Adam Again remaster 10song copy copyTen Songs by Adam Again is one of the essentials ...a watermark in the evolution of intelligent art/funk/pop in Christian music.

Ten Songs by Adam Again - remastered
Adam Again
www.facebook.com/adam.again
Frontline Records
10 tracks 52:58

The album is nearly a quarter-century old now but the music – especially thanks to a fine remastering job – is still fresh and vital. If there's one clue that this was made in the late eighties it would be the drum programming – but the overall percussive vibe of the album is so strong (and the beats create such a deep groove) that it really makes no difference. I won't say that Adam Again was ahead of their time – it's more like they ignored their time completely and just went ahead and made the music they wanted to make. Lucky for us... At any rate, talk about truth in advertising: Ten Songs by Adam Again is, well ...ten songs by Adam Again! And that should be more than enough to make the heart of any fan of the early days of Christian Music skip a decidedly funky beat.

Fronted by the late Gene Eugene (vocals, guitar, keyboard, drum machine), who was accompanied by Greg Lawless (guitar), Riki Michele (vocals), and Paul Valdez (bass), Adam Again produced passion-filled funk that still sounds great today. Produced and arranged by Eugene, Ten Songs by Adam Again sounds elegant yet nasty, touching the heart but not forgetting to get the body involved, regaling the listener with riff-driven grooves, chunky rhythm guitar, pumping bass, and wailing, tortured-sounding solos from Lawless' Stratocaster.

In many ways Adam Again sounded like a more soulful version of The Talking Heads, right down to Eugene's decidedly unique vocal style. This was a band that knew how to balance intellect and emotion, earthiness and spirituality, body and soul – and they never did it any better than they did on this album. Especially in the late eighties, most bands in the Christian market would never have thought of recording the simple, but sadly elegant "Ain't No Sunshine" and the beautiful, theologically pure "The Tenth Song," (which closes the album with the words, 'When I remember You, I remember that Your body was broken / I remember that your body was split / I remember that You didn't have to do it') on the same project. Adam Again was one of the few bands that were not afraid to express physical celebration, human loneliness, romantic love and spiritual longing all as common elements of our journey – but isn't that just the way life mixes it up?

Ten Songs by Adam Again is one of the essentials, folks. From the tour de force dance-funk of "Beat Peculiar" to the sad, lamenting "Who Can Hold Us," to the darkly spiritual "Tenth Song," with its "She's So Heavy" ascending bass line and infectious repetition – this is a watermark in the evolution of intelligent art/funk/pop in Christian music. Good – no, very good – to hear it again.

4 ½ Tocks
Bert Saraco
www.facebook.com/express.image

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