Candi Staton, who will be celebrating her 85th Birthday in March, will release new album ‘Back To My Roots' on 14th February 2025 via Beracah Records / New Day Distribution.
Her 32nd album, ‘Back To My Roots' features 12 tracks that revisit the soul music legend's Alabama roots. It's a mixture of Staton-penned originals and covers. The album's first single, ‘Love Breakthrough', can be heard below:
Written by Staton, the track is about divinely inspired peace and universal love. It showcases a Motown-styled flavour in the classic style of Diana Ross & The Supremes' biggest 1960s hits.
Staton will be in London this month to receive the Americana Music Association UK’s highest honour, the International Lifetime Achievement Award, at the UK Americana Music Awards ceremony at Hackney Church on Thursday 23rd. She will also attend the premiere of “I’ll Take You There”, a new film about the music and civil rights history of Alabama, in which she stars. This specially commissioned documentary will be screened at Hackney Picturehouse on Monday 20th, preceded by a panel discussion featuring participating artists with Staton as special guest.
About her new album Staton says, “I grew up hearing a lot of these old gospel songs when they were new gospel songs. I toured with the Jewel Gospel Trio in the 1950s and we got to know people like Mahalia Jackson, Sam Cooke and others who first sang these songs. So, I’m sort of paying tribute to them and the influence they had on me by refreshing these songs and making new songs in the old style.”’
“These songs represent my roots,” Staton adds as she reflects on her many trials and triumphs. “Even the new songs on some level represent something I've experienced and that's what real soul music is about.”
‘Back to My Roots' was produced by Staton with her second eldest son, Marcus Williams, a professional drummer who has toured with the likes of Peabo Bryson, Isaac Hayes, and Tyler Perry. They brought in Mark Nevers of Lambchop fame, who produced three of Staton’s prior Americana albums for Honest Jon’s and Thirty Tigers, to sweeten certain tracks.
“Some of the first songs I ever heard were songs like `Peace in the Valley’ and `It’s Gonna Rain,’” says Staton. “The new songs or cover songs are tracks that remind me of that era when I was growing up as a child and evolving as a young woman. That’s why I named the album Back to My Roots because I’m going back to the roots that made me who I am.”
‘Back to My Roots' track listing:
- I Missed the Target Again (Candi Staton)
- It’s Gonna Rain (PD/ Candi Staton arranger)
- Hang on in There (Candi Staton)
- Shine A Light (Mick Jagger, Keith Richards)
- Lord Will Make a Way Somehow (Thomas Dorsey)
- God’s Gonna Use Me Anyway (Candi Staton)
- 1963 (Candi Staton)
- Reach Down and Touch Heaven for Me (Candi Staton)
- Love Breakthrough (Candi Staton)
- Shine A Light (Mick Jagger, Keith Richards)
- My God Has a Telephone (Aaron Frazer, Micah Blaichman, Wyndham Baird) Ft. William Bell
- In God’s Hands We Rest Untroubled (Lari White, Jimmy Stewart, Marion Cannon)
