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Charles Bradley, Victim of Love

2013 | Label: Daptone Records / The Orchard

By Barry Walters eMusic Contributor

04.02.13 Charles Bradley is not the kind of guy to sing of love in fantastical terms; he’s much too real for that. Bearing a voice streaked with the ravages of inner torment, this nomadic 64-year-old soul shouter — now based in a Brooklyn very different to the one in which he grew up — instead captures the pains and pleasures of love in sobering but unrestrained tones: He screams, shouts, pleads and moans of desire and disappointment so extreme that words alone cannot suffice. Not merely singing, he testifies of love… more »

The Como Mamas, Get an Understanding…

2013 | Label: Daptone Records / The Orchard

By Ashley Melzer eMusic Contributor

03.30.13 Ester Mae Smith and sisters Angela Taylor and Della Daniels have been singing together since childhood, but the way their voices blend sounds much older: singing a cappella at Mt. Mariah Baptist Church in Como, Mississippi, the women harness a stripped-down sincerity. In their voices, God is taken off the pedestal and put in arms’ reach.

“Now let us all go back to that old landmark,” the women sing on the first track of Get an Understanding…, an invitation by a gospel trio molded in the land of the blues. “God… more »

Nicole Willis and the Soul Investigators, Tortured Soul

2013 | Label: Timmion / Kudos Records Limited

By Barry Walters eMusic Contributor

03.27.13 Imagine if Curtis Mayfield were still alive and making music as he did in the late ’60s and early ’70s. Now factor in the devout feeling of Paul Weller’s Mayfield-loving records of the ’80s with the Style Council. That’s the sound and spirit of Nicole Willis and the Soul Investigators, an unlikely but inspired combination of a Brooklyn-born, Helsinki-based singer and a Finnish band. It’s righteous, reverent old-school soul filtered through the retro/revisionist sensibilities and playing skills of New Wave and acid-jazz.

You’ve heard it before, yet not quite: Opening salvo… more »

Bettye Lavette, Thankful N’ Thoughtful

2012 | Label: Anti/Epitaph

By Wayne Robins eMusic Contributor

09.25.12 After enduring 40 years of bad luck in the record industry, the persistent blues/soul singer Bettye Lavette finally gained some career traction in the 21st century, with a series of smartly-conceived albums on the Anti- label. Thankful N’ Thoughtful may be the best of this bunch, matching Lavette’s interpretive skills with unexpected or unconventional song choices. On Bob Dylan’s “Everything is Broken,” Lavette sounds on the eve of spiritual destruction. “Dirty Old Town,” via composer Ewan McColl (and famously performed by the Pogues), could be a tribute to every troubled… more »