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What are they putting in the water in Detroit? 

Once again, the city that has given us such Gospel powerhouses as The Winans, Kim Burrell, Vanessa Bell Armstrong, and the legendary Mattie Moss Clark, serves up a solo artist emerging from the Clark family musical dynasty: Karen Clark Sheard. Certainly, Karen is no stranger to performing, having for years been part of the astounding Clark Sisters—and, if you’ve never been exposed to The Clark Sisters, stop reading now and pick up  Is My Living In Vain , which is now on CD, or, better yet, rent the documentary film, Gospel, pop it into your DVD player, and discover this amazing group. 

The legend of The Clark Sisters continues today in the solo work of Twinkie, Dorinda, and, of course, Karen Clark Sheard. As with her siblings, Karen’s most potent asset as an artist is her amazing voice—it is an instrument that soars, swoops, roars, whispers, shouts and cries with amazing skill, emotion and dexterity. She is a singer ...which is kind-of like saying, ‘Rembrandt was a painter…’ There’s much more to it than that.

It’s been 26 years since Karen and her sisters exploded onto the scene and changed the face of not only contemporary Gospel music, but pop-soul music as well. The raw, visceral early recordings, typically found on vintage black Gospel labels, has given way to super-slick recordings by many of those same artists, now backed by the powerful music-machines in LA, NY, and Nashville. Karen’s new CD shows the pluses and minuses that go along with being part of a more powerful music business than she could’ve dreamed of in 1980.

On the plus side—this is a very well-recorded mostly-live album (there are three studio tracks). The sound is full and rich, the instruments are clearly recorded, as is the choir, and, of course, Karen. This is a far-cry from the often poorly recorded and engineered LPs of earlier days. The producers (Israel Houghton and Aaron Lindsey) wisely allow room for stretching out a song when needed, another advantage of the CD age of Gospel recordings! The Cd’s third track, “Favor” (the notes indicate this to be the radio-single), actually clocks in at over 10 minutes (!) although it’s the first 6 minutes that make up the basic song; a somewhat generic, smooth, jazzy Gospel ballad that would sound at home on a Kirk Franklin CD—it’s what happens after the 6-minute mark that makes Karen Clark Sheard special. When Karen struts her vocal ’stuff,’ the songs picks up an intensity and becomes much more ’live’ than the preceding section—it’s what Karen does when she stretches those amazing vocal muscles that bring the potential out of an otherwise just-adequate song. This is the pattern in several spots throughout the album: a slick, familiar-sounding song begins, and is transformed along the way by vocal alchemy.

While all of the slick production in the world can’t save a bad singer, neither can an amazing singer make average songs great—herein lies the problem. It’s true that Karen’s vocals fill in the creative gaps, but when she reprises snatches of songs that were done years ago by The Clark Sisters, there’s a certain raw energy that one misses, and there are even a few moments on the very powerful ’worship tracks’ where Karen, surprisingly, gets “pitchy,” as Randy Jackson would say. 

You will not hear anything musically, that you haven’t heard on recent Kirk Franklin albums, or on those of his many imitators. The familiar choral phrasing and arrangements, the over-all sound of the band, and the predictable lyrical content are weak factors on this project. “Be Blessed” (one of the studio tracks), for example, is a wonderful, funky, hooky song—but it might as well be a Mary Mary / Kirk Franklin recording—there’s no ‘signature’ Karen Clark Sheard sound about it. Sounding like a popular ‘younger’ act might not be a bad thing, but I wonder if it’s where Sheard can really shine? The other two studio tracks are also strong and funky, but with Karen sounding more like Kim Burrell than herself, on “You Showed Me” (again—I’m not saying that’s a bad thing. How many people, after all, can sing like Kim Burrell?) —a side note: this track has one of the strangest fade-away and return endings I’ve ever heard! The album’s closer, another studio track, “A living Testimony,” has Karen sounding very comfortable in a rhythmic, funky, clavinet-driven song that sounds like something Stevie Wonder wishes he’d have written for his last album! “It’s Not Over” ends the album and leaves us thinking that the new sound Karen and her crew have been looking for might’ve shown up just when the album was, well ….over.

This album, like so many in the contemporary Gospel market, is a mixed bag of stirring, powerful performances, and play-by-the-numbers writing and production. You get your obligatory Salsa in "Authority," your Praise & Worship in "Show Me Your Glory," your shout in "Hallelujah"… Of course, with an artist like Karen Clark Sheard, it’s mostly about that amazing voice…

By Bert Saraco 3/25/2006

Add half a tock if it’s all about the voice for you. Subtract half a tock if you've ever seen Gospel music performed in a funky little church that's never forgiven Aretha for 'going secular.'