Perhaps because she played with various groups for years before making her mark in Europe with
Livin' Joy's "Dreamer" in 1994-95,
Janice Robinson is not your standard R&B singer. In fact, it would be more accurate to think of her as a rock singer-songwriter. She has assembled a backup band that includes rock veterans like
Jim Keltner and
Waddy Wachtel and even gotten a wonderful slide guitar performance from
Ry Cooder on "Sleeping In The Playground." "Nothing I Would Change" is the autobiographical statement that leads things off, and
Robinson remains self-referential in her lyrics. She doesn't really have much to say beyond telling her own, brief story, but she is passionate about that, from the bittersweet hometown reunion of "Dead End Girl" to the memory of racial slurs in "Gracefully Gliding." "Who cares if I'm black or white," she asks on the title track, and she explores miscegenation with an integrationist's fervor in the album closer, "It Really Don't Matter." Those are nervy sentiments at a time when popular music remains as polarized as society at large, and they may make her album difficult to market. But this is an auspicious debut by a talented singer who is also a promising writer. ~ William Ruhlmann