The Best of the Gospel Years

Description

The Best of the Gospel Years is a compilation album by the American singer and songwriter Dion DiMucci of Dion & the Belmonts fame, released on Ace Records in 1997.

It is bitterly ironic that it’s taken a secular company to lovingly put together this gem of a collection, rather than Word who originally recorded the ‘Inside Job‘ (1980), ‘Only Jesus‘ (1981), ‘I Put Away My Idols‘ (1983), ‘Seasons‘ (1984), ‘Kingdom Of The Streets‘ (1985) and ‘Velvet And Steel‘ (1986) albums which are the source of these tracks. The Christian music industry didn’t do well by Dion Dimucci. Maybe the one-time million selling pop star who’d once crooned ’50s doowop classics like «Teenager In Love» and ’60s rock ‘n’ roll opuses like «The Wanderer» was simply too much of a maverick. But as these tracks demonstrate, Dion has one of the GREAT pop voices, an oily, sinuous world weary whine which made the blues sound like it was born on the Bronx sidewalk. The budgets for these albums were tiny but Dion assembled superlative backing bands crammed full of names beloved by sleevenote trivia freaks and sang bluesy, haunting and at times achingly personal songs of faith. Tracks like «Center Of My Life», «New Jersey Wife», «Sweet Surrender» and «The Truth Will Set You Free» all from his classic ‘Inside Job’ album are breathtakingly good songs though there are one or two cuts I miss («Only Jesus» for instance). Trevor Churchill, the Ace boss (who I last saw when he was passing me Bell Records soul classics to review way back in the ’60s), has done a great job in bringing the spotlight back on one of the giants of pop whose songs of faith still have the potential to move the spirit. [Tony Cummings, Cross Rhythms, June 1997]

CD tracklist:

01. Center Of My Life
02. Still In The Spirit
03. I Put Away My Idols
04. The Truth Will Set You Free
05. New Jersey Wife
06. New Breed Of Man
07. Sweet Surrender
08. Healing
09. Train For Glory
10. I Believe (Sweet Lord Jesus)
11. Hymn To Him
12. Come To The Cross
13. He’s The One
14. Simple Ironies
15. Daddy
16. Golden Sun Silver Moon
17. You Need A Love
18. Day Of The Lord (Duet with Pamela Sessody)