriately titled Reloaded, King — nicknamed Slim, Jr. — is in the mix along with stalwart members Robert “Sugar” Hightower (remember him as the sassy-confident child lead of the Hightower Brothers?), Maurice Robinson and Michael Kimpson.

King gives the Supreme Angels a more youthful vocal sound, and the retro soul seventies feel the musicians cultivate throughout Reloaded is, if not timeless, still very much in vogue. The songs (save one) are new but lyrically they traverse quartet holy ground: shelter in a time of storm, thanksgiving for blessings, holding on against all odds, surviving in a tough world with lots of questionable choices, Mother, and the need for spiritual healing.

The CD opens and (almost) closes with quartet handclappers. “Wicked Land,” a take on “My Lord’s Gonna Move this Wicked Race;” and “What’s the Matter with Jesus” are 100 percent pure Supreme Angels fare. “How Long” showcases superb lead vocals and a music riff reminiscent of English pub band Ace’s opening salvo in its seventies hit of the same name, but it is not the same song. “Hold On and Never Give Up” is bouncy and bright Northern Soul. In the receeding seconds of “Your Touch is All We Need,” the quartet beseeches the Lord to watch over and protect a litany of their quartet bretheren, such as the Canton Spirituals.

Listen for Sugar’s biting guitar solo on “Don’t Let the Devil Steal your Joy” and the Supreme Angels’ performance of the reverential hymn, “I Need Thee Every Hour,” which closes out the project.

Slim Hunt may be gone, but his legacy lives on in the Supreme Angels.

Four of Five Stars

Essie Johnson-Lane, Chicago Chapter GMWA Rep, Dies

Dennis Cole informed TBGB and the Chicago Area Gospel Announcers Guild that Essie Johnson-Lane, long-time Chicago Chapter Representative of the Gospel Music Workshop of America, has passed away.

Dennis says: “Please keep Essie’s daughter, Faye (Wanda), Essie’s twin sister Bessie and the entire family, along with our Chicago Chapter of officers and members in your daily prayers. We will notify you of pending arrangements as soon as they are available to us.”

TBGB Editor Marovich to Present at Gospel Complex Conference

On Monday, May 4 from 1:30 to 4:45 p.m., TBGB editor Bob Marovich will join a panel of experts at the Gospel Complex for Education and Preservation Annual Conference to discuss “The Chicago School of Gospel.” The program will be held at Nova Southeastern University in Davie/Fort Lauderdale, FL.

THE CHICAGO SCHOOL OF GOSPEL
The story of gospel music as it proliferated from the Chicago area through known and unknown personalities in the Gospel Music tradition. In the discussion, we will highlight the impact of the “noted hotbed churches” which gave birth, fostered and nurtured Gospel Music in its embryonic stages and through its controversial and often turbulent times.

The discussion will include the early church radio broadcasts which impacted church ministries and served as a forerunner to national radio and television broadcast ministries of today. We will also discuss the musical influences of the Churches of God in Christ on Gospel Music.

Attention will be given to the pioneering songwriters, composers, arrangers, publishers and musicians who all together developed and contributed to what scholars labeled the Chicago School of Gospel – thereby confirming and validating Chicago’s place as the undisputed “Mecca” of the Gospel Music tradition in America.

Panelists: Professor Reggie Miles, Professor L. Stanley Davis, Bob Marovich, Minister Mack Mason

For more information or to register, visit www.gospelcomplex.org and click on “Annual Conference.” Hope to see you there!

Various Artists – Oh Happy Day: All-Star Music Celebration

Various Artists
Oh Happy Day: All-Star Music Celebration
EMI Gospel/Vector Recordings 2009
www.emigospel.com

In the spirit of T Bone Burnett’s Grammy-winning coupling of bluegrass queen Alison Krauss and rock icon Robert Plant (Raising Sand), a cadre of producers pair rock and pop artists with gospel singers on Oh Happy Day: All-Star Music Celebration. The result? Combinations that are at once improbable and divinely inspired.

The seamlessness of each performance may be due to the top-quality of the artists, the know-how of the producers, the fact that gospel music is the underpinning of most American pop music, or all three. Regardless, this project is simply electrifying. Each track is distinctive, yet each seems drawn from the part of the soul that is beyond human understanding.

Standout performances on the collection include Jonny Lang channeling the guitar wizardry of Elder Utah Smith on John P. Kee’s “I Believe,” as the Fisk Jubilee Singers let their hair down and back him with an uncommon funkiness. The Clark Sisters seem born to sing Stevie Wonder’s “Higher Ground,” on which they share studio time with petal steel guitar legend Robert Randolph. Mavis Staples and Patty Griffin win the award for the collection’s rootsiest duet on the Consolers’ “Waiting for My Child to Come Home,” although Joss Stone and Buick Audra’s harmonica-dominated informal jam session on “This Little Light of Mine” comes in a close second.

