Soul Strutter: Raquel Rodriguez [2021] - Sweet Side [Blue Dream] (Full Album)

This slipped out quietly last Friday (23 Apr 2021). The new album from the prolific Raquel Rodriguez who has released at least four singles already this year ('Undone', 'You', 'Don't You Know', 'Read The Room') which were bundled into an EP as each track was released. She's now come up with a fourteen track album (although three are interludes/intros so eleven tracks only) which features all four singles, plus three previous singles 'Nobody Else', 'Crybaby' from 2020 and 'Leave Me Behind' from 2019.

That leaves four new tracks: 'Sweet Side' (a mellow stepper [1B/91]), 'I Know, I Know' (another mellow ballad/stepper [3B/88]), 'Daydream' (a more funky groove [10A/80]) and 'Last Night' (an uptempo dancer and probably the best of the four (apart from the use of that darned vocoder!) [10B/123]) I believe 'Last Night' is/will be the next single. To be blunt though, I think the best material has already been released as singles, but if you haven't already got them, then buy the album.

The album is being pressed on limited edition vinyl (400 copies) available from her website (link below) at $25.

She lives in L.A. and is of Mexican/American heritage and released her debut self-titled EP way back in 2011, followed by two albums ('The 310' in 2016 and 'The 301 Pt2' in 2018) and another five track EP with Stan Taylor 'Sunday's Best' of sweet soul covers in 2019, with various singles in between each album/EP. 'Sweet Side' is her first full length album as 'The 301' had only six tracks and 'The 301 Pt. 2' had five.

I did a feature on her last year which captured most of her best material up to that point.

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