REGINA BONELLI
If you channel Big Mamma Thornton and Etta James through an Al Green filter you might get close to the essence of Regina Bonelli. The Brooklyn born, New York Blues Hall Of Famer is a true Soul-Blues diva with the songs and presence to back it up. With the kind of voice that makes you sit up and pay attention, her new album, Truth Hurts, is a tour de force where modern blues and vintage soul meld together into a whole new musical animal. "I think this is really the first time we've been able to capture the intensity of what it's like when we play live," she comments. Backed by the True Groove All-Stars, Bonelli taps into the emotional core that lies at the heart of the album's six originals and three select covers to exacting results. It's not so much that she's wearing her heart on her sleeve as she is drawing every drop of emotion out of each track and and leaving a pool of tears - both the joy and sorrow varieties - in her wake. "When I'm singing, everything that comes out is true; its coming right from the body, from the inside to the outside. Sometimes the way it comes out seems like a kind of desperation, other times its very cathartic. I write from experience. Certain truths are not the most pleasant things. Truth hurts, but the truth can set you free. I really believe that; it's like 'OK, now I can breathe.'"
"One of the most powerful voices of the Moment"
— Blues Again France