Renee Spearman – Whoa to Wow!

Renee Spearman

Whoa to Wow!

JDI Records (2012)

By Bob Marovich for The Black Gospel Blog.

I first heard Renee Spearman on the multi-faceted JDI Records release, He Changed Me (2008), as one-half of the duo, Renee Spearman and Prez.

The lovely singer-songwriter with the pop-inflected voice must have taken the motto of JDI Records—step out on faith and just do it—to heart, because she stepped out and released a solo CD, Whoa to Wow!

Although the album is not quite as genre-spanning as He Changed Me, it does blend contemporary gospel, smooth jazz, and urban AC sounds with churchy traditional pieces. One might conclude that the album was built around Spearman’s current hit single of the same name, a passionately sung duet with D.J. Rogers on God’s ability to turn bad into good. However, there are other solid cuts on the album, most of them written by the singer herself.

For example, Beverly Crawford appears in a big way on “Another Way,” sounding for all the world like a twenty-first century Dot Love with her no-nonsense delivery and blue notes. On “Breakthrough,” Spearman collaborates with vocal arranger Tony Jones and the E-merge Ensemble for a pulse-pounding aisle walker. Crawford should have been added to this track as well, roaring in like the Concorde or, if not her, DeNetria “Little ‘Ree” Champ (what ever happened to her?).

Tonight Show guitarist/vocalist Paul Jackson Jr. and drummer Teddy Campbell create jazz scenery on the prayerful “Nothing Without You.” By offering a litany of reasons to be thankful, “Thank God I’m Still Here” is a decent rotation add for Thanksgiving.

Whoa to Wow! is short but sweet and portends more to come from Renee Spearman as a singer-songwriter.