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RATING:

Label – Independent
Producer – Stage 2 Productions
Website – http://www.monicaministries.com

Monica Rivae is young lady that hails from Smyrna, Tennessee. Her latest, self titled, project features a blend of classic songs with a few new ones thrown in. Monica has a nice, easy listening voice.

She kicks the project off with the Ralph Carmichael classic, “Reach Out to Jesus”. She adds a little bit of a country touch to this old ballad. She follows up with the great old Elmo Mercer tune, “The Way That He Loves”. “I Am”, written by Greg Coleman, is ballad number three to kick off the project.

“That’s How Blessed I Am” finally picks the tempo up and is a refreshing change of pace. This song has a little bluesy feel to it and was written by Jeffrey Ferguson, John Mathis and Toni Jolene Clay. Monica has included the great Larry Gatlin tune, “Help Me”. I have always loved Larry Gatlin songs for their chord progressions. She stays true to the earlier recordings of this song.

“Your Mercy’s All I Need” is a pretty Country ballad written by Gaylon Parker. The team of Ferguson, Mathis and Clay has written another song for the project, “Touch of Grace”. “I’ll Never Turn Back” picks the tempo up and is a nice mid tempo song written by Dottie Rambo. The lead vocal on this song seems to have been mixed lower than the rest of the project.

It’s been many years since I’ve heard the Lou Hildreth, David Ingles song, “Now I Have Everything”. I have always enjoyed this song and Monica sings it well. She has chosen the Aaron Wilburn, Eddie Crook song, “That Sounds like Home to Me” to close the album. This song, made famous by Vestal Goodman, is a great old song and even has Johnny Minnick singing background on it to give it that Goodman sound.

Monica has a very pleasant voice and she sings on pitch and with nice feeling. That being said, this project left me wanting more. As a singer, I would rather sing ballads but I also realize that the ebb and flow of an album or concert is very important. This project, while technically good, never fully caught my attention, due to the lack of up tempo material. A change of pace would have been nice here and there.

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