Customer Reviews

The Righteous Ones

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

I don't have enough words to communicate to you the energy, craft and passion that Toshi Reagon puts into this album. It's one of the best I've heard in the last several years -- the range of genres she builds upon is breathtaking, mixing rock, blues, gospel, 70s soul, and just about everything else. Her songwriting and performances are both moving on an emotional level, and high-energy enough to get your feet moving too! "Real Love" is an immediate standout, but virtually every song here has something to recommend it. Those who know about this album or who have caught her live are lucky indeed.

I heard this album palying in the background at my local Silver Platters. I had to have it.

"Real Love" builds slowly, and you know something big is going to happen. It does. Sweet Honey and the Rock kicks in and they are gone.

Next up is "There Are" great vocal work and a great groove.

"Drive It Home Tonite", you may not want to play on a first date, but more like around the second or third one. This would make Tina or Chaka blush. With envy.

Only a couple of clinkers, most notably the hyperfrenetic ending of "Like it That way". But she more than makes up for it on the bittersweet "Yes It was"

And all that happens on the first half of the album.

With as much genre-crossing blues/folk/gospel/rock as she does, Toshi Reagon has created a album that will appeal to a broad variety of tastes. And hopefully find some airplay as well. Highly recommended.

Toshi Reagon is the daughter of Bernice Reagon Johnson, the co-founder and spiritual leader of Sweet Honey in the Rock, the all female, blues, gospel, soul, roots, rock, a capella group based in DC. Toshi's second release, "The Righteous Ones" is very much a music lover's kind of music - smart, well composed, well produced, unpredictable, thoughtful and funky.

This is one of the best albums I have ever heard. Ever since I saw her in concert two months ago, I 've been "hook"ed. I bought this cd that night, and now I am trying "Kindness" and her very first recording.

I'm sorry to be blunt, but I do feel like someone who disses this album may not be open-minded enough to stretch their mind beyond cookie-cutter formats and musical styles.

No one is doing music like this!!!!!

I love Happy and Satisfied, Like it That Way, Sweet in The Morning, Yes It Was, and This Moment especially right now, but this album is a real play-through! peace

I hesitated buying this CD at first because of the initial bad reviews, but in my opinion it is just about as good as Kindess. Only a couple of duff tracks prevent it from being as good. It is not in my top 10 for 1999, but I still recommend it. It is as happy and as introspective as her previous work. The main difference is that it has more of a gospel feel where Kindness had more of a folk feel. I wouldn't call it "heavier" or "funkier" though, as some of the reviews I have read indicated.

In short, if you liked Kindness, I am sure you will like this. If you haven't heard Toshi previously, but like female folk music in general, this is a fine place to start with her.

I have seen Toshi Reagon perform live several times, and there's nothing like sitting in a cabaret and hearing her voice and the sound of her guitar, and watching the sweat on her brow-- you can't get any closer to her music or her soul than that-- and you're never dissatisfied. It's what it must've been like for people who had a chance to see Coltrane or Holliday or Dylan live when they were at their best--raw and full of emotion. A CD rarely captures the analog perfection of imperfection that a live show brings, and this CD is no exception--(it would be great if someone just recorded her live and put that out!) but it is still a rare precious jewel in a window full of plastic pearls and paste diamonds. If "Real Love" doesn't get you goin', nuthin' will-- the harmonies of Sweet Honey In The Rock are magnificent and Toshi's duet with Katherine Russell on "Darlin" is sublime--if just for Miss Russell's soulful intonations. I've heard better Toshi Reagon CD's. 'Kindness" was my favourite. "The Righteous Ones" CD is too long and maybe a little uneven in content, but I'd rather hear Toshi Reagon sing on a bad day than Britney Spears do whatever it is she does on a good one. Toshi plays and sings really good MUSIC--, can't say that for many of the folk on my radio or MTV--bottom line.

I feel a bit dishonest writing a review of Ms. Reagon's voice and talent, and not of this particular recording... ...but she is, without a doubt, one of the most important figures in music and one of my ultimate favorites. I feel absolutely priveledged having heard her as an opening act for Lenny Kravitz about 10 years ago at the Ritz in NYC. How isn't a talent like hers better known?

Ms. Regon possesses a power and grace unfamiliar to most singers, yet never sounds forced.

This is a super album that's really taken me by surprise. I love toshi's work- 'justice' for it's guts and passion, 'kindness'- a bit academic but still great- and now this new release- 'righteous one.' I'm completely drawn in by the passion of the songs, the musical adventure they create, the imaginative and accomplished sourcing of material and styles. 'there are', 'sweet in the morning' and 'this moment' are the current faves. the big surprise is 'i'm just an egg...'- as fresh and driving as it gets.

Although I don't feel as strongly about the rest of the album, "Darling" is a heartbreaking masterpiece. Yes, you've felt this way, and if you haven't, I'm sorry.

This album is exquisite. Toshi Reagon coos and growls with a velvety intensity. The collection is diverse in a positive way. The band is clearly comprised of front-of-the-line, no-apologies pros. And the back-up singers -- if I die and get within earshot of heaven, these are the voices I hope to hear. Just like Reagon, the voices supporting her have a confident-with-attitude smoothness that makes it insulting to call them angelic. Depending upon my mood, my favorite picks from the album change. Although, I admit, the anthem-like title song,"The Righteoous Ones," does draw me back to the CD to get re-aquainted with Toshi again and again.