Tbnh

This 11th album from the seminal acid jazz/funk pioneers follows 2014's Sweet Freaks and is the first since their debut to be released on the Acid Jazz label, which gave its name to the music style played by the band and their contemporaries. Still with a solid following after more than three decades in the business, the group teams with collaborators such as Mark Ronson and their former vocalist N'Dea Davenport for a slab of smooth, romantic funk-soul with chunky bass and drums and jazzy brass. The single "These Walls" is included. ~ John D. Buchanan|

The celebratory feeling is stronger on TBNH than it is on any of the Brand New Heavies ten preceding studio albums. Since Sweet Freaks in 2014, principals Andrew Levy and Simon Bartholomew have returned to the Acid Jazz label and changed lead singers yet again, joined now by the bubbly but not saccharine Angela Ricci. The vocalist is the lead on only three songs, however, with past BNH members NDea Davenport and Siedah Garrett and other guests (including Angie Stone, Beverley Knight, and Jack Knight) taking turns on a set of fully decked-out disco. The rotation works to the advantage of Levy and Bartholomew, who also get songwriting input from most of the singers and tend to keep it fresh, even with clear references and likenesses to well-known late-70s/early-80s material by artists such as the Miracles, Diana Ross, the Emotions, and Prince. Their neatest trick is pulled with Davenport and guest co-producer slash superfan Mark Ronson, who give Kendrick Lamars These Walls a subtly dazzling makeover with a twisting rhythm a bit like that of Womack & Womacks Baby Im Scared of You. ~ Andy Kellman