Reviewed by Trevor Kirk

Nottingham-born Gemma-Dawn has spent a good few years on the UK gospel scene. Like many before her and no doubt like many since, she began singing in church at an early age, sang in her university Christian Union choir, and was a member of an award-winning girl gospel trio. Since 2003, when the group broke up, she has been under the wing of Nottingham's best-known gospel singer Freddie Kofi, and her debut solo EP, which Freddie produced, arranged, engineered and played keys and synths, was released in the autumn of 2006. Her press release enthuses about "a fresh, unique sound", but the problem is, to my ears at least, it's very similar to a lot of the other gospel sounds around. There are echoes of many gospel divas here, the one difference being that it's all pretty gentle, with not a lot of fire and passion. Gemma-Dawn wrote one of the three songs here, another was penned in 1994 by a late lamented former member of her trio, and the third is the old gospel song "I Surrender All". I think that she and Freddie need to sit down and decide which way she needs to go style-wise, because there's nothing here that makes her stand out from the crowd.

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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