Love is Reality

Description

Love is Reality is an album by the American soul singer and songwriter Al Green, released by Word Records in 1992. Also manufactured and distributed by Epic, a division of Sony Music. The album was produced by Tim Miner.

Al Green is a national treasure, the kind of guy who could sing the Dead Sea Scrolls or a box of Cocoa Pebbles and still ooze hot, buttery soul. On his Word/Epic release, Rev. Green’s supple instrument has been used in resolutely contemporary urban gospel, giving him a fair share of renewed R&B radio and club success. With ‘Love is Reality’, producer Tim Miner keeps Green’s black pop approach (heard last year on «Leave the Guns at Home»), while delving deeper into the instrumental textures prominent on his classic ’70s Hi Records sides.

All the while, Green keeps prominent the Savior of and for whom he’s singing. While the jabs of a tight horn section punctuate «I Can Feel It», Green tells of a Jesus who “died for a Memphis boy like me.” He reprises the feeling he gets from intimacy with the Divine on the smoothed-out feistiness of «I Like It» and insists that everybody keep their individuality in Christ. He likes that, too.

Aside from keeping Green’s object of faith in the forefront, Miner adds touches of the sound of the Afro-American church, too. Gotta love wheezy organ supplementing the relaxed swingbeat of «You Don’t Know Me», and there’s room for true, accelerated gospel vamping on the groove workout of «Sure Feels Good», which must be Green coming close to his pastor/preacher persona.

The soul man is neither negligent of the social implications of the Gospel in the more neo-urban title cut; and he reclaims his place as a lover man for «Just Can’t Let You Go», the best take on the “God is my girlfriend” tack in ages.

Only taint, albeit a tiny one, is the saccharine children’s choir on «Again». Nevertheless, this is the art of a master at work, true to his comforting art and the Comforter at once. If you think all urban gospel need be spiritually ambiguous, Green says otherwise… sweetly. [Jamie Lee Rake, CCM, April 1992]

> Apple Music (https://music.apple.com/us/album/love-is-reality/1165900575)

CD tracklist:

01. I Can Feel It – 4:59
02. Love Is Reality – 4:34
03. Just Can’t Let You Go – 4:08
04. You Don’t Know Me – 4:07
05. Again – 4:52
06. Positive Attitude – 4:30
07. Sure Feels Good – 4:29
08. Long Time – 4:02
09. Why – 4:13
10. I Like It – 4:02

Note: Simultaneously released on cassette and and CD by Word Records.