Album Review: David and Tamela Mann- Us Against the World

I took objected as I spotted people clowning on David and Tamela Mann’s new album (and book) Us Against the World.  The couple’s suggestion that the album is intended to serve as a sensual soundtrack for Christian couples struck some wags as hysterical.  I can only assume these heathens are unfamiliar with Sam Cooke, Aretha Franklin and Al Green.

The explicitness of a lot of contemporary R&B eradicates its appeal.  For instance, Trey Songz’s two repulsively graphic 2018 albums 11 and 28 make me queasy.  I’m entirely on board with the gospel-based Manns making grown-and-sexy soul.  Besides, I’m a longtime fan.

Unfortunately, Us Against the World is merely adequate.   Babyface and Toni Braxton’s like-minded 2014 collaboration Love, Marriage & Divorce and Womack & Womack’s 1988 classic Conscience are far more effective.  Even so, Us Against the World songs including “Feels Like” are refreshing examinations of marital grace.


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I touted the music of Logan Richardson, Cardi B and Kanye West on a “Best Music of 2018” program on KCUR’s Up To Date two days ago.

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I write weekly concert previews for The Kansas City Star.

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Ray Sawyer of Dr. Hook & the Medicine Show has died.  “Sylvia’s Mother” and “The Cover of ‘Rolling Stone’” were among very few radio hits my dad and I both enjoyed.

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Pegi Young has died.

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The versatile lyricist Norman Gimbel has died.

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My childhood loathing of Captain and Tennille may have been my first brush with music criticism.  Even as a credulous child, that zippity doo-dah offended my sensibilities.  Daryl Dragon has died.

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Howard Begle, the “legal eagle” who helped Big Joe Turner and Ruth Brown obtain back royalties, has died.  (Tip via BGO.)

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Honey Lantree of the Honeycombs has died.  Here’s “Have I the Right?”.  (Tip via BGO.)

(Original image by There Stands the Glass.)

Album Review: Sly & Robbie and Nils Petter Molvaer- Nordub

I’m at the center of the tiny target audience for Nordub, an unlikely collaboration between the reggae innovators Sly & Robbie and the jazz trumpeter Nils Petter Molvaer.  There can’t be more than a few thousand people who appreciate deep Jamaican dub and experimental Norwegian jazz.  Yet Nordub deserves an audience beyond a handful of oddball music obsessives.  The album’s colossal sonic landscape would appeal to admirers of Miles Davis’ electric bands as well as to intrepid listeners eager to hear the sound of tomorrow today.


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I reviewed a concert by Bill Frisell, Thomas Morgan and Rudy Royston at Plastic Sax.

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Proper appreciation of most Kool Keith-related projects requires being in the right frame of mind.  Dr. Octagon’s Moosebumps: An Exploration Into Modern Day Horripilation is no different.  Here’s the gloriously absurd “Flying Waterbeds”.

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I didn’t care for the 2014 duet album by Nels Cline and Julian Lage, but bassist Scott Colley and drummer Tom Rainey add enormous excitement to the guitarists’ Currents, Constellations release.  Here’s “Imperfect 10”.

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Sarah Shook & the Disarmers’ Years is a modest alt-country album that could have been released by Bloodshot Records in 1998.  RIYL: the Bottle Rockets, bottom shelf whiskey, the Meat Purveyors.  Here’s “Good as Gold”.

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Dave Douglas & Joe Lovano Sound Prints combine their enormous talents on Scandal, a post-bop quintet date that I wish was just a couples notches further outside.

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Cardi B’s Invasion of Privacy rivals Migos’ Culture II as my favorite party album of 2018.

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Rafiq Bhatia’s Breaking English is a worthy progressive noise album.

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The Aruán Ortiz Trio’s Live in Zurich provides additional evidence that the pianist is a genius.  RIYL: Thelonious Monk, giants hiding in plain sight, Craig Taborn.

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While Kurt Elling’s performances never fail to impress, his albums have never done much for me- until now.  The adult pop effort The Questions is like a marriage of Joni Mitchell and Frank Sinatra. 

(Original image at There Stands the Glass.)