I dunno if I'm supposed to like sappy, romantic loversrock artists like Archie Wonder as a guy but i sure know that I do. I'm a big softie and songs about passionate love is more appealing to me than raunchy ragga full of sexual braggadocio. I don't know much about this guy, my internet search proved quite fruitless but he's Jamaican, 31 yrs. old and lives in the US. I love me some obscure acts but "Archie Wonder" has failed to make any impact on me until now.
The first song, "Stop playing games" reveals that he's an fully developed artist whit an amazing voice and presence in what he sings. The song is about an ungrateful love and the following breakdown of their relation, it's not lyrically breathtaking but the singing is amazing and very emotionally charged. Second up is "Happiness and joy", another great love song, also slightly melancholic although the lyrics are a bit more happy, a song that's perfect for a lazy Sunday spent laying around in bed and taking it easy. Like many other great loversrock artists Archie Wonder is mixing things up whit throwing a few "praising jah" kinda religious tracks, one of these are song 4, "Jah lifted me up" who is sung over an old, well known riddim (i think it's called "Moonlight lover" originally but I'm crappy whit remembering the names of riddims so i dunno). It's about how Jah empowered him to go on and do right despite living in a world full of bad folks and negativity. It's a smooth, easy on your ears song which ads some appreciated dept and variety to this album.
Skipping a few tracks along the way we come to track 7, "Rain" which is one of my favorites on here, it's another song of a romantic nature whit a slightly repetitive loop thrown in to all the other instrumentation. If i where to compare this song to any other artists sound i would probably think of someone like "Sanchez" who Archie sounds kinda familiar to. This song really stands out and should appeal to anyone even remotely into the more romantic side of Reggae. Then we have "Falling in love" on the "Ganja farmer" riddim (or at least elements of it) which is also an amazing cut, just as much thanks to the excellence of the riddim as Archie Wonders performance over it
There's a few more songs on here, some over well known riddims and some not but all are of a high quality and Archie Wonders voice is quite something, he sings his behind of on this album and proves he got what it takes to make it to the big league. An unusual aspect of the album is the lack of features, you would think that he would have 1 or 2 songs whit some bigger artists and perhaps a duet whit some female singer or dj which is almost standard for unknown artists albums. This does however not hurt "What about love" at all and i wish more artists resisted the temptation of cluttering their albums whit other artists. Over all an great album from an talented newcomer i hope we get to hear a lot more from in the future.
