From time to time, our website receives records to review that emanate a feel-good feeling about them, a feeling that transcends one's passion for a specific genre, because it encircles completely the definition of Music, intended in its most complete sense of the word.
The album in question is called, rather aptly, It’s All About Love, released from the Canadian collective Wild Blue Herons, a project led by musical partners-in-crime, as they are in life, Bill Sample and Darlene Cooper.
With a remarkable artistic pedigree behind them (keyboardist and composer Bill Sample has worked, among others, with artists like Ray Charles, Kenny Loggins and Celine Dion, while singer Darlene Cooper has collaborated with the likes of Eric Bibb and Marcus Mosely), Wild Blue Herons started out as a hybrid between Funk and Jazz up until 2023, when Cooper and Sample recruited a full Horn Section to further expand their sonic lexicon in a rather successful way, as their new album It’s All About Love clearly demonstrates.
Wild Blue Herons, already from the opening note of Mr. Wiggly, the only instrumental of the album, takes you straight away into the band's kaleidoscopic musical universe, where uplifting songwriting, the wonderful and incredibly versatile singing style of Darlene Cooper, the dynamic and highly organic contribution of the band's Rhythm Section (Randall Stoll on Drums, Tim Porter on Guitar and Miles Foxx Hill on Bass) and Horn Section (Jim Hopson on Trombone and Steve Hilliam on Tenor Sax), plus the very inspired arrangements curated by Bill Sample, make of It’s All About Love a stunning recipe of food for soul at any moment of the record.
Sample, Cooper and the whole band embrace music with enormous artistic grace and fun, sharing their feel-good vibes through a sonic montage of Soul, Jazz, Fusion, Swing and Funk with phenomenal musicianship, enchanting the listeners through their music and transporting them in a place where there are no limits or boundaries, within music, a place where you can dream, you can hope, you can dance, clap your hands and, most importantly, you can smile from within.
Infectiously entertaining, incredibly well played and sang, superbly arranged, It’s All About Love is such a precious record, a ray of sun for the rainy days and a postcard to everyone's soul. Bravi, Wild Blue Herons.
It's All About Love is out now and it is available to be purchased via Wild Blue Herons Bandcamp Official Page
