Reviewed by Trevor Kirk

"Kenneth is young, good looking, and a perfect gentleman," says the covering letter with this one, and inspecting the video on the enhanced CD-ROM track that PC users can access on this album, I must agree. Ah, if that were all that were needed! The bottom line is, does the music cut it, especially bearing in mind the style that he's adopted to get his message across is one that many have used before - a bit of hip hop, a bit of rhythm and blues. Playing time is quite generous at just under 49 minutes for 11 tracks, but the production quality is decidedly poor, in particular the treatment of the three well known worship standards on the track list. Now I don't mind people doing cover versions of familiar material, as long as they can bring something new or different that improves on the original. Unfortunately, "Shine Jesus Shine" gets a fair old mangling, with an unconvincing opening rap and a very cheesy synth backing track; "Lord I Lift Your Name On High" shambles along, Kenneth's lead is strangely nasal and the harmony vocals don't blend at all; and "Shout To The Lord" plods on for over seven minutes, with the same eccentric lead vocals and some seriously off-key backing singers. Compounding the problems, Kenneth's own songs are lacklustre and ordinary, and performance-wise suffer from similar vocal defects. Much hard work is needed if there's to be a follow-up to this very disappointing offering.

The opinions expressed in this article are not necessarily those held by Cross Rhythms. Any expressed views were accurate at the time of publishing but may or may not reflect the views of the individuals concerned at a later date.

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