At the end of a week when music lovers celebrated the life of Aretha Franklin, the greatest gospel singer-turned-soul-legend in history, another gospel singer tries his hand at soul and R&B. Mike Farris won the 2015 “roots gospel” Grammy award for Shine For All the People. His new album, Sliver & Stone, is in stores today on Compass Records.
Though the instrumentation, complete with pulsing organ and backing vocalists that recall the Memphis heyday of Stax Records, may seem to be a departure, Farris’s music is rooted in the gospel tradition of celebrating and getting through life’s hardships.
The album is also a return of sorts to secular music. Farris first rose to the attention of the music world with his 1990s band, the Screamin’ Cheetah Wheelies. Though that band trafficked in southern rock rather than gospel or soul, Farris’s voice was its defining feature and earned them a major label deal on Atlantic Records after emerging on the bar scene in Nashville.
Farris has a singular voice that brings out all the pathos, love, pain and redemption in his original songs. The studio band, which features well-known backing players such as Gene Chrisman, Reese Wynans, and long time Farris collaborator Paul Brown with a special guest appearance by guitarist Joe Bonamassa, put their own spin on songs that evoke the classic grooves of the soul era.
The first three tunes on the album, “Tennessee Girl,” “Are You Lonely For Me Baby?” and “Can I Get a Witness?” essentially set the stage for the tunes that follow. Those cuts include a meditative take on “Hope She’ll Be Happier,” a deep cut from the catalog of the great Bill Withers, and “When Mavis Sings.”
The latter song is both a testament and declaration to the life and music of another great gospel/soul singer. Its telling line, “When Mavis sings her song…we get the message, the message of love” sums up this fine album.
