The Nelons – Loving You

The Nelons
Loving You
Daywind Records (release date: August 1, 2024)

By Robert M. Marovich

Listening to the Nelons’ Loving You is bittersweet, knowing it is the final album to feature Kelly Nelon Clark, Amber Nelon Kistler, and Jason Clark, three of the four group members killed in a July 26 plane crash that also claimed the lives of Amber’s husband Nathan Kistler and friends Melodi Hodges, Larry Haynie, and Melissa Haynie.

What should have been a celebratory album launch is now a memorial tribute to a beloved southern gospel group.

The album’s overarching theme is love in its various manifestations. “That’s What Love Is” is a country pop song about about showing love by helping one another. Fiddle and other string band instruments weave through the tight harmonies and lovely melody. The musicians sound as comfortable backing Travis Tritt as the Nelons. The title track is a gently rhythmic ballad about God’s love for each of us long before we came into being. “Three Nails Instead” is an ode to Jesus’s ultimate love for humankind. “God Won’t” is a paean to the constancy of the Most High, whose love is such that he won’t leave us even when others do.

The Nelons open a breathtaking a cappella version of Dottie Rambo’s “He Looked Beyond My Faults” with the wordless motif sung by Norwegian sensation Sissel for the 1997 film Titanic. The arrangement, with cascading harmonies, is ideal for a church or college choir.

The Gaither Vocal Band and Christian music vocalist Joseph Habedank feature on “Moses,” an Appalachian folk-tinged tale on the life of the biblical figure. The melodic ballad “River of Peace” features Spanish-language lyrics courtesy of singer-songwriter-producer Martin Trevox (aka NT Martin).

The single, “There’s a Hole in the Heart” is an optimistic appeal from veteran songwriters Bill Gaither and Larry Gatlin for social-emotional healing in America. “Somewhere along the way we lost our song,” the Nelons sing about the nation’s residents, interpolating a bit of the camp meeting favorite “Revive Us Again” for good measure. Would that Bill and Larry had joined the group on the track.

There’s no harmony like family harmony, and the Nelons bring their trademark sumptuous blend to Loving You. The ten radio-sized songs are produced by Gaither, Gordon Mote, Jason Clark, and Wayne Haun.

The bittersweet “We’ve Always Had a Song” concludes the project, reminding us that the Nelons always shared a song “in the best and worst of times.” They sang them all sweetly to the very end. Their absence leaves a hole in our heart.

Five of Five Stars

Picks: “He Looked Beyond My Faults,” “That’s What Love Is,” “River of Peace”