Smith, White, and Fairchild - Love Never Fails, CD Review

Aug

2003

Smith, White, and Fairchild - Love Never Fails

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Label: Daywind Music Group
Producer: Ricky Skaggs
Song Titles: “Secret Place,” “Where Angels Fear To Tread,” “Closer To Home,” “Fight On,” “Ever Near,” “Reach For The Scars,” “Trouble Me No More,” “In Gethsemene,” “He’s Alive,” “Love Never Fails,” and “Walking Through The Fire”

Country music stalwarts Connie Smith, Sharon White, and Barbara Fairchild combine their vocal gifts for Love Never Fails. This distinguished trio holds a number of individual accomplishments including White’s participation in the O Brother, Where Art Thou? phenomenon, Smith’s star status in the 1960s and 70s, and Fairchild’s stint with Heirloom.

Producer Ricky Skaggs has put together a basic country sound for this project. The music is very much in the background, with a focus on the vocals. This helps the listener pay attention to the harmony and the lyrics.

“Secret Place” is an easygoing tune with some steel guitar accompaniment. The lyrics ask God to “hide me in your secret place.” “Where Angels Fear To Tread” gives the angels’ point of view on God’s throne room. “Closer To Home” describes the journey of life, and how each day is one more day closer to heaven. “Love Never Fails” has a Singing Cookes 3/4 time feel.

After five rather slow numbers, “Reach For The Scars” steps up to a lukewarm medium pace. Track seven ("Trouble Me No More") finally, at last, picks up the tempo to a level that could be arguably called “fast.” Before it’s all over “He’s Alive” and “Walking Through The Fire” are added to give the project a little bit more excitement. The lyrics are well written and interesting to hear on the slower numbers, but putting five draggy songs at the beginning of a CD tends to put the listener to sleep.

My rating is high for lyric selection and graphic design. Vocal arrangements, performance and production quality range from moderate to high depending on the song. Overall unique elements and difficulty get a moderate to low rating. Pacing gets a solid F. That system averages out to an overall rating of 3 stars for Love Never Fails.

Rating: 3 Star Rating

Reader Comments

Deon had a prejudice of country artists??? ROTFLOL!

Deon and Susan have the total respect for those artists. They are staunch supporters of the Oaks and other artists from the country field singing gospel.

Commented by On 08/19/2003

Larry, I don't think that I have misread Chris, and there is no tension on my part, however I have said it many times before, so I'll say it again, "Nobody will come on SoGospelNEWS.com and degrade Southern Gospel Music, and not hear from me about it. SGN is here solely to uplift and promote the good of Southern Gospel Music, whether it's sung by SG artists or country artists. Nobody has degraded country artists, only Chris has degraded SG artists. David gave this CD a 3 star rating, which out of 5 stars makes it a better then average recording, and that is nothing to get bent out of shape about and start running down SG artists to try and make country artists look better. You can disagree with a review without degrading others in the process.

Deon Unthank
SoGospelNews.com
My Blog

Some people are like Slinkys… Not really good for anything, but they
still bring a smile to your face when you push them down a flight of stairs - Author Unknown

Commented by On 08/19/2003

What's funny is, I told my parents that they better not ask me to review this CD, because I would have given it a worse score than three stars. I definitely think that CD had a lot of potential, but it never quite reached that mark.

The fact is, all three of these ladies are extremely talented, and the CD never really captures that. It just seems like another run of the mill SG project.

Commented by Chris Unthank On 08/19/2003

Hey, I have to agree with the review too. My Mom bought this cd and we listened to it together yesterday on the way home from shopping. Don't get me wrong it's good but it didn't knock my socks off. Now as for Chris Barnes saying that the Crabb Family shoudn't be on the opry or putting down any southern gospel artist-I feel that's just wrong. I don't see a reason to run down southern gospel artists or a reason to degrade them. Country music doens't take away from Southern Gospel and Southern Gospel doesn't take away from Country. I am thrilled about the Crabb's being on the Opry- they are reaching the unsaved and blessing people. I remember the Monday after they were on the Opry that appeared on CMT hearing people in the grocery store talking about how good it felt to hear that song "Through the Fire" and wanted to know more about christian music. That really excited me. Anyway, back to the point- It's a good cd and I feel it got a very fair rating.

Commented by Joy A. Wates On 08/19/2003

My favorite Southern Gospel music is the quartet style, but I understand that there are a lot of country gospel fans, witness the top charts each month. I listen to other styles, and I personally think the Booth Brothers are hard to beat, but I still prefer the quartets. That said, Chris needs to chill. There is obviously room for all types of music and we should all enjoy what we like and try to not criticize others. By the way, what is 'cookie cutter'?

Commented by On 08/19/2003

I think I've gone out of my way to show that I have rational reasons for the ratings I give to products. Style does NOT enter into it at all for me. I don't rate a CD higher or lower because it may contain some country elements, for example. I consider every aspect of the recording that comes to mind while I'm listening sometimes as many as four or five times, and then I average that out to an overall quality rating.

Also, the rating doesn't reflect the potential ministry value in any way. It's merely a comparison with other recordings.

BTW, Deon, I was thinking a 3 star rating would be considered average, since it's in the middle of 1 and 5. Can we go as low as 1/2 star? If so, maybe I should have given this 2 1/2 instead. At any rate, this is a dead average CD. There's plenty out there that's worse, and there's plenty out that's better.

Commented by On 08/21/2003

David, maybe we need the all-knowing Susan to make this decision, but I reckoned that average out of 5 stars would be 2 1/2.

BTW, I've heard a couple to remeain unmentioned that wouldn't have gotten 1/2 star... LOL

Deon Unthank
SoGospelNews.com
My Blog

Some people are like Slinkys… Not really good for anything, but they
still bring a smile to your face when you push them down a flight of stairs - Author Unknown

Commented by On 08/21/2003

I FINALLY got me a copy of this CD at NQC. I must say...I actually like the CD. "Where Angels Fear to Tread" is my personal fav. I may have given the recording 3 1/2 stars if I were reviewing it.

There are some really good songs on here, but like David, the long string of slow songs does tend to make the CD drag.

But I really like the CD, and find the songs very well sung and are very strong lyrically.

Commented by On 09/17/2003

You know this is my first time on this site and after reading all of the comments I wonder If God ever entered into your thoughts before you sent your comments in.
Everyone has a right to their opinion and a right to voice it, however no one should be doing it at the expense at degrading or putting anyone else down. We are all here to try to help one another and to do our best what ever that may be. I haven't heard all of the cd yet but have heard one of the songs on it and do plan on buying it tomorrow. I am not necessarily a fan of slow tempo music but it has its place as does all music. I would hope that maybe before you send in your comments next time you would try to think about how God would like for you to handle it and maybe be a little kinder with your words for everyone concerned.

Commented by On 09/21/2003

Thanks for your comments Francie. However, there is one thing that I must comment on. No one degraded or put down Smith, White, and Fairchild. Rather, we commented on the music, the art. There is a big difference between critiquing art and critiquing PEOPLE.

That is a problem that SG has. No one knows how to give or recieve a bad review of someone's music. Perhaps if we stopped taking things so personally and really starting taking into consideration what the problems are in the industry, Southern Gospel would do much better in the long run.

Commented by Chris Unthank On 09/21/2003

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