Charles May - Songs Our Father Used To Sing (Remastered) (2020) [Hi-Res]

The process behind concept record “Songs Our Father Used to Sing” included a great deal of fanfare. On its face, the album is based on a humble enough premise: siblings Charles May and Annette May Thomas pay a loving tribute to their father, legendary gospel singer Brother Joe May, known affectionately in the gospel world as the “Thunderbolt of the Middle West.” But the album, ambitious in its sound, indulges even further into the grandiose in almost every aspect of its creation.

Both Charles and Annette come into the album, each with their fair share of recent fortunes in entertainment. Charles had just traveled abroad with a rock-gospel outfit and had placed songs in television and film. In a similar vein, Annette’s singing made its way into the film “Class of ’74.” The album’s supporting cast was star-studded, too. Engineer Andrew Berliner was already an established presence in the Los Angeles recording community, and background parts were dispersed between well-known gospel artists Edna Wright, Rueben Franklin and Oma Drake, among others.

As the album’s title insists, the sibling duo interpret a six-minute medley of songs their father made famous. The rest of the album, though, finds Charles May at the helm, arranging, producing and writing tracks such as “Satisfied,” a minimalist, conga-driven track that, removed from its sanctified subject matter, could fit right at home in the score of a Blaxploitation film. Gospel Truth director Dave Clark fittingly defined the album as a deliberate mixture of gospel and soul, assuring to listeners, “You will hear the messages that today’s crusaders for Christ are sending to the youth of the world.”