FOR WEEK ENDING DECEMBER 22, 1984

cCopyright 1984, Billboard Publications, Inc. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in any retrieval system, or transmitted, in any Billboard form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise. without the prior written permission of the publisher. ECIERN by Bob Darden TOP SPIRITUAL

Q Compiled from national retail store and one -stop sales reports. C) C7 V CHRISTMAS CAME EARLY for country singer gospel favorites and new material. Gosdin, a hit song- co ARTIST TITLE Vern Gosdin, but it brought a present he'd wanted for writer in his own right, and Max D. Barnes wrote five ,:: d. LABEL & NUMBER /DISTRIBUTING LABEL years: His first religious , "If Jesus Comes To- of the tunes. A North Carolina bluegrass band turned ANDRAE CROUCH LIGHT 5863 Weeks at No. One: 5 1 1 25 morrow (What Then)" on Compleat Records. It is, him on to "The Other Side Of Life," and he'd loved the NO TIME TO LOSE quite simply, the best country gospel album this writ- classics of Albert E. Brumley since childhood. SHIRLEY CAESAR MYRRH 6732 2 2 25 er has heard in years. "We almost didn't do `I'll Fly Away'," Gosdin says. SAILIN' Gosdin has one of the great voices in country music. "SESAC president Jim Black says more than 800 art - VANESSA BELL ARMSTRONG ONYX RO 3825 3 19 5 He's had No. 1 hits for a number of labels over the ists have recorded it since 1932. But we were working CHOSEN past decade or so; however, he came from a gospel - on it on the bus one night and it just seemed to work. KEITH PRINGLE HEARTWARMING 3784 /ONYX 4 20 5 singing family and started his career off with the. That's the way Mr. Brumley's `Jesus, Hold My Hand' PERFECT PEACE came about, too. We just had a `guitar- pulling' and it THE RICHARD SMALLWOOD SINGERS ONYX 3833 5 3 25 came up, and I kept it in the back of my mind until it PSALMS Gosdin's religious album came time to do a religious album. 6 9 9 REV. MILTON BRUNSON AND THE THOMPSON COMMUNITY CHOIR "Some of the newer things Max and I wrote when it MYRRH 6763 MIRACLE "LIVE" is a return to the roots became official I was going to get to do the album. I REV. F.C. BARNES AND SISTER BROWN 7 8 81 sure did love writing it. Max and I saw the line that's ATLANTA INTL. AIR 10059 /ATLANTA INT'L ROUGH SIDE OF THE MOUNTAIN Gosdin Gospel Quartet with his brothers before turn- the title of the album on a church outside of Hender- SANDRA CROUCH LIGHT LS -5825 8 7 65 ing to secular country music. And he always wanted sonville and wrote it from there. WE SING PRAISES to do a gospel album. Compleat, an energetic young "I play these songs everywhere, even in honky REV.CLAY EVANS & THE FELLOWSHIP CHOIR SAVOY 14762 9 5 17 label out of Nashville, gave him that chance. tonks, and they get a great response. I'd love to take WHAT HE'S DONE FOR ME "This has been a long time in comin'," Gosdin says, the whole band and do a gospel -only concert real soon. MYRRH 7.01-678306 -5 10 12 5 "something I've needed to do. And I wanted to do it I don't care where or when. Tell 'em to any- TRUST IN GOD with a real budget, with real players and songs, not time." REV. F.C. BARNES & REV. JANICE BROWN 11 6 25 like some country stars who just toss off a gospel al- Gosdin is mining a nearly iginored vein of religious ATLANTA INTERNATIONAL 10077 /ATLANTA INT'L NO TEARS IN GLORY bum in a weekend. I wanted to do it right. music with this album. Country gospel is not South- LITTLE CEDRIC & THE HAILEY SINGERS GOSPEARL 16019 12 4 37 "Still, it seems that a country singer has to reach a ern gospel. This is traditional country music with JESUS SAVES certain status before they'll allow him to do such an (usually) male harmony voices on the chorus. Outside EDWIN HAWKINS AND THE MUSIC AND ART SEMINARY MASS CHOIR 13 11 9 album. This way, I got to work with singers Lou Reid of some recent releases by Maranatha! Music and Al BIRTHRIGHT 4045 ANGELS WILL BE SINGING from Ricky Scaggs' band and Curtis 'Mr. Harmony' Perkins and a few others, Gosdin has it all to himself. THE GEORGIA MASS CHOIR SAVOY 7088 14 13 9 Young, Pete Drake, Kenny Malone and Jerry Doug- "A lot of people have told me they like the real emo- I'M GONNA HOLD OUT las of the Whites. The result is that I'm more satisfied tional harmonies we do on this album," he says. THOMAS WHITFIELD & CO SOUND OF GOSPEL 140 15 15 37 with this album than any secular album I've ever re- "They're not perfect. They come out human, rather HALLELUJAH ANYHOW corded. I was good and ready and didn't hold nothin' than perfectly polished. Lou and Curtis are just nat- JACKSON SOUTHERNAIRES MALACO 4392 16 10 25 back." urals when it comes to singing harmony. MADE IN MISSISSIPPI And the response? Well, folks at Compleat say that "We took their harmony vocals from `Jesus, Hold JAMES CLEVELAND AND THE CHARLES FOLD CHOIR SAVOY 7072 17 17 57 "If Jesus Comes Tomorrow" is their hottest selling al- My Hand' and put them without any accompaniment THIS TOO WILL PASS bum right now. At Gosdin's concerts, it's selling out just before the last song on side I. It just knocked me BILL SAWYER TYSCOT 01030 18 25 9 on the concession tables long before his hit country re- out. For someone wanting to analyze harmony, this is SOMETHING OLD, SOMETHING NEW leases. the place to do it. I wish you could have seen Lou's VANESSA BELL ARMSTRONG ONYX R -3831 19 34 77 Part of the album's charm is a savvy mixture of old face when he heard it for the first time." PEACE BE STILL

