Bryan Wilson – Limited Edition

By Bob Marovich for The Black Gospel Blog.

“This is the best time of my life,” Bryan Wilson sings on the opening track of his new CD, Limited Edition.  It sounds like it.  Wilsonchannels positive energy through his voice and the electric crispness of the production.

Released in late September, Limited Edition is a collection of new Bryan Wilson recordings, of which only one—his recent single, “Expect You Now”—will appear on his forthcoming full-length project, due out in 2013.  It is indeed a limited edition, with only a few pressed, but Executive Producer Bil Carpenter reports that it has already received remarkable support from college radio.

Wilson has to be happy about that, too.  Joy and optimism, in fact, are the focus of this collection, both in terms of lyrics and melody.  In particular, “It Will Happen,” “El’gebra (You And I = 1),” and “Everybody Clap Your Hands” bristle with hopeful enthusiasm.

The album also finds Wilson shuttling back and forth between urban AC and traditional approaches to sacred music.  He can be hip, as on “Everybody Clap Your Hands,” with its chirpy motive, then hit otherworldly high notes on an updated arrangement of “I Need Thee Every Hour.”  Wilson riffs on Eugene Smith’s classic gospel blues, “I Know The Lord Will Make A Way,” recorded during a live performance in 2008.  Another song from the live performance is “If You’re Talking About Jesus,” where he assumes a sanctified preacher’s tone to lead the congregation on this aisle dancer.  For the concluding “Just Fine,” Wilson plants one foot in each camp.

There’s no doubt that Bryan Wilson is a talented singer and that his debut as a child with the Mississippi Mass Choir was just the beginning of a long career.  Whether contemporary or traditional, the music on Limited Edition leaps off the disc.