
For a couple of months now, top Brit soul man VICTOR HAYNES has been promising us a new album, the official follow up to his acclaimed ’21 LP, ‘Can We Talk’. The new album, ‘Love Is The Answer’ was flagged up by two singles, ‘Back To Love’ and ‘Newsflash’. Both were/are top modern soul dancers and the good news for the soul rug cutters is that there are plenty more like those on the new 9 tracker.
Like the included ‘Back To Love’ and ‘Newsflash’, ‘If I Could’, ‘Let Love Grow’, and ‘Nothing Can Stop This’ tick all the right soul dance boxes… tight beats and zipping rhythms. The album title track and ‘Searching’ are little more sedate but still eminently danceable and c’mon, none of us are getting any younger.
The slowest cut is the smooth ‘ Heartbreaker’ – a lovely, mid-tempo melodic vehicle for Vic’s velvet, world weary vocals. He even gets to try his hand at scat while the lovely piano solo will please the smooth jazz crowd. For something quite different the album also offers a “soulful house” mix of ‘Newsflash’. It’s not too frantic and shows our man’s versatility and realization that he doesn’t have to stick in the same gear!