Rating: 3.5 stars

Producer: Danny Crawford
Label: Skyland Records
Website: www.vintagequartet.com

Song titles: I’m Gonna Tell The Story; I’ll Cast My Crown; He’s Been So Good To Me; Somebody Touched Me; I Can See The Hand; Freedom Still Flows; Lord Stir The Wind; The Cross Has Won Again; That Wonderful Day; Everything

Crossroads Music recently launched a new label, Skyland Records, to give up-and-coming artists a chance to have Crossroads production, marketing and promotion, and distribution. The first release of this label comes from a new quartet, The Vintage Quartet. By all accounts, this is the group’s debut project, though they have been singing since 2010. I hadn’t heard much about them until a friend of mine (that many know around the SG blogs as irishlad) started giving them some praise. I decided that, since he’s no slouch when it comes to critiquing SG music, it would be worth it to download the project. I ended up being pleasantly surprised.

Being a newer, regional group that has just signed to a component of one of the bigger record labels, it’s no surprise that their debut effort would be a fair mix of original songs and covers. In fact, after the opening track, the project has a streak of four cover songs. The first two, “I’ll Cast My Crown” and “He’s Been So Good To Me,” come from the Soul’d Out Quartet catalog. The former is nice, but doesn’t quite top the original, and the latter throws in some higher tenor harmony near the end to help put the group’s mark on it. The next two songs are both Cathedrals tunes, and both are tenor features. Tenor Chris Jenkins has a voice that reminds me of a mix of Jodi Hosterman and Jeremy Peace, and his rendition of both of these tunes are different from what you might expect because of the timbre and range he possesses. Other covers include The Kingsmen’s “The Cross Has Won Again” (a song that deserved a revival) and “That Wonderful Day” (another Soul’d Out Quartet song that has been widely recorded, but once again is made unique by the harmonies on the higher end).

The original songs on the project are well done. “I’m Gonna Tell The Story,” which also serves as the group’s debut radio single, is a straight-ahead quartet number that fits the group’s sound well. “Freedom Still Flows” is a slower song that the group won a talent contest with in 2011, and is one of the project’s stronger songs. My personal favorite of these songs is found in “Lord Stir The Wind,” an upbeat bass feature that gives Jim Albertson that really lets tenor Jenkins and lead singer Steve Bertaux shine on the choruses. “Everything” is a slower song that never really grabbed my attention.

Vintage Quartet has a lot to be proud of with this effort; it does a good job of highlighting their strong sound and the song selection is decent, though a couple of the covers could have stood to have the quartet put their spin on it rather than follow what was originally recorded so closely. The combination of voices found with Chris Jenkins, Steve Bertaux, Warren Kinney, and Jim Albertson are very good for any quartet, much less a regional one. I was especially impressed with Jenkins; with the power and range in his voice, I wouldn’t be surprised to see him end up with a group with The Kingsmen in the future.

You may be wary of buying a project from a quartet you’re unfamiliar with, but The Vintage Quartet has made a project is worth the purchase. Tell The Story receives 3.5 stars.

Author’s Note: Yes, folks, I’m still here! As usual when there’s long periods of bloggerly silence on here, that “real world” stuff just got in the way! To be honest, I had hoped to get something up while on break from college last week, but in the midst of moving to a new house and having the Internet inaccessible until the latter part of the week, that didn’t happen. I hope to get back into the routine of commentary and project reviews soon.

While perusing Youtube yesterday for something totally unrelated to Southern Gospel, I happened to notice a new post from the official Gaither channel in my subscription feed. The description started with, “Look what Bill Gaither found in his Homecoming video vault!” That’s all it took to pique my interest; I had thought it would be a short clip of a special moment from older tapings that was previously unreleased, but as it turns out, it’s a full-fledged trailer for an upcoming video:

I can honestly say that I have not had this level of excitement for a Gaither Homecoming video in quite a while, and from observing the chatter around the SG corners of the web, many others are sharing this fresh anticipation. It got me to thinking; why is that? Why has there been a relative lack of excitement for recent Homecoming releases? The entire Homecoming franchise is certainly successful, and the concert tour is arguably the highest quality SG concert experience out there. The quality of recent videos is far from bad, as well.

Perhaps it’s because the original Homecoming releases featured the legends mixing with the “up-and-comings,” and now that most of the legends are no longer with us, the videos have become an “NQC lite” of sorts, gathering a lineup of artists not unlike what you would see on main stage. Count me in the number that got chills when Howard and Vestal came up in that trailer singing “I Wouldn’t Take Nothin’ For My Journey Now,” and was thrilled to hear Jake Hess sing again (I’d forgotten just how…. GOOD he was!).

My prediction is that sales for this video will surpass the recent ones, and that’s because they have that “spark” that made the franchise as big as it is today. Gaither will start to find more and more of these treasures from the vault and release them. I believe I read somewhere that they have hours of material that was never released from the tapings, so it is possible. In the meantime, I think I know a good use for an extra $15-$20 I may have laying around come January 24.

Here’s a couple interesting tidbits from the weekend you may have missed:

First, check out this video that David Bruce Murray blogged about last week and recorded at a recent Dove Brothers concert. The song is “I’ll Fly Away”:

A couple thoughts:
1. The low G that bass singer David Hester hits actually vibrates two Bose speakers right off the stage. Wow.
2. The Dove Brothers are a good quartet to begin with, but throwing a live band into the mix takes them to a whole new level. Look to see how that affects the arrangements on their recordings from now on.
3. Speaking of which, the group has a full preview of their upcoming release, Unstoppable, available on their website’s music player. It’s well worth the listen.

In other news, Daniel Mount has posted both the song list and cover art for the upcoming Gaither Vocal Band project, Greatly Blessed, on his site. The songs are as follows:

1. Better Day
2. When He Blest My Soul
3. Love Like I’m Leavin’
4. You Are My All In All – this is possibly the popular Praise & Worship song, and if so, it will be interesting to see how the group can present it to an SG audience without being too polarizing. Then again, the GVB has never been strictly SG. I can see this as a David Phelps or Wes Hampton feature.
5. Please Forgive Me – An interview I was fortunate enough to do with Michael English indicated that he would be out front on this Crabb Family classic.
6. Greatly Blessed, Highly Favored
7. He’s Alive – There is a song of the same title about Jesus’ resurrection that has been featured on a Homecoming video, and was also recorded by David Phelps on his very first solo project, Journey to Grace, that came before his time with the Vocal Band. A solo by Phelps with the whole group kicking in on the final choruses would be a powerhouse sound for sure.
8. Ain’t Nobody – if this is the same song by Soul’d Out Quartet, it would be one of the most unique sounds the GVB has ever adopted. Keep an eye on this one.
9. Clean
10. Muddy Water – The group has adopted a country flavor to several of their songs recently (Jesus & John Wayne, anyone?), so I wouldn’t be surprised if this is the tune made famous by Trace Adkins. A Michael English lead could possibly come from this, especially since the lyric is essentially the story of the prodigal son.
11. That Sounds Like Home To Me – This Happy Goodmans classic was mentioned in the interview. It will be interesting to see how the group arranges this song.
12. I Know How To Say Thank You
13. He Is Here – Michael English stated that this would be a big song for Wes Hampton, and I’m sure that Wes will do great on this Kirk Talley staple.