Curtis Harding

One Liner: O.G.-sounding soul man.

Wikipedia Genre: Soul (pretty rare these days to get one that simple.  Usually they give a guy like 9 genres these days).
Home: Atlanta

Poster Position: 17
Day: Saturday at 2:45
Both Weekends.

Thoughts: I'm a fan of this southern soul renaissance thing.  Leon Bridges, St. Paul, Robert Finley, the Black Keys and Dan Auerbach stuff.  This dude was born in 1979, so while he's not a child doing this stuff, he also wasn't alive when this type of slinky, sexy, exuberant soul music was hot in the first place.  But his album covers go ahead and depict him as a 70's soul star, complete with a bushy ass mustache.

But here's the million dollar question, Jack.  Do you actually listen to the original soul music?  Do you have any clue what the renaissance should sound like?  Uh, yeah, man.  I literally woke up from sleep the other day with Sam Cooke in my brain (after a very weird dream where I had been bathing in a large sink, trying to impress someone who was watching me bathe, by singing Sam Cooke's "Bring it on Home to Me" whilst keeping my whole head under the bathwater in this large sink, so yeah, I'm big into classic soul).  My guess is that if I ask Spotify for a playlist of "Soul" I'm going to get like 9 Drake songs and one Al Green tune.  Look man, I bought the Dead President's Soundtrack.  I've grooved to the In Yo Face compilations.  I know some soul stuff, brah. (but no, I'm well aware that I am not a deep and wide soul man).  And this is good shizz.

How is this for a start: "In Atlanta in the early 2000s, Harding was part of the hip-hop group Proseed. He met singer CeeLo Green ... and he rapped on some songs off Green's 2002 album Cee-Lo Green and His Perfect Imperfections along with several Proseed members. He toured with Green as a backing singer on the 2002 Smokin' Grooves Tour alongside Outkast, Cypress Hill, Lauryn Hill, and The Roots. He also sang on Green's 2010 album The Lady Killer, including co-writing the bonus track "Grand Canyon.""  Not bad to get in with a guy like CeeLo.  Which would also explain how it is that this guy had his most recent album produced by Danger Mouse (who was half of Gnarls Barkley with CeeLo).

Two albums in his catalog, 2014's Soul Power and 2017's Face Your Fear.  His most streamed track from that new album, "On and On," has 3.6 million streams.  Live version, but you'll get the gist.

Dig that groove for real.  His voice gets a little thin here and there on that take, but his album sounds much stronger on the voice.  Another note about weird sound things, several of his studio songs ("Need Your Love" in particular) have a weird mix on them, so that little things pop up oddly in the sound, like too much maraca coming out of the left speaker, or too much organ in another song.  
His song with the most streams comes from that first album, "Next Time" has 3.9 million streams.

See that cover?  That is some old school soul man shit right there.  I think the second album has a cleaner sound from his band, but his voice slays on either one.  Super solid track though.  "Wednesday Morning Atonement" is also super dope - very chilled strut supported by flutes and a swaggering beat.  "Go As You Are" is also very good.  The new album is better than the old, for sure.

I have been sticking to these two albums for two days now - hard to move on, because he's damn good.