"For me, personally, Mind, Body and Soul is my real debut."
Joss Stone's words may come as a surprise to fans of the seventeen-year-old singer from Devon, Her first album, The Soul Sessions, established Stone as perhaps the most precociously gifted vocalist of her generation. But that November 2003 release, Joss admits, "started out as a side project and turned into this huge thing."
"I didn't mean it to," she adds with a cheerfully self-deprecating laugh, "but people just kept buying it."
By the summer of 2004, The Soul Sessions had sold more than two million copies worldwide, including over half a million sales in the UK. It became a regular fixture in the UK album top ten, breached the US Top 40 in April '04, and hit the Top Ten in thirteen countries around the world.
Listen to the dynamic and assured performances that comprise Mind, Body and Soul-from the feverish first single "You Had Me" and the playful dance track "Don't Cha Wanna Ride" to the impassioned rock-soul ballad "Killing Time." Then recall that when Joss Stone signed her deal with the EMI affiliated S Curve in the US and Relentless Records in the UK, she had never made a record or performed with a live band before a live audience. What she did have-to quote Joss's co-writer, vocal arranger and mentor Betty Wright-was "a God-given gift," a voice of uncommon strength, soulfulness, and sensitivity.
"I think my singing is so much better on this album," says our Ms. Stone. "Your voice can't ever be the same, once you've started singing live as much as I have over the past year." Joss co-wrote eleven of the fourteen songs on her new disc, including collaborations with such veteran hit makers as Lamont Dozier and Desmond Child. "I had a lot more confidence in myself as a writer than I would've had a year ago," she admits.
The poignant opening track "Right to Be Wrong" and the ethereally grooving "Jet Lag" were recorded by Joss and her musicians together in real time. Indeed, the singer would have preferred to cut all of Mind, Body and Soul in this fashion "but because I was doing gigs between sessions, it was impossible to record everything that way. Still, when you listen to the tracks, the playing of the band is very live. There's no overproduction and not a lot of programming of any kind."
In a reprise of their stunning Soul Sessions success, the team of Mike Mangini and Betty Wright produced all but three tracks on Mind, Body and Soul, and the stellar supporting cast features guitarist Willie "Little Beaver" Hale, pianist Benny Latimore, and organist Timmy Thomas. These three veterans of Miami soul music's mid-Seventies heyday were reunited in 2003 for The Soul Sessions by another of their peers, singer/songwriter/vocal arranger Betty Wright.
Other contributors to Mind, Body and Soul include guitarist AJ Nilo, multi-instrumentalist Angelo Morris, and the master drummers Cindy Blackman and David "Jody" Hill. Nile Rodgers of CHIC plays guitar on "You Had Me," and the hip-hop soul duo Jazzyfatnastees (Joss' S-Curve label mates) add background vocals on "Jet Lag" and "Security." Angie Stone plays Rhodes on "Security" and ?uestlove of The Roots plays drums on "Sleep Like A Child." The album's first video "You Had Me" is directed by Chris Robinson, whose credits include major hit clips for Usher, Alicia Keys, Jay-Z & Beyonce, and Lenny Kravitz.
With the September 2004 release of Mind, Body and Soul, this particular young artist will return to the road-a place that now has become her second home. Within one year, she performed everywhere from the intimate Joe's Pub in Manhattan to the massive Glastonbury Festival in the UK. The touring life has its stresses and strains, but it seems to suit Joss Stone.
"It's busy. But I like it, y'know-it's exciting. And singing is fun. Singing is fantastic."
