various: go devil go!

If you enjoy uplifting sing-along family spiritual songs with crystal-clear vocal harmonies and a swirling synth-organ, this gospel album definitely is not for you. Go Devil Go! represents precisely the other side of the coin. The material collected here shows the most savage and visceral side of vintage gospel music. On this God-forsaken disc, the hymnals range from hypnotic mid-tempo primitive rural blues to chaotic, raw R'n'B workouts. Guitars and furious hand-claps accompany singers who do not speak of this world and are pushing hard to get to the other side. But fear not, the lyrics, messages and screams on this LP call out to the bottom-feeders, backsliders, and miscreants to redeem ourselves from the wages of sin and the inferno that waits for us down below. Go Devil Go! is Jerome Records' own selection from the glorious 3CD set Fire in My Bones compiled by Mike McGonigal in 2009. Most of the recordings included here were published in 45s or 78s for less known independent companies, some by tiny local labels and sometimes paid by the church congregation itself. As McGonigal explains in the liner-notes: "This is Gospel -- which we must always remember translates as 'the good news' (...) I find it to be among the most vibrant, playful, beautiful and emotionally-charged music in the world." Amen.