JSoul - Love Soldier (Blackout Studios)

J.S.O.U.L. is an R&B singer from Baltimore who I first heard on The J Rock Project, his collaborative mixtape with rapper Ab Rock. I always saw him at a beat battle last year where he was competing with the productions he does under the name Black Sinatra, and he had some good shit, so I picked up his last album, Love Soldier, which was reviewed by Bret McCabe in the City Paper about a year ago. There's a couple local hip hop producers on here, Sean Toure and Top Secret, but it's really just a straight up soul album, real mellow and moody, with an emphasis on his voice. I've been real heavy into R&B the last couple years so it's nice to hear some pretty professional grade stuff coming out of Baltimore, I know there's a lot of good singers around here but very few of them have gotten together an album that sounds this polished and accomplished. J.S.O.U.L. performing with The J Rock Project at the J Dilla tribute at Club Reality this Friday.

J.S.O.U.L. - "Control" (mp3)
This is one of 2 tracks produced by Sean Toure and I really like the whole weird sound and vibe of it, still waiting for him to drop a solo album.

Labels: mixtape/album review, mp3, Sean Toure