Artist Guide

Rosalyn Candy (New Album Alert!)

March 1, 2021:

NEW ALBUM ALERT!:

Buy Rosalyn Candy's new MOOD SWINGS CD at Apple.

MOOD SWINGS TRACK LIST:

1. If They Only Knew

2. Love to Love You

3. Mood Swings

4. Jody Jr.

5. Captions

6. Funky Forty Reply

7. Nobody Said

Daddy B. Nice notes:

Rosalyn Candy debuted as a southern soul artist on Louisiana producer Beat Flippa's landmark collection of various artists, BEAT FLIPPA: I GOT THE BLUES VOL.1, in 2015, one of a trio of then unknown female vocalists including Miss Portia and Veronica Ra'elle. Rosalyn Candy was the first to record a solo CD (scroll down this page for her debut review), and now she steps forward with her sophomore effort, a brief but assured outing titled Mood Swings.

Candy could have fleshed out this EP-like set with any number of former singles---for example, "Southern Soul Party," "I Came To Dance," or "Boom Shaka Laka", making quite a distinguished album. Instead, she serves up a group of fresh new tunes focused on the day-to-day struggles of a hip, decisive (and sometimes foul-mouthed) young woman. And, for the most part, it works well.

Headlining the set is "Funky Forty Reply," another, formerly-released single and by far Candy's most popular song to date. Although it fits into the overall theme of a successful young woman dealing with young men of various sorts, southern soul aficionados will recognize it at once as the worthy and entertaining successor to Best Debut Artist Of 2020 Arthur Young's "Funky Forty," the single that launched his career.

"Just because you gave me forty dollars," (Rosalyn sings)
"Let's not pretend
That the money you gave me
Gonna make me a freaky friend."

Actually, I discovered Arthur Young through Rosalyn Candy's cover song "reply" while scrolling through YouTube one day a year ago.

The rest of the CD features new material that legitimizes Rosalyn Candy's growing artistic maturity and compositional talents in tunes like "If They Only Knew" and "Captions". "Love To Love You" a kindly demurral from a woman to the sexual advances of man, and "Jody Jr.," a spicy, explicit put-down of another man, stand out as singles with promise.

Unfortunately, the title cut "Mood Swings" doesn't fare as well, especially if you heard---as I did---a far more spectacular song called "Mood Swings" by a new artist named Gwen Yvette a few months ago.

But while Rosalyn's "Mood Swings" suffers from the competition, her May 2020-charting single "Nobody Said (It Was Going To Be Easy)" has aged very well. It's inspiring---"Lean On Me" type of song---and a Rosalyn Candy classic.

Listen to all the tracks from Rosalyn Candy's new MOOD SWINGS album on YouTube.

Buy Rosalyn Candy's new MOOD SWINGS CD at Apple.

Listen to Rosalyn Candy's new MOOD SWINGS album on Spotify.

--Daddy B. Nice

About Rosalyn Candy (New Album Alert!)

June 23, 2016: ROSALYN CANDY: Timeless Soul Music Never Dies (Rosalyn Candy) Three Stars *** Solid debut by a new Southern Soul Artist.

Rosalyn Candy was introduced to the southern soul audience on last year's award-winning (Best CD 2015) compilation, Beat Flippa: (Various Artists) I Got the Blues, Vol.1. Rosalyn was part of the trio of vocalists (with Ms. Portia and Veronica Ra'elle) on "You Can't Handle This" and shared a duet with Veronica Ra'elle on the even more attention-getting "The Best You Ever Had," in which her voice-overs gave a warm, fuzzy feeling to all the southern soul diehards who never got enough of LaKeisha Burks' teasing-ornery-young-chick's chatter on Marvin Sease's late-career records.

Beat Flippa's production expertise and keyboard wizardry are sorely missed on Candy's solo-artist debut, a collection of eight tracks titled Timeless Soul Music Never Dies, but the young songstress deserves credit for being the first of the divas--Rena, Veronica, Ms. Portia, Mz. Pat, Charlene Neal, Lysa--introduced on BEAT FLIPPA to publish a full-length CD. She's also displayed a nose for the "business" of music by previously recording most of the songs from the new CD as singles through CD Baby.

Roslyn displays a knack for popular music and catchy hooks on cuts like "Role Play," "Pour It Up," "Love Games" and "Shake It Up," but the vocals, arrangements and mixing are more typical of the production-challenged southern soul of a decade ago (think Queen Isabella, Coco, Jewel J, Lady J, Lois, Little Kim Stewart) than the best of today's music (Willie Clayton, LaMorris Williams, T.K. Soul, Sir Charles Jones, Big Cynthia, Adrena, Nikita/Mys. Niki (produced by T.K. Soul), Tucka).

The seductive "Love Games," for example, builds on the structure laid down by another less-than-perfect but fondly-remembered diva, Judi Brown Eyes' "Sam." Similarly derivative, "Stroke It" recycles the guitar riff from Tyrone Davis's "Turn Back The Hands Of Time."

The mid-tempo "Pour It Up" and "Role Play" seem most likely to succeed as southern soul singles, with hooks and arrangements that are memorable if not perfectly realized. If you want to check out what this album's material might have sounded like with first-class instrumentation, listen to Rosalyn's "Let's Get The Business Clear," possibly an out-take from I GOT THE BLUES VOL. 1--available on YouTube but otherwise (to my knowledge) not published for distribution--in which a keyboard that sounds awfully like Beat Flippa takes the proceedings to another level simply through the exquisite work on the keys.

In the meantime, Candy's potent combination of playful recorded insouciance and behind-the-scenes work ethic--both evident on her debut--position her as an always-welcome, younger-generation diva to be reckoned with.

--Daddy B. Nice

DBN notes: This CD has gone out of print. The music-sellers listed at the end of the review have also gone out of business. And in only five years!

Buy Rosalyn Candy's new TIMELESS SOUL MUSIC NEVER DIES at CD Baby.

Buy Rosalyn Candy's new TIMELESS SOUL MUSIC NEVER DIES at iTunes.

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