Over the last 35+ years I have reviewed many thousands of albums, but while I cover a wide variety of genres, it must be said that soul and pop are not the styles one would normally come across when reading my works. It is also not a style I expect when thinking of Nick Katona and his labels, so to say I was somewhat surprised when I put this on the player is something of an understatement. What makes this work are the wonderful arrangements with Lang Bliss on the drums, Zane Bliss on bass and keyboard player Eric Bikales (Stevie Wonder, Cher, Patti LeBelle, Tom Waits) combining with guitarist and engineer Townsend(Reliant K, DC Talk, Jennifer Knapp) to create something which is modern yet also very Seventies, mixing Stevie Wonder with Sister Sledge and Steely Dan. Then at the front are the luscious vocals of Renee Bliss who is wonderfully smooth so one just falls into this min album, thoroughly enjoying the experience. There are a whole host of additional musicians involved as well, all bringing their polish to proceedings: David Davidson (Sheryl Crow, Katy Perry, Jason Mraz, Colin Hay), Tabitha Fair (Sting, Travis Tritt, Michael McDonald, Amy Grant, Celine Dion, Vanessa Williams), Kim Keyes (Peter Cetera, Amy Grant, Vince Gill, Billy Joel, Reba McEntire, Rascal Flatts), Soren Wohlers (arranger, vocal and musical director, Nashville studio), Scott Bernard (Kenny Loggins, studio), Kurt Stowe (Juke House Saints, studio), Mark Douthit (Lionel Richie, Elton John, Amy Grant, Billy Joel, Vanessa Williams) and Kelly Johnson (Bryan Duncan, studio).

There is just one cover (at least it is the only one I recognise), Marvin Gaye’s “What’s Going On” which has some glorious orchestration, stunning sax, really nice drums and then those lovely vocals at the front. I feel totally out of my depth when trying to write a review of music like this as it is not something I normally listen to, and is not a style I will ever play out of choice (there is not a single Stevie Wonder or Marvin Gaye album in my collection), but I can recognise a superb piece of work when I hear it even if the genre is not normally for me, and when the vocals, songs, arrangements, performance and production is as good as this I can certainly understand why Nick took the opportunity to release it. Polished and smooth, this takes us back in time to when music like this was produced by real performers and not computers and pro tools. The only downside is that at 34 minutes it is just not long enough.

Rating: 8/10

Links:
https://www.blissbliss.com/
https://peacocksunriserecords.com/