Darwin Hobbs – Free (a tbgb review)

Darwin Hobbs
Free
Tyscot Records (release date: August 26, 2008)
http://www.tyscot.com/

Darwin Hobbs is referred to as the Luther Vandross of gospel, but to my ears, his husky, muscular voice is more akin to the blue-eyed soulster Michael McDonald, with whom the forty year-old singer once worked.

Regardless, the Darwin Hobbs sound is what one might label “power praise music”: a marriage of CCM melodies, praise and worship lyrics, black gospel vocal technique and speaker-blowing, gutsy soul accompaniment. On Free, Hobbs pushes the sacred subgenre a notch higher, delivering a high-octane, almost symphonic listening experience in its complexity, his wall of sound blistering with thundering bass, rolling drums, and dramatically intense vocals. Even if you can’t quite make out some of the lyrics in the musical swirl, you get the point: Hobbs and his singers are Alpha Praisers. They don’t just drive the devil away, they get up in his face with courageous vocal fist shaking.

But the raw power behind Hobbs’ fifth CD, Free, is not surprising if you know the album’s backstory. For Hobbs, the devil on earth was the sexual abuse he suffered as a child at the hands of his mother’s now deceased husband. Now that he has gone public with his story, Hobbs has fashioned Free as a work of personal catharsis, his escape from the darkness, a bat out of the private hell of silence that suffocated his spirit for many years.

While the opening track, “Heal the Land,” is the critical highpoint of the album because of its psychedelic late ‘60s flavor, “Free” is the radio favorite for its austere, memorable melody and potent expression of Hobbs’ liberation from the abuse. The metaphors in “Crosswalk” are rife, but the song is also a good example of Hobbs’ serious, “no turning back” lyricism. You’re a player on God’s team or you’re out. Period.

A bonus track, “He’s Able,” is a super-sized production number, effective as the album’s concluding moments, the choir singing with a gravitas rarely heard this side of Orff’s Carmina Burana. “He’s Able” is a redemptive resolution, the album’s grand denouement, signifying Hobbs’ release from the grip of his haunting past.

The production quality of Free, thanks to producers Hobbs and Aaron Pearce, is clear and precise; the multi-tracked layered sound never devolves into muddiness. Sacred music to be played at maximum volume for maximum impact.

Three of Four Stars