Although I do not go out of my way to listen to gospel music
\n(and I am admittedly not a fan of contemporary Christian music), I
\ndo occasionally find a gospel-oriented disc crossing my desk here
\nat the Pierce Memorial Archives. What I often find is that such
\ndiscs surprise me in ways I didn’t expect.<\/p>\n
Take The Holmes Brothers, for example. This trio puts out a
\nwonderful noise that one might not believe is coming from such a
\nsmall group – and on a label noted for blues music, no less!
\nSpeaking In Tongues<\/i> is the kind of disc that reminds me just
\nwhat this style of music should be: a celebration that doesn’t get
\ntoo preachy.<\/p>\n
Oh, sure, there’s going to be a lot of singing about Jesus and
\nof God throughout many of this album’s 13 tracks. But there is
\nsomething so organic in the delivery and performances of
\nvocalist\/guitarist Wendell Holmes, vocalist\/bassist Sherman Holmes
\nand vocalist\/drummer Willie “Popsy” Dixon that literally pulls the
\nlistener in, hands them a tambourine, and encourages them to get up
\nand, if nothing else, just revel in the music.<\/p>\n
And what joyful music it is! Whether you’re listening to their
\nspins on material from other artists (Ben Harper’s “Homeless
\nChild,” Bob Dylan’s “Man Of Peace,” Sister Rosetta Thorpe’s “Can’t
\nNo Grave Hold My Body Down”) or the retro-power of one of their
\noriginals (“Speaking In Tongues,” “Jesus Got His Hooks In Me”),
\nit’s hard not to be infected by the happiness of these tracks. You
\ndon’t necessarily have to be religious to appreciate these songs;
\nif anything, just the “joyful noise” says more than any sermon
\ncould. Put it this way: what I hate most about CCM music is being
\nhit over the head with a religious message. The Holmes Brothers
\nstrike a nice balance between the underlying religious theme and
\nthe captiveness of the music.<\/p>\n
All of this said, there is one minor slip on
\nSpeaking In Tongues<\/i>. The Holmes Brothers do an admirable job
\non their cover of The O’Jays’s “Love Train,” except it’s performed
\nwith too plodding of a beat. It’s strange that they would choose to
\ntone down their delivery on a song which all but begs for a faster
\ntempo.<\/p>\n
I might not go out of my way to listen to gospel, but even after
\none listen to
\nSpeaking In Tongues<\/i>, The Holmes Brothers had guaranteed
\nthemselves a prime place in the Archives, amidst the CDs I often go
\nback to for one reason or another. If you ever wondered what it was
\nabout gospel music that made people want to get up and dance,
\nSpeaking In Tongues<\/i> will answer that – and don’t be
\nsurprised to see yourself cutting the rug while this disc
\nplays.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":28083,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"tags":[],"artist":[7621],"rating":[5613],"class_list":["post-39477","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-the-holmes-brothers","rating-rating-a-minus"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/39477","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/review"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=39477"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/39477\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/28083"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=39477"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=39477"},{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=39477"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=39477"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}