Mint Condition - E-Life

The difficult thing about reviewing albums like Mint Condition's E-Life is that they're so good and so strong, the reviewer winds up gushing about it and any criticisms look like mere nitpicking, because there's so few real flaws to critique. But at the risk of sounding like a shill for the band, here's what's up: E-Life, which will be released in the U.S. on May 6, 2008, is one of the best R&B albums of 2008. By far. Mint Condition is a real band using real instruments to make real music about real issues that real people deal with in the real world. There's nothing fake or phony here.

R&B is filled with artists who are the equivalent of a fast-food meal or a junk food binge - they're good for temporarily relieving your hunger, but ultimately quickly forgotten. E-Life, on the other hand, is like fine dining; it's an album you can listen to and not get tired of after two or three times. This is the type of album that can be savored because it's so full of flavor.

Exhibit A is the album's first single, "Baby Boy Baby Girl," which features guest vocals by gritty Soul singer Anthony Hamilton. The song, about being a good parent, is a strong reminder of the power of unconditional love and how important being a good parent is. Message songs can sometimes be too preachy, but Mint Condition manages make this one hip and catchy and not all all overbearing. The band also puts a new spin on some old topics, such as cheating lovers (via the song "Somethin'," which features Phonte of the hip-hop crew Little Brother); the love song "Just Believe;" and the playful "Golddigger," in which lead singer Stokely Williams courts a woman by telling her that he wants her to be his personal golddigger, which is a twist on the recent trend of songs that diss and denounce women looking for rich men to take care of them.

Other outstanding songs include the upbeat, swinging "Wish I Could Love You (Pimp Juice)," about a woman who's a player with a string of men; and the powerful ballad "Queen of Come Here Go Away," about a woman who can't seem to make up her mind as far as what she wants.

If the album's flawed at all, it's that the middle third of the album contains a series nondescript ballads that at first listen sound a little too ordinary. But upon further listening, its these songs that contain some of the album's best lyrics, such as the sexy "Moan," and album's title track, which deals with living life in our increasingly electronic, automated and digital world.

As mentioned above, this is overall an excellent album and one of the best of 2008. A big reason why is that the band still makes completely organic music. Amazingly, the group has had the same lineup since their 1991 debut album - Stokley Williams (vocals), Lawrence El (piano, keyboards), Rick Kinchen (bass, lead guitar), Homer O'Dell (rhythm guitar) and Jeffrey Allen (saxophone, keyboards. And all their time performing together has turned them into one of the best bands in all of music. E-E-Life is concrete proof of this. People have mourned the death of "real" R&B in recent years, but on E-Life, music as art is reborn.