Al Green and Heather Headley render a fine duet on Curtis Mayfield’s “People Get Ready.” Why more radio stations aren’t playing Heather’s music, be they gospel or adult contemporary stations, “makes me wanna holler, throw up both my hands.”

The title track is an old evangelistic hymn made famous when Edwin Hawkins and the Northern California State Youth Choir gave it a west coast easy feeling. Here the song is led by Queen Latifah, who can do just about anything, with Rev. Stefanie Minatee and Jubilation as the choir. Rev. Minatee is kin with the late Rev. Lawrence Roberts (Angelic Choir), so she knows a thing or two about choral singing. It shows, too, as Jubilation offers a bright but brassy backdrop to Latifah’s gospel vocals, which sound as natural as breathing.

Arguably the strongest performance on the album is Jon Bon Jovi and the Washington Youth Choir doing “Keep the Faith.” The handclapping, Holiness-inspired arrangement demonstrates just how deep the sacred has permeated secular music.

What’s especially pleasing about Oh Happy Day: All-Star Music Celebration is that the gospel component is not treated as exotic or otherworldly but is afforded the same musical respect as the rock artists. Hallelujah!

Five of Five Stars

TBGB Pick of the Week: April 27, 2009

“Mr. President”
Janelle Monae
From the album Metropolis (Bad Boy Records/Wondaland 2008)
www.jmonae.com

Although this song was not meant for the gospel market, its message is not out of place for an urban inspiration station that takes chances.

From her science fiction concept album Metropolis, which she produced with Sean “P Diddy” Combs and the Wolfmasters, GRAMMY-nominated neo-soul singer Janelle Monae delivers an impassioned plea to the President to make things right. Prince-inspired guitars swirl around Janelle as she sings, “A book is worth more than a bomb any day.” Her references to the president as “Father” give the song a sacred touch.

In the context of the album’s theme – Janelle is a fugitive android named Cindi Mayweather seeking a better life in the midst of a futuristic Sodom and Gomorrah – the song may not seem especially religious, but its message of equality and peace spans timeframes and genres. In other words, don’t think of spaceships and androids and instead hear it as a call to governments everywhere to improve education and cease hunger, poverty, illness, and build a better world. What can be more inspirational than that?

My Journey – Conrad Miller

My Journey
Conrad Miller
Millcon Music Ministries 2009
http://www.millconmusic.com/

Back in the day, Conrad Miller was a card-carrying member of the Soulful Seven, a nationally-known group whose cover of the Swingin’ Medallions’ “Double Shot of My Baby’s Love” (MGM) is a northern soul collectors item. Miller also wrote the passionate “Carla My Love” for the Softones, a sweet soul group from the Seventies with a sound similar to the Stylistics and Manhattans.

Although Miller grew up singing in his church choir and is now vice chairman of the Deacon Board at Second Baptist Church in Doylestown, PA, until recently he hadn’t stepped out as a gospel artist. After the untimely death of his daughter Lauren a day after her sixteenth birthday, the singer/songwriter decided life was too short to put off his official entry into the sacred music industry any longer. My Journey, produced and arranged by GRAMMY, Stellar and Dove Award-winner Steven Ford, is the product of that decision.

The lyrics may be grounded in personal faith, but the songs on My Journey sound as if they were pulled off old vinyl records. Miller has maintained his charming, pleasant tenor voice, and delivers his songs in a polite, reverent manner. Expert backing comes from strong, tight male groups (variously the “Back Bench Boys” and a quartet that includes Steven Ford) that give the album a quartet sensibility.

The eleven songs are amalgams of traditional gospel and sweet soul, with Biblical references peppered throughout the lyrics. Thematically, Miller sings of redemption from worldly appetites, the pleasures of salvation and the service and thanksgiving that follow. For example, on “Blessed by the Best,” a no-nonsense angel throws Miller down to get across his point. Many tracks employ the three-and-a-half minute soap opera technique that was compulsory for pop song architects during the transistor radio era, though on My Journey, Miller stretches some to five and six minutes.

While “Amazing” is the catchiest tune on a CD bulging with bubbly, bouncy songs, “Paradise” is the surefire winner. It’s a deep northern soul ballad, complete with staccato guitar licks, that sets its sight heavenward. The quartet on the all-too-brief “Movin’ On Up” tosses in tight falsetto harmonies that recall the Esquires’ “Get On Up.” On the concluding song, “From Here to Eternity,” Miller interpolates lines from the quartet chestnut, “Where He Leads Me.”

Fans of classic soul and gospel quartet especially will appreciate Conrad Miller’s My Journey.

Three of Five Stars

Congratulations 40th CMA Dove Awardees!

