Bitty McLean – Love Restart

Release Info

Bitty McLean – Love Restart

Label:  Taxi / Silent River / Tabou1 | Format: CD-LP-DR | Street date: August 31, 2018 | Bandcamp

Previous Albums

When the 16-track album “Movin’ On”, Bitty McLean’s first collaboration with the legendary drum & bass duo Sly & Robbie and Tabou 1’s Guillaume Bougard, hit the streets in March 2009 it was immediately clear for anyone with a keen ear for quality reggae music that they formed a winning team. For those having certain doubts this was confirmed with the 2013 released follow-up “The Taxi Sessions” and then “Heart Mind & Soul”, which was put out two years later.

Formats

And now there’s the long awaited new studio album from Bitty McLean and his partners in crime titled “Love Restart”. The latter is available in three formats. The CD features eleven tracks, which mainly consists of tunes which the term ‘radio edit’ seemingly fits well. And then there’s the vinyl LP featuring strictly extended versions of six tunes taken from the CD – three lovers & three roots offerings. The Digital Download release, presented as Deluxe Edition, is a mix of ‘radio edit’ tunes and extended versions.

Sly, Robbie & Taxi Gang

Bitty McLean is a very strong singer, who together with Sly & Robbie plus the Taxi Gang (Robbie Lyn, ‘Lenky’ Marsden, Mikey Chung, ‘Sticky’ Thompson, ‘Dougie’ Bryan) has created a collection of tunes that has class stamped all over it – something you might expect from Bitty McLean and these well experienced musicians.

Lovers & Roots

Although many see him as a singer who’s specialised in delivering beautiful romantic songs, Bitty McLean also excels on a number of noteworthy roots tunes that are part of this new album. One of them is the strong “War Is Over”, a track known from the December 2016 released 10″ vinyl EP which furthermore included “Never Let Me Go” and two versions of “Rumours” by Bunny Rugs. The great “Babylon Has Fallen”, a popular theme in roots reggae music, shows that he’s not only an excellent singer but also a real good songwriter. The same goes for the solid “Open Eyes (Crisis)”, a message tune which most likely musically has to grow on you. That however is not the case with the gorgeous “Is That Your Reward”, a moving cultural tune with an awesome backdrop that gets under your skin. Easily amongst some of the finest is the spiritual “Every Word & Move”, a tune with an inspirational vibe. And then there’s also the solid “My Call”, which is just as fine as “Every Word & Move”. Needless to say that Bitty McLean shines bright on fine love songs like the opener “Take My Heart (Love Restart)”, “Broke My Heart” and “Made To Fall In Love”. In particular “Song Of Songs” is a very delightful offering and one which rises near the top of the album.

Fans of Discomixes will be excited to see extended versions of songs included on the vinyl LP and Deluxe Edition.