After all this time, you expect JJ Grey and Mofro to hit you with a simmering gumbo of blues, rock, R&B, gospel, funk and folk — and “Every Minute,” from the group’s forthcoming album Ol’ Glory, doesn’t disappoint.
What gives JJ Grey and Mofro its plangency, its lasting import, is the way all of that hearty musical goodness is wrapped around such personal narratives. The determinedly hopeful “Every Minute” begins in the back pew, with a soulful cry for grace in this life. As horns join the processional, the focus widens into a sermon about staying focused on the good that surrounds us.
Soon, the Florida-based JJ Grey and Mofro are making an absolutely heavenly, cross-pollinated racket, like a bourbon tabernacle hootenanny. “Every Minute” unfolds as if discovered in a long-lost hymnal item, but then reanimated by the coolest group of Muscle Shoals cats you could scare up.
Ol’ Glory, due February 25, 2015 as JJ Grey and Mofro’s debut for Provogue Records, looks to be dotted with such heart-filling joys. Grey and Mofro members Anthony Cole, Andrew Trube, Anthony Farrell, Todd Smallie, Dennis Marion and Jeff Dazey were joined on the sessions by guests Luther Dickinson and Derek Trucks on dobro and slide, respectively.
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