D'Angelo
Voodoo
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(Virgin Records)
D'Angelo conjures up the spirits of Jimi, Marvin, Sly and Stevie to create one of the year's most heartfelt and sensual romps through carnalville. The son of a preacherman, D'Angelo treads the spiritual/sexual waters that his forebears Al Green and Prince know so well. Refusing to drown us on either side, D'Angelo offers a taste of the "Devil's Pie," fries it up in "Chicken Grease," gives it away like Roberta Flack in "Feel Like Making Love," then asks, like all good lovers do, "How Does it Feel" before heading back to the motherland ("Africa"). -- Mayo
Rachel Lampa
Live for You(Word)
This Louisville teen's major-label debut must have sent a chill through Satan and his brimstone home. Lampa possesses the heaven-sent voice that Whitney, Mariah and Christina pray for, and she's smarter: Liveis a Mensa-caliber collection of sweeping pop and pelvis-powered dance tunes. Christian music at its hippest, the album connects with shimmying sinners and churchgoing teens alike. Praise the Lord and crank up the volume. -- JonesLucy Pearl
Lucy Pearl
(Pookie/Beyond Music)
From the bong water of En Vogue, A Tribe Called Quest and Tony!/Toni!/Toné! bubbled Lucy Pearl, a groovy group that melds the vocal talents of Raphael Saadiq and the bodacious Dawn Robinson with Ali Shaheed Muhammad's rhythmic contributions. They've got little more than booty-shaking (and occasional in-law dissing) on their minds, but somehow, that's plenty. -- Jesitus
Slum Village
Fantastic, Vol. 2
(Barak/Goodvibe/Atomic Pop)
It takes a Slum Village to raise awareness that Motor City is once again a center of elevating soul music. The members of this Detroit group -- T3, Baatin Melchizedek and producer Jay-Dee (Q-Tip, Common, Erykah Badu) -- had to battle bootleggers and lackluster major-label support to get this disc out, and it's lucky they did: Fantastic's laid-back rhymes work well as a sonic accompaniment to the interstellar, jazz-inflected funk we've come to expect from Jay-Dee. From the irresistible bump of "Conant Gardens" and the quiet, slow Soul Train-funk of "Tell Me" to the headbanging "Raise It Up," these slummers work like a GM assembly line designed to deliver a custom-built pimpmobile. -- Mayo
REISSUES Anthony Braxton
For Alto Saxophone
(Delmark)
Master deconstructionist Anthony Braxton's double record of solo saxophone improvisations was an expensive vinyl find prior to this year's reissue. Braxton's command of the alto is evident to anyone who's heard his discs, and his abilities and imagination come shining through on this free-jazz masterpiece. Many of his trademark techniques are already in effect on this early work, recorded in 1968: overflowing streams of multiphonic sound, breathy, amorphous "ballads," angular, deconstructed blues riffs. An essential free-jazz document, this is a catalogue of what can happen when an instrument is placed in the hands of a master. -- Brown Fela Kuti
Shakara/London Scene
(MCA)
Kuti, the father of Afropop, is being rediscovered by a new generation thanks to the emergence of his son, Femi Kuti, who's one of the most jaw-dropping performers on the current scene, and the patronage of hip-hop's intelligentsia. This attention inspired MCA to amass The Best Best of Fela Kuti, a two-CD introduction to Fela. The company's worthiest decision by far, however, was to pair a full twenty vintage Kuti platters on ten separate CDs. The ultra-forceful Shakara/London Scene is only the tip of a very cool iceberg. -- Roberts
Jackie McLean
A Fickle Sonance
(Blue Note)
Blue Note's jazz library is richer than King Midas, as is ably demonstrated by its recent CD resurrections, put out under the supervision of imprint honcho Rudy Van Gelder. Jimmy Smith's The Sermon, Herbie Hancock's The Prisoner and Horace Silver's Six Pieces of Silver could all fill this slot ably, but A Fickle Sonance, from 1961, gets the nod by virtue of McLean, a saxophonist then at his most inventive. -- Roberts
Willie Nelson
Red Headed Stranger
(Columbia/Legacy)
Columbia's "American Milestones" series just keeps getting better and better. This year's batch includes the astounding Johnny Cash at San Quentin, treasures by George Jones, Johnny Horton and the Carter Family, and this, the album that made Nelson an icon. Red Headed Stranger has never been out of print, but neither has it been presented so lovingly, complete with spruced-up sound, four bonus tracks -- including, of all things, "Bach Minuet in G" -- and liner notes in which Willie reveals that the LP's concept came to him during a drive from Denver to Austin. -- Roberts
Hank Penny
Crazy Rhythm: The Standard Transcriptions
(Soundies/Bloodshot)
Colorado Springs resident Bill Cook owns what's arguably the planet's most astounding private collection of radio transcriptions -- recordings from the '30s to the '50s made expressly for radio play and not intended for public distribution. But last year, in conjunction with Bloodshot, he began making his choicest selections available, and Crazy Rhythm proves that his vault is overflowing with riches. Penny, a largely forgotten popularizer of Western swing, is heard to terrific advantage on thirty little slices of heaven. -- Roberts
Thinking Plague
Early Plague Years
(Cuneiform)
Among Denver's foremost contributors to the art-rock canon, the men and women of Thinking Plague revel in complications: Their songs are knotty, cerebrum-tickling contraptions that treat expectations like roadkill. Early Plague Years returns the act's formative works to the marketplace -- ...A Thinking Plague, from 1984, and 1986's Moonsongs -- in all their sometimes confounding but always intriguing glory. -- Roberts
