Now that's what I call transformation and longevity of a former dance diva. From her time with Shalamar and her first dance hits with MCA (Looking For A New Love, Still A Thrill) Jody Watley has really become a respected singer and songwriter and, judging by the title of her recent album, a lounge diva. Midnight Lounge has been available since 2001 via Jody's website and in Japan only so with this US release we get two extra tracks that weren't available on the original version (The Essence and remixes of Whenever and Photographs). But with some of the songs already been released as a 12" single you may be familiar with tracks like Whenever, Photographs, I Love To Love (Jody's collaboration with Masters At Work - unfortunately not featured as full length 12" version here) or Saturday Night Experience (with the Ron Trent Mix appearing here).
But Jody has more to offer like the title song Midnight Lounge were she explains the intention of her music 'all I wanna do is just dance'), the nice midtempo Skin Deep with some thoughts about interpersonal relationships ('Beauty will not keep us together, it's love') or the drum & bass influenced More.
For me Midnight Lounge is just a great modern soul music album with a cutting edge that makes it different from the rest. It may take some time until you really get into it's quite diverse styles with combining influences of house, lounge and drum & bass, but if you, do you'll discover Jody's far-reaching musicality. A real grower of an album.