Congratulations to the following gospel artists on their recognition at the 40th GMA Dove Awards, held Thursday, April 23 in Nashville:

Urban Recorded Song of the Year: “Get Up” – Mary Mary (right)

Urban Album of the Year: The Fight of My Life – Kirk Franklin

Traditional Gospel Album of the Year: Down in New Orleans – The Blind Boys of Alabama

Contemporary Gospel Album of the Year: Change the World – Martha Munizzi

Choral Collection of the Year: I’ll Say Yes – Carol Cymbala & Brooklyn Tabernacle Choir

Rev. Timothy Wright Homegoing Details

From Black Gospel Promo:

The Rev. Timothy Wright, Has Made Heaven His Final Resting

By Sheilah Belle

Brooklyn, NY — Rev. Timothy Wright, known as the “godfather of gospel” has made Heaven his final resting place. He passed over into his peaceful resting place, early Friday morning, April 24th, 2009. Bishop Albert Jamison told us here at The Belle Report, “I got the call around 12:45am, shortly after the baseball game went off.”

Bishop Jamison has been extremely helpful with Rev. Wright’s family during this transition as he has also been keeping us well informed here. To that end, Bishop Jamison has released the following information:

Public viewing for Rev. Timothy Wright
Grace Tabernacle Church of God in Christ
Crown Heights, Brooklyn, New York
Saturday, May 2nd , 12noon to 8p.m.

Sunday, May 3rd, 1:p.m. to 5p.m.
A Nightly Musical Tribute to Rev. Timothy Wright

Sunday, May 3rd @ 7p.m.
Pleasant Grove Tabernacle
Fulton & Howard Avenue, Brooklyn, NY
Bishop Albert Jamison, pastor

Home going Service for Rev. Timothy Wright
Monday, May 4th @ 10am
Pilgrim Cathedral
Broadway & Gates Avenue
Brooklyn, NY, 11221
Bishop Roy E. Brown, pastor

More details, still to come, but may we keep the entire Wright family and friends of the family in prayer.

Rev. Timothy Wright Dead at 61

Extremely sad news from the Associated Press Wire Service:

Grammy-nominated gospel singer Reverend Timothy Wright died April 23 at the age of 61, months after a tragic July 4 car crash that left him critically injured and also killed his wife and grandson.

Wright was the pastor at Grace Tabernacle Christian Center Church of God in Christ, located in the Crown Heights section of Brooklyn. He released more than a dozen gospel recordings, writing many of the songs. His latest album, “Jesus, Jesus, Jesus,” came out in 2007.

In 1994, his record “Come Thou Almighty King,” with the New York Fellowship Mass Choir, made the Billboard Top 20 charts for gospel albums and was nominated for a Grammy for best traditional soul gospel album.

He got another nomination in that category in 1999 for “Been There Done That,” recorded with the B/J Mass Choir and featuring Myrna Summers.

“Jesus, Jesus, Jesus” features the New York Fellowship Mass Choir. The title track, written by Wright and his wife and recorded live at a Church of God in Christ convocation, expresses the plight of a woman displaced during Hurricane Katrina: She encourages herself and others by calling the name of Jesus. Among the other songs on the album was “You Must Come In At the Door.”

According to the book “Uncloudy Days: The Gospel Encyclopedia,” by Bil Carpenter, the Brooklyn-born Wright began playing piano for his local church at age 12 and also began composing at a young age.

By his early 20s, he was music director at Brooklyn’s Washington Temple Church of God in Christ.

He began writing songs for such fellow musicians as Mattie Moss Clark and the Rev. Isaac Douglas, according to Carpenter’s book, and in 1976 formed the Timothy Wright Concert Choir. Among the choir’s albums were “Who’s on the Lord’s Side?” and “Do You Know the Light?”

Wright was critically injured July 4 in a three-vehicle crash on Interstate 80 near Loganton, Pa. Another car was going the wrong way when it struck Wright’s car. His wife, Betty Wright, 58, was killed in the crash, and their 14-year-old grandson, D.J. Wright, died later at a hospital.

The driver of the wrong-way car, John Pick, also was killed, while a passenger in a third car was injured.

The Wrights were returning from a Church of God in Christ conference in Detroit, said Leroy Johnson, a trustee at Grace Tabernacle.

“Beautiful” – The Nevels Sisters

“Beautiful”
The Nevels Sisters
From the CD Beautiful (MoLife Entertainment 2008)
www.molifeent.com

Contemporary gospel singers The Nevels Sisters of Youngstown, Ohio are not compared to their Detroit inspirations, the Clark Sisters, for nothing. Veniece Andrews, Debra Jordan, Gail Nevels and April Wade have a style and tightness of harmony that only sisters can pull off with aplomb. They also have plenty of experience, singing together since children and releasing their first album back in 1984.

“Beautiful,” from the Nevels Sisters’ new CD of the same name (released last November), is God’s tender affirmation to his female creation. It’s a call to recognize one’s inner beauty and in doing so, to forsake behaviors like prostitution and addition that threaten to poison the mind and the body. The authentic string section adds lushness to an already rich RnB-flavored melody and strong beat.

Check out the single’s companion video. The Christian mime, acting out the lyrics as conscience personified, steals the show!

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