Big Fish Audio | EQ Magazine Craig Anderton | Urban Contemporary Gospel Product Review
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Urban Contemporary Gospel | EQ Magazine

Reviewer: Craig Anderton Back to Urban Contemporary Gospel product details

Big Fish Audio: Urban Contemporary Gospel

I fondly remember my father occasionally playing "Gonna Ride that Glory Train," from Harlem's Abyssinian Baptist Choir, at top volume. It wasn't the religious message that got him, but the musical one: It was exciting, vital, raw, and truly uplifting . . . then again, that's what good Gospel music is all about.

Urban Contemporary Gospel has 34 construction kits, each with loops, drum hits, and mixed drum loops also broken out as individual loops (e.g., kick, snare, overhead). The sound quality is conservative-sometimes a bit muffled (a little EQ solves that) and not "hot" (so drag out your maximizer). But overall, there's a fine selection of bass, guitar, drums, keys, organ, and some pretty delicious gospel vocals. In fact, most of the loops (save the vocals) would fit well into a lot of contemporary R&B and hip-hop. Furthermore, the Acidization is far superior to older Big Fish releases-and this is not always easy material to Acidize.

The tunes don't have the rip-your-head-off excitement of hardcore, old school gospel; as the title suggests, they indeed have more of an urban sound-some of the loops would even fit well in smooth jazz. Still, there's a good balance of uptempo and slower tunes, making the set quite comprehensive. In a world of me-too sample libraries, this one stands out as unique and, well, uplifting. -Craig Anderton

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