Soul Strutter: 06/23/23

Friday, 23 June 2023

Keyshia Cole [2023] - Forever Is A Thing [BMG]

The first release from Keyshia Cole since "I Don’t Wanna Be In Love" in 2021 is "Forever Is A Thing" (out today) and both are expected to be included on her upcoming eighth, as yet unnamed, studio album.

The song is a grief-stricken ballad (co-written by Cole with Larry Griffin Jr. (aka Symbol One) Ron Fair and Sir Tim (Timothy German)) paying tribute to her mother Frankie Lons who, owing to her drug addiction, gave Keyishia up for adoption to family friends aged two. They reconciled years later but her mother passed in July 2021. The song is being released on the eve of the debut of a Lifetime biopic, "Keyshia Cole: This Is My Story", in which Cole plays herself and her mother is played by Debbi Morgan (short trailer below).

It is simply stunning, a beautiful song, beautifully sung and very well produced. This is what soul music should be all about in our book! Never mind all the electronic wizardry, soul music should move you and we don't mean just on the dance floor!

Keyshia is from Oakland, CA, and began her career in music aged 12 when she met MC Hammer for whom she sang BGV's She was later taken under the wing of Tupac Shakur who promised to help her on her way but was shot in a drive by shooting and died six days later.

She moved to L.A. and was signed by A&M and released her debut album "The Way It Is" in 2005 followed by a further six albums since then and now with an eighth in the pipeline.

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Details

Rating:	9
Explicit:	N
Genre/Style:	Neo Soul
Format:	Single
Media:	Digital
Label:	BMG
Cat No:	None
Date:	23/06/2023
Key/BPM:	6A/68
Price:	£1

Tanika Charles [2023] - Think of You (Live in Studio - Clean Version) [Record Kicks]

The first single from a forthcoming live album "The Union Sessions" from Toronto's Tanika Charles is "Think of You" released by Italy's Record Kicks. There are two versions of the song, explicit and clean, we've posted the clean version.

The live in studio album follows her third studio album "Papillon de Nuit: The Night Butterfly" from Apr '23 and is due for release on 26 Jul '23 and contains the following tracks:

01 - Can I Be Yours? (Live in Studio)

02 - Parkdale feat. James Jones (Live in Studio)

03 - Think of You (Live in Studio)

04 - Silly Happy Wild (Live in Studio)

05 - Since You Been Gone (Live in Studio)

The first four songs appeared on her debut project "What? What! What?!" in 2010 with the final track "Since You Been Gone" from "The Gumption" (2019). Tanika has tried and tested them for over a decade at live shows and brings that into the live studio sessions so don't think that they are simply regurgitations of previous album tracks. All songs were recorded off the floor in a single afternoon sitting at Union Sound without overdubs.

The band included some of the best musicians in Canada with D/SHON Henderson and Tafari Anthony on vocals, Jemuel “J3M” Roberts (piano, EP and synths) and the core band Damian Matthew (bass), Robb Cappelletto (guitar) and Austin Gembora (drums) who are members of Toronto band re.verse. We are told that James Jones popped in for all of 20 minutes to record his verse on "Parkdale".

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Details

Rating:	8.5
Explicit:	N
Genre/Style:	New Soul / Live
Format:	Single
Media:	Digital
Label:	Record Kicks
Cat No:	None
Date:	21/06/2023
Key/BPM:	10A/86
Price:	£1

Muni Long feat. Usher [2023] - Hrs & Hrs (Remix) [Supergiant Records]

Muni Long certainly 'can' do this for "Hrs & Hrs" as this must be at least the fifth time she's released it or a version of it.

We've posted three of them, the Amazon exclusive "Hrs & Hrs Jazzy Hrs" (Feb '22), on her "Public Displays of Affection" album (Sep '22), and now this Remix featuring Usher which retains the songs original structure with an added verse for Usher. They performed the song live last month at one of Ushers' concerts.

The song was originally recorded for her EP version of Public Displays of Affection" in Nov '21 (which was later extended and became the album in Sep '22) and again on "Baby Boo" EP in Jun '22. She has also done a Spanish language version of the song. There are also plenty of remixes and covers of the song. Someone has even done an unofficial mashup with it and Beyonce's "Rocket" (included below along with a video for the original version).

Needless to say, the song has over 175m streams on Spotify alone and she won her first Grammy with it for Best R&B Performance at this year's Grammy Awards.

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Details

Rating:	8.6
Explicit:	N
Genre/Style:	Neo Soul
Format:	Single
Media:	Digital
Label:	Supergiant Records
Cat No:	None
Date:	23/06/2023
Key/BPM:	2B/70
Price:	£1

Angie Stone [2023] - Love The Feeling [SoNo Recording Group] MUSIC VIDEO

The second appearance today from Angie Stone whose latest album, "Love Language", is currently topping the Soul Associates Top 30 for the second week.

The most played track is "Love The Feeling" so it's great that she's just released a music video for it even though, as yet, it has not been released as a single, perhaps a clue to the next single?

The backdrop to the video features couples two-step dancing.

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Details

Rating:	8.6
Explicit:	N
Genre/Style:	New Soul
Format:	Video
Media:	Digital
Label:	SoNo Recording Group
Cat No:	None
Date:	21/06/2023
Key/BPM:	10A/100
Price:	£1