"Step Into The Light", the first track on her new album, evokes the best of the criminally under--rated Mavis Staples instantly-a vocal mixing breathy, sinuous intimacy with a gospel intensity that soars. Backup vocals by the Dixie Hummingbirds and acoustic slide guitar over organ & pulsing bass help bring to mind a recent Five Blind Boys album with blues backing sidemen. The result here is a nice blend of funky soul and spirit.
The album, her first since a 1993 effort that Prince produced, resulted from producer Jim Tullio's losing two friends in the 9/11 attacks. He wrote "In Times Like These" and called Staples to ask her to sing it. She went to his home studio, cut the tune and Truillo suggested she do her own record. Despite working on what will be the last Pops Staples album with the final performances of the Staple Singers, Mavis felt the time was right to try to do an album ".like the Staples' always did, a record that would send a positive message and uplift people."
Mavis continues the mix of gospel, and blues tinged-soul throughout. "Pops Recipe" has a circling riff and lyrics recalling the founder of the family group, gospel icons thru their 1950's recordings on VJ, Riverside and Stax labels. Pops trademark tremolo guitar sound backed ethereal modal harmonies on hits like "Uncloudy Day" and "Will The Circle Be Unbroken"-he learne his picking chops on the same Dockerys Plantation where Mississippi bluesman Charlie Patton started from. Mavis took many of the lead vocals, her contralto sounding older than her years.
"There's A Devil On The Loose" begins with a purple reference "It's a sign of the times." and goes on to list some of the ills running loose today. "A Dying Man Plea" is actually Blind Lemon Jefferson's "See That My Grave Is Kept Clean", with additional lyrics credited here to Pops. (He cut a version on one of his albums.) It gets a propulsive urgency here
The dreamy "God Is Not Sleeping", is only one of several songs of faith that set a message over spacey sounds. Another is "I Wanna Thank You". An affirmative "Ain't No Better Than You" is a number of social consciousness that recalls the Staples involvement in the Civil Rights struggle, and their association with Dr. Martin Luther King. "I Still Believe In You" sounds like it could have been an out-take from the 1975 Curtis Mayfield produced soundtrack for LETS DO IT AGAIN, which featured the Staples. "At The End Of The Day" was obviously inspired by Dylan's "You Gotta Serve Somebody" with its recitation of job possibilities, it bubbles infectuously. \
The album comes full circle as it ends with "Will The Circle Be Unbroken". "That was the first song our father taught us," Staples says. Her passionate delivery and husky vocal touches on some primal core.
She definitely keeps the circle going here.
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