It’s been quite a few years for soul music, which feels like it’s undergone quite the revival, with everyone from Mercury Music Prize winner Michael Kiwanuka to Sharon Jones and the Dap-Kings to Raphael Saadiq to Nao to Cleo Sol, and very notably of late, Anderson .Paak, making music that can squarely be described as soul or neo-soul or retro soul or whatever the heck else you’d call it. And even on hipper projects like Sault, so beloved of us 4 on the podcast, you could make a strong argument that soul is right at the beating heart of its sound.
But it’s also a tricky genre to navigate – the history of soul music is so wide and so breathtakingly diverse, and its influence is so embedded in our musical culture, that it can be hard to find a space to make anything that genuinely feels new, and there is a lot of stuff out there that treads very heavily on existing formats. Nothing wrong with that, of course, but that old discussion that we’ve had on this blog/podcast many times rears its head once again – how can you best homage to the genre you’re working in, while moving music forwards?
I should say, for the record, that soul music has been one of the bedrocks of my musical taste since I was first leant an Aretha cassette by a friend in my teens. Like a lot of folk, I first gorged on Motown, Jackie Wilson & the 60s girl groups then headed into 70s soul territory via Stevie, Curtis, Marvin, Sly Stone and the rest, and by the time I was at Uni, I was getting into contemporary stuff like Mica Paris, Young Disciples and some of the acid jazz scene of the Brand New Heavies and Galliano era. I suspect my love of late 90s/early 00s R’n’B – and boy do I love that stuff – comes from the fact that it is a souped up, dance floor friendly take on soul music – which is arguably what RnB has always been! The vocals, the arrangements, it’s all in there, just with a hefty bass and drum kick.
Cut to the chase: I’m a sucker for soul music. But in the modern era, the more ‘traditional’ the soul revival sound, the less I’m personally that engaged with it. So I don’t mind a bit of Sharon Jones, but I preferred Raphael Saadiq when he’s got a bit more R’n’B in him and he’s not just sounding like a retro soul revivalist. Ditto, Kiwanuka got more interesting when he became more experimental and had the likes of Inflo on board pushing his sound into a more contemporary space.
I first came across Durand Jones via his band Durand Jones & The Indications via their big breakout single Witchoo, which I loved. However, at the time, when I dug into the rest of that album, Private Space, I found a band and a vocalist that felt a LITTLE too enamoured of Philly Soul and 70s soul disco vibes, and the exercise felt a bit too retro and stale for me to really connect with. In comparison to Anderson .Paak, for example, who seemed to be absolutely tearing the floor up at the same time with something steeped in those same influences, but felt so fresh!
Fast forward 2 years and I’m looking for an album to choose for this AOTM. I’m struggling – there is nothing that’s been recently released that grabs my attention. And then, while flicking through Metacritic, I see Durand Jones – but this time a solo album. And the reviews are INSANE. I stick it on, and from the very first track, and that gorgeous liquid string arrangement on beguiling opener Gerri Marie, I knew I was listening to something pretty special.
I’ve devoured a bunch of podcasts and interviews that the TINH brothers have shared (and that we’ll share with you in the links section!), and what first strikes you about Durand Jones, apart from his fierce intellect and strong personality, is how much this record means to him. This is him coming to terms with himself as a Queer black man from the Deep South – I think the first time he’s openly referenced that – in the astonishing confessional ballad, That Feeling (bloody WordPress won’t let the video embed in a working fashion, but go and check out the video on YouTube). It’s openly confessional, trying to make sense of his and his family’s life in Hilaryville, Louisiana, a town formed by former slaves given the land as part of most emancipation reparations – once ‘the place you’d most like to live’ according to his grandma, but now decimated by drugs and poverty.
First thing to say is that this album is constructed in classic album format – a sprightly, tight 41 minutes, moving opener leading to chugging banger Lord Have Mercy. The entire set is a homage to the entire breadth of soul music, with so many highlights that you could name any track as one. Sadie is a slice of plaintive doo-wop; Wait Till I Get Over a straight-down-the-line gospel track that suddenly drifts off into an ambient finale; See It Through a catchy AF soul jam that will surely be another single:
The closing tracks of the album are particularly strong. Someday We’ll All Be Free is a Stevie-esque ballad that mix political and emotional yearnings that surprisingly bursts into a rap in in the middle of the song – it’s a real album highlight. Letter to My 17 Year Old Self is a rather leftfield ballad, full of musical experimentation, that reminded me of Parade-era Prince. Like earlier slow jam I Want You, it wants to play with the form as well as celebrate. Finally, we end with the gorgeous, mournful Secrets, before the set ends and we just hear the sound of water, presumably the Mississippi river. Are the secrets being washed away? Or is Durand being reborn in the river? Either way, the sound of tides lap against the listener until it fades out.
This album has got under my skin like no other this year, save for Young Fathers, and like them, it’s a personal real AOTY contender, and certainly a top 10 shoo-in. So why does it work so well? I think the fact that band recorded so much as live in the studio gives it the most ridiculous energy. It’s like you’re listening to a live performance. Despite that, it somehow never feels like an exercise in retro-soul. I think that comes down to the breadth and skill of the songwriting, as well as at the very modern persona and emotions of the record’s protagonist, Durand J. He drags every inch of emotion out of every song like a force of will! Finally, the arrangements are deft and smart throughout – in particular the use of crunchy, heavy rock guitar is a genius move, and works against it sounding neatly soul-like. Listen to it muscle its way in at the end of Lord Have Mercy, for example, and it adds such a punchy layer that takes the sounds somewhere new. The whole thing is an exercise in how you make a soul record in 2023 that feels vital and relevant. Durand, we waited, and you sure as hell got over!
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