Ami Rushes – Testify

Ami Rushes
Testify
Ami Rushes Ministries 2010
www.amirushes.com

On her latest project, Testify, Ami Rushes sets out to “remove burdens and destroy yolks” – those of her listeners as well as her own — through the cathartic and redemptive power of music.

The title, however, could just as easily apply to the Rev. James Cleveland protégé’s continued support of traditional gospel as the cure for what ails you.

As she has done time and again throughout her solo career, Rushes gives props to the legends by covering the classics on Testify. “Let’s go back to 1960,” Rushes announces at the start of Sidney Hason’s “There is Nothing Too Hard for God.” The organ chirps perfunctorily and a perky, handclap beat introduces a 1960s-era garage band-style workout.

Teaming up with her longtime friend and producer Kurt Carr, Rushes turns Testify into her best work yet. Much of the album has a high-spirited, celebratory, praise party feeling. For example, on “Didn’t It Rain,” a spiritual gospelized by Roberta Martin, Rushes serves as impassioned narrator and lead singer as the background vocalists chant with the precision of a Broadway chorus and Rick Watford delivers some saucy quartet-style guitar licks. “Determination” is a straight-ahead church wrecker, and on the title track, written by the late Reverend Timothy Wright, the entire company demonstrates some choral aerobics, including chiming harmonies.

Timothy Wright’s spirit hovers palpably over Testify, most poignantly in the closing medley, when Rushes reprises his hit, “Jesus, Jesus, Jesus,” as a way to relieve the dramatic tension of a solemn, prayerful reading of Andrae Crouch’s “Always Remember.”

Ami Rushes is a saved and sanctified power rocker whose soulful, rock-hewn voice can just a easily tear into a song as deliver a tender, emotional ballad with lullabye-like calm.

Four of Five Stars

gPod Picks: “Determination,” “Didn’t It Rain,” “Testify.”

Reviewed by Bob Marovich for The Black Gospel Blog.