Neo Soul — CDs  

The first album in many many years from Karen Bernod – the vocalist who was one of our favorite Neo Soul singers from the turn of the century, finally back here in a very tight little set! The sound here is more mature and sophisticated than Karen's debut – a sound that's certainly got some professional touches in the production, yet which still retains the personal sense of warmth and bold indie spirit that first drew us to her work. If anything, Karen seems to have a new confidence in her music – putting forth lyrics that really get past mainstream soul BS, but doing so with all the presence of a much bigger star. Titles include "Hair I Am", "Subway Love Game", "Comfort Zone", "You", "African Chant", "Tell Em Let Em Know", "Truth Iz", and "Dreamer".

Damn great work from Raheem DeVaughn – the full promise of his soulful sojourn in the underground mixtape scene! Raheem first got his start laying down vocals over beats and other folks' tracks on self-crafted CDs that changed hands covertly in the east coast scene – and that experience gave him plenty of time to grow and mature, quietly developing his sound to a point where he can really burst forth with power on a record like this! There's still a bit of the old mixtape feel going on here – a range of older musical influences that inform Raheem's tunes – and a personal, almost casual approach that has DeVaughn speaking intros to some tracks, almost as if he's spinning them out with a personal, conversational style. Yet the production is also much better than before too – quite warm, with some great beats and keys in the mix – proof that stepping out of the underground can often be a good thing for a soul artist. Titles include "Customer", "Hello Love", "Woman", "Love Drug", "Friday", "Can We Try Again", "Empty", "Four Letter Word", and "Woman I Desire". Includes guest appearances from Floetry, Big Boi, and Malik Yusef.

A great title for an equally great little record – one that marks a whole new stage of genius for Philly soul maestro Vikter Duplaix! Vikter's been making our world plenty brighter with his music for a number of years, but with this record he earns our respect even more – by smoothing out some of the rougher edges of earlier sides, and going for a focused, positive sound that's really tremendous! There's a sense of presence here that's undeniable – not just the role of a hip singer who showed up on many singles at the start of the century, but a focused artist committed to changing the world through the power of his music. Duplaix is working here with a number of different producers – most notably James Poyer, but also Michael Angelo Saulsberry, Ron Trent, Sebastian Arocha Morton, and Omar Edwards – but throughout the set, the sound is very unified and very personal, not the sort of scattershot, studio-hopping work that you'll get in most of the R&B mainstream these days. A few tracks here appeared on the earlier Stimulation EP – but the album's the full presentation of the message that started with that one – featuring 12 tracks that include "Make A Baby", "Pure", "Another Great Love Gone By", "A Life Worth Living", "For Life", "Stimulation", "The Way That I Feel", "In The Middle Of You", "I See The Sun", "Nothing Like Your Touch", "Fade It", and "Temple Of Thoughts".