Soul’s On Fire
Anthony Hamilton
The Point Of It All, 2008 (iTunes, CD)

I’m an Anthony Hamilton fan. I think his voice is great, I even like the histrionics, Christian game-spitting (“we can read The Bible…even get baptized too”) and faux-gospel. I like about half of each of his previous albums (not including the illegitimate step child of an album, Soulife) and that’s a lot for me. Thus far I’ve been a little underwhelmed by this newest release but this song has garnered 18 listens in as many days.

This song has a high quotient of histrionics. My favorite line is: “I’m still hurting, about to give up, done lost sleep and lost weight…I’m doin’ bad.” Yes, thank you, the picture is becoming clear.

I also love the fade out:

Won’t somebody call the preacher and let him help me
Call my mother, won’t you tell her to stop and pray (?)
Please one-body won’t you help me through another day
I can’t make it, no…
Help one-body won’t just
Help me through my problems, won’t ya?
Give a little faith to me
Say a little prayer for me
Somebody call my friends
Somebody call my friends

One curious song writing element is the bridge (at 2:44) which is only two bars. Can anyone make out what he says there?

Songs are available for two weeks.

This entry was posted on Thursday, February 12th, 2009 at 2:25 pm and is filed under Music Appreciation. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.