JAMES CLEVELAND AND THE NEW SAVOY 14761 20 NEW II. JERSEY MASS CHOIR LIVE AT SYMPHONY HALL IN NEWARK NJ

DOUGLAS MILLER GOSPEARL PL-16022 21 14 33

I STILL LOVE THE NAME JESUS THE SENSATIONAL NIGHTINGALES MALACO 4391 22 24 17

I SURRENDER ALL

TRAMAINE HAWKINS LIGHT LS521 23 30 69 DETERMINED LUE NOTES THE TRUTHETTES MALACO 4386 24 31 45 by Sam Sutherland TAKE IT TO THE LORD IN PRAYER

THE NEW JERSEY MASS GOSPEL CHOIR SAVOY SGL-7086 25 RE -ENTRY & Peter Keepnews LIVE AT THE RITZ

ALBERTINA WALKER SAVOY 12 26 18 13 THE IMPOSSIBLE DREAM

NICHOLAS MESSAGE 1002 27 26 61 THERE IS so little jazz on televi- vey a sense of the skill they put space than the much more intrigu- WORDS CAN'T EXPRESS sion these days that the mere exis- into making music and the enjoy- ing sounds of Getz and company, BISHOP JEFF BANKS SAVOY 14749 28 28 33 t-nice of a show like "Jazz Comes ment they derive from it. The brief who seem to be just hitting a LORD LIFT ME UP Home To Newport," which made interview segments don't shed groove when the closing credits CHARLES FOLD SAVOY SGL 7087 29 22 5 its debut last week on PBS stations much light on the musicians or the start rolling. HE'LL STEP RIGHT IN around the country, would be festival, but they're interesting One other quibble: The narra- CONNIE JOHNSON GTS 1078 30 NEW cause for some excitement regard- enough. tion, by Gene Galusha, purports to VICTORY less of its quality. The fact that it's Goldman and producer Hal Hut - offer a historical overview of the DOTTIE PEOPLES CHURCHDOOR 14746 31 37 33 a pretty good show -albeit with a koff have, however, made some Newport bash, which celebrated SURELY GOD IS ABLE few rather quirky faults -can al- DR. CHARLES HAYES AND THE COSMOPOLITAN CHURCH CHOIR 32 27 9 most be considered a bonus. SAVOY 14746 I KNOW THE LORD LAYED HIS HANDS ON ME The show, offering excerpts PBS brightens the small screen SISTER LUCILLE POPE ATLANTA INTERNATIONAL 1 /ATLANTA INT'L 33 33 37 from this summer's Newport Jazz GREAT REUNION Festival, isn't likely to make any- with Newport Festival excerpts THE MIGHTY CLOUDS OF JOY MYRRH 001 34 16 49 one forget "Jazz On A Summer's SING AND SHOUT Day," the classic Newport Festival questionable artistic decisions. Gil- its 30th anniversary this year. But DONALD VAILS AND THE CHORALEERS 35 40 9 SAVOY 14743 film of some years back. But the lespie and an all -star ensemble of Galusha neglects to mention that HE PROMISED A NEW LIFE combination of that beautiful James Moody, Walter Davis Jr., the festival was banished from FLORIDA MASS CHOIR SAVOY SGL -7078 36 32 123 Rhode Island scenery and the Ron Carter and Louie Bellson Newport after gate- crashing riot- LORD, YOU KEEP ON PROVING YOURSELF TO ME sounds of Dizzy Gillespie, Stan sound magnificent on the sinuous ers curtailed the festivities in 1971; THE PILGRIM WONDERS CHURCH DOOR 22021 /CHURCHD00R 37 35 37 Getz, Dave Brubeck and Michel blues `Kirks' Works," but the only that it moved to New York, where THE TIME IS NOW Petrucciani makes for a most other number by the "quintet" in- it eventually metamorphosed into THE GOSPEL KEYNOTES o &v 1200 38 36 33 pleasant hour's viewing and listen- cluded in the program is actually a the Kool Festival; and that New- TELL IT TO JESUS ing. trio number featuring Carter, with port didn't start hosting a summer PAUL BEASLEY MYRRH 6749 39 23 9 Director Rudi Goldman, a for- Gillespie nowhere to be heard. And jazz event again until 1981. With- MY SOUL IS FREE mer jazz musician, does a good job Brubeck's energetic but unsurpris- out that information, the pro- TIMOTHY WRIGHT GOSPEARL 16017 40 21 49 of capturing the musicians in ac- ing renditions of the tried -and -true gram's title doesn't make much TESTIFY tion, lingering just long enough on "Blue Rondo a la Turk" and "Take sense. Reco ding Industry Assn. Of America (RIAA) seal for sales of 500,000 units. their hands and their faces to con- Five" are given considerably more RIAA seal for sales of one million units.

62 BILLBOARD DECEMBER 22, 1984

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