Album Review: Micah Stampley – ‘Love Never Fails’
Artist: Micah Stampley
Album: Love Never Fails
Street Date: 11/11/13
Record Label: Motown Gospel
Genre: Urban/R&B/Gospel/Choir
iPod Pick: He Loves Me
Micah Stampley has been around for a while now and still putting up the flag well. If you’ve heard these lyrics before, maybe on a Sunday morning in church or a hot Monday afternoon via radio you know Micah “I’m tired of the status quo, there’s got be more than this. . . We are desperate people, we want more more more” beautiful song. Let’s see if we get served more on Micah’s latest project.
We Will Praise You is the perfect album opener with a very catchy ‘la la’ hook. It’s almost pop. You might find yourself humming the refrain melody mindlessly after a couple listens.
‘Oh Give Thanks’ falls short a bit in melody progression on the album overall. It has a cliché bouncy almost afro beat we’ve heard so much on other gospel songs, in fact on movie scores and commercials maybe. Though it brings in the whole essence of a live performance with it variation on instrumentation, it gets a bit tiring along the way. He Loves Me is a beautifully balanced reggae tinged melody. What I love most about are the harmonies with Chevelle Franklyn and the trumpets are heard clearly. Though beaty it manages to come as an easy-to- listen-to track. You will love it.
One of the highlights of the album is Micah Stampley’s cover of Chris Tomlin’s Our God (also formerly covered by Israel Houghton and Seventh Day Slumber) but you would almost mistake this one for an entirely different song (reminds me of what The Welcome Wagon did with David Crowder Band’s Remedy). This one is a winner! Things slow down on the album title track Love Never Fails as Micah croons to remind us that ‘The love of Jesus never fails’.
Honestly I went a bit gaga once I heard the intro of Come to Jesus. It’s a cover of one of CCM’s most breathtaking songs titled Untitled Hymn (Come to Jesus) by Chris Rice. It’s a song you can’t afford to change a lot of if doing a cover and I think Micah realizes this because he keeps the pattern, modulations and arrangements. His voice is the spice of it all. Overall he does it well, making it his own.
Destiny is firm and declarative. In fact it kicks into this up tempo chant by the end. The Donnie McClurkin-esqued The Greatest brings really nothing new to the table musically though Micah’s voice shines well on it.
Micah also covers Let The Church Rise a song which was written by Israel Houghton and Jonathan Stockstill of The Deluge band (Remember How Long by Da’ T.R.U.T.H. from the Big Picture project?). All though formerly performed by Sound of The New Breed, this song never got the attention it deserved.
Zion is beautiful. Closing the album is a cover of Josh Groban’s You Raise Me Up (already done by artists such as Selah and West life) and finally he makes it into something a choir can comfortably sing on a Sunday morning.
Micah Stampley’s new effort Love Never Fails is a total package against all odds contained therein. It’s interesting to see an artist who keeps growing not just stretching themselves album after album. Micah Stampley has really morphed as an artist since Songbook of Micah. 6 records later, I have a strong feeling this is just the beginning.
