Size: 78,8 MB
Time: 33:48
File: MP3 @ 320K/s
Released: 2024
Styles: Soul/Gospel/Funk mix
Art: Front
1. Soul Provider (3:49)
2. Pure Heavenly Joy (3:03)
3. Tables In The Temple (3:42)
4. Be So Glad (4:02)
5. Stretch Out (3:14)
6. Anything That I Could Ever Want (3:22)
7. Jesus (3:41)
8. Look At Your Life (2:59)
9. Whenever He Calls Me Home (2:51)
10. I Couldn't Hear Nobody Pray (3:00)
Soul Provider is the third long-player from Memphis' octogenarian sacred soul queen Elizabeth King. With her powerful contralto, she's performed on gospel radio for decades. Her first single, "Testify," appeared in 1969. In 1970 she was frontwoman for the otherwise all-male Gospel Souls, who cut five singles and an album, but the latter went unreleased. She retired from recording and sang only in church or on the radio for nearly 40 years. In 2019, Bruce Watson coaxed her back into performing and signed her to Bible & Tire Recording Company. In 2021, aged 77, she released her debut album, Living in the Last Days, followed by 2022's I Got a Love. Soul Provider was recorded at Delta Sonic Sound in Memphis with the Sacred Soul Sound Section (Will Sexton on guitar, bass, and keyboards; Matt Ross-Spang on guitar; Mark Edgar Stuart on bass, and Will McCarley on drums and percussion). The ten-song set also employs a host of guests who include Jimbo Mathus and guitarist John Paul Keith.
The album offers a more soul forward presentation. Some of the songs were written by members of her band, some are King originals; there are gospel standards and a cover of Lou Reed's "Jesus." The title-track opener was written by Mathus. He plays guitar, organ, and sings backup alongside Mississippi singer-songwriter Schaefer Llana. It's a souled-out love song to God that sounds like it came from Goldwax Records during the '60s. There's conviction in King's voice which rises above Jamison Hollister's upright gospel piano and fiddle as she sings about traveling south of heaven on the Jericho Way with God. Organ, fiddle, and guitars bubble and roil above the stately drum kit as she testifies, "I'm walking in circles/I know who I am/I finally understand ...." The second single, "Stretch Out," is a slow, funky gospel-blues penned by King. Her vocal, buoyed by Alex Greene's organ and synth, is given added depth by the Sacred Soul Sound Section.
"Tables in the Temple," composed by Keith, also revels in the blues. His guitar supports Gamble's Wurlitzer electric piano atop a four/four drum shuffle and call-and-response between King and her vocal chorus. Sexton's "Anything I Could Ever Want" is a burning Southern funk workout adorned with brassy horns, gritty wah-wah guitar, a filthy bassline, and cracking breakbeats. It's followed by Lou Reed's "Jesus" from the Velvet Underground's White Light/White Heat." She renders it faithfully and without irony, using psychedelic trappings such as reverbed flutes, sitar, and backmasked production. The set closes with the standard "I Couldn't Hear Nobody Pray." The band's slow, swaggering shuffle allows King vocal freedom. She digs deep into the grain of her voice for the nuanced spiritual truth in her DNA. Soul Provider is easily as consistent as her previous albums, but it's also rawer, more intimate. It's the most startlingly immediate date in her catalog. /Thom Jurek, AllMusic
The album offers a more soul forward presentation. Some of the songs were written by members of her band, some are King originals; there are gospel standards and a cover of Lou Reed's "Jesus." The title-track opener was written by Mathus. He plays guitar, organ, and sings backup alongside Mississippi singer-songwriter Schaefer Llana. It's a souled-out love song to God that sounds like it came from Goldwax Records during the '60s. There's conviction in King's voice which rises above Jamison Hollister's upright gospel piano and fiddle as she sings about traveling south of heaven on the Jericho Way with God. Organ, fiddle, and guitars bubble and roil above the stately drum kit as she testifies, "I'm walking in circles/I know who I am/I finally understand ...." The second single, "Stretch Out," is a slow, funky gospel-blues penned by King. Her vocal, buoyed by Alex Greene's organ and synth, is given added depth by the Sacred Soul Sound Section.
"Tables in the Temple," composed by Keith, also revels in the blues. His guitar supports Gamble's Wurlitzer electric piano atop a four/four drum shuffle and call-and-response between King and her vocal chorus. Sexton's "Anything I Could Ever Want" is a burning Southern funk workout adorned with brassy horns, gritty wah-wah guitar, a filthy bassline, and cracking breakbeats. It's followed by Lou Reed's "Jesus" from the Velvet Underground's White Light/White Heat." She renders it faithfully and without irony, using psychedelic trappings such as reverbed flutes, sitar, and backmasked production. The set closes with the standard "I Couldn't Hear Nobody Pray." The band's slow, swaggering shuffle allows King vocal freedom. She digs deep into the grain of her voice for the nuanced spiritual truth in her DNA. Soul Provider is easily as consistent as her previous albums, but it's also rawer, more intimate. It's the most startlingly immediate date in her catalog. /Thom Jurek, AllMusic
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