I had the pleasure of spending three hours listening to walkerdad’s most recent playlist/mixtape release, Future Soul.   walkerdad is Robin Hall, