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Singers Nona Hendryx, Sarah Dash rejoin Patti LaBelle for vocal blast
By Malcolm X Abram
Beacon Journal music writer
POSTED: 09:58 a.m. EST, Nov 17, 2008
For many casual fans, 1970s female trio Labelle is summed up in the sassy hit song Lady Marmalade. But its sextet of '70s albums encompassed an impressive (and these days, unlikely) array of genres, including funk, rock, big ballads, R&B and gospel, all pushed, prodded and occasionally pounded by the group's three big voices — Patti LaBelle, Nona Hendryx and Sarah Dash.
The group broke up in 1976; Patti LaBelle went on to become an icon, while Hendryx, the group's primary songwriter, continued to write and perform her unique style of R&B. Dash also released a few solo albums and worked with Keith Richards' X-pensive Winos and the Rolling Stones.
Now the group returns with a new album, Back to Now, and the same attitude. Unlike some veteran acts, the trio has mostly played to its strengths and produced an enjoyable album that picks up where 1976's Chameleon left off.
The group wisely decided to go retro, with live musicians playing actual instruments and nonmechanized grooves that recall its classic album Nightbirds, with production help from Philly Sound architects Kenny Gamble and Leon Huff, former Who manager/producer Kit Lambert and Lenny Kravitz. Additionally, the trio wrote or co-wrote eight of the disc's 10 songs, imbuing the collection with a bit of the 1960s and '70s social consciousness sorely lacking from the bulk of today's young artists.
All three sexagenarians' voices are still strong enough to peel paint off a wall, and their mix is still a powerful and unique blend. The disc opens with Candlelight, a classic-sounding Hendryx-written/Kravitz-produced ballad that sports gospel piano and wah-wah guitar that should have old-school fans salivating for more.
The good will generated by the opener is momentarily thwarted by the disc's lone concession to ''blazing hip-hop and R&B,'' Rollout, a standard female empowerment anthem with a bouncy synthesized beat. While producers Wyclef Jean and Jerry ''Wonda'' Duplessis don't go overboard on the groove, autotuning the trio's vocals is not only wholly unnecessary (as the three can actually sing), it simply sounds wrong. The trio recorded a version of disco-era drag icon Sylvester's You Make Me Feel Mighty Real, which probably would have been a more natural fit.
But once that bit of pandering is done, the album settles back into the welcome retro groove, with fine ballads that highlight the group's vocal interplay, such as the quiet-storm-ready Superlover and the slow-building, string-laden melodrama of Without You in My Life.
Kravitz, whose contributions are more consistent than his own recent output, lays down a low-boiling groove augmented with funky horn charts on Hendryx's survival anthem System, a song revived from the Chameleon era. Funk rock rears its head on a cover of the underappreciated Mother's Finest's The Truth Will Set You Free, to which the group lends a gospel fervor.
The ladies express more social concern on the LaBelle/ Gamble/Huff-written Tears for the World and the album's centerpiece, Rosa, a nearly seven- minute ode to the late civil-rights pioneer Rosa Parks. It builds to a big vocal crescendo and finds all three ladies testifying as if they were still in church.
The reunion album ends with a Lambert-produced vintage recording of Cole Porter's Miss Otis Regrets that is so melodramatic in both its soaring orchestral arrangement and in LaBelle's full-throated, intense delivery, it should give drag queens around the world a new showstopper for their acts.
Back to Now won't top the Billboard charts, nor does it quite rival Nightbirds as the group's best album.
But for fans who have waited for such a reunion, the album is not only a welcome return by these three forces of nature, but also a statement that while autotuned vocals and skeletal, ringtone-ready hooks might be the hot sound right now, good music by talented artists is timeless.
Malcolm X Abram can be reached at mabram@thebeaconjournal.com or 330-996-3758.
For many casual fans, 1970s female trio Labelle is summed up in the sassy hit song Lady Marmalade. But its sextet of '70s albums encompassed an impressive (and these days, unlikely) array of genres, including funk, rock, big ballads, R&B and gospel, all pushed, prodded and occasionally pounded by the group's three big voices — Patti LaBelle, Nona Hendryx and Sarah Dash.
The group broke up in 1976; Patti LaBelle went on to become an icon, while Hendryx, the group's primary songwriter, continued to write and perform her unique style of R&B. Dash also released a few solo albums and worked with Keith Richards' X-pensive Winos and the Rolling Stones.
Now the group returns with a new album, Back to Now, and the same attitude. Unlike some veteran acts, the trio has mostly played to its strengths and produced an enjoyable album that picks up where 1976's Chameleon left off.
The group wisely decided to go retro, with live musicians playing actual instruments and nonmechanized grooves that recall its classic album Nightbirds, with production help from Philly Sound architects Kenny Gamble and Leon Huff, former Who manager/producer Kit Lambert and Lenny Kravitz. Additionally, the trio wrote or co-wrote eight of the disc's 10 songs, imbuing the collection with a bit of the 1960s and '70s social consciousness sorely lacking from the bulk of today's young artists.
All three sexagenarians' voices are still strong enough to peel paint off a wall, and their mix is still a powerful and unique blend. The disc opens with Candlelight, a classic-sounding Hendryx-written/Kravitz-produced ballad that sports gospel piano and wah-wah guitar that should have old-school fans salivating for more.
The good will generated by the opener is momentarily thwarted by the disc's lone concession to ''blazing hip-hop and R&B,'' Rollout, a standard female empowerment anthem with a bouncy synthesized beat. While producers Wyclef Jean and Jerry ''Wonda'' Duplessis don't go overboard on the groove, autotuning the trio's vocals is not only wholly unnecessary (as the three can actually sing), it simply sounds wrong. The trio recorded a version of disco-era drag icon Sylvester's You Make Me Feel Mighty Real, which probably would have been a more natural fit.
But once that bit of pandering is done, the album settles back into the welcome retro groove, with fine ballads that highlight the group's vocal interplay, such as the quiet-storm-ready Superlover and the slow-building, string-laden melodrama of Without You in My Life.
Kravitz, whose contributions are more consistent than his own recent output, lays down a low-boiling groove augmented with funky horn charts on Hendryx's survival anthem System, a song revived from the Chameleon era. Funk rock rears its head on a cover of the underappreciated Mother's Finest's The Truth Will Set You Free, to which the group lends a gospel fervor.
The ladies express more social concern on the LaBelle/ Gamble/Huff-written Tears for the World and the album's centerpiece, Rosa, a nearly seven- minute ode to the late civil-rights pioneer Rosa Parks. It builds to a big vocal crescendo and finds all three ladies testifying as if they were still in church.
The reunion album ends with a Lambert-produced vintage recording of Cole Porter's Miss Otis Regrets that is so melodramatic in both its soaring orchestral arrangement and in LaBelle's full-throated, intense delivery, it should give drag queens around the world a new showstopper for their acts.
Back to Now won't top the Billboard charts, nor does it quite rival Nightbirds as the group's best album.
But for fans who have waited for such a reunion, the album is not only a welcome return by these three forces of nature, but also a statement that while autotuned vocals and skeletal, ringtone-ready hooks might be the hot sound right now, good music by talented artists is timeless.
Malcolm X Abram can be reached at mabram@thebeaconjournal.com or 330-996-3758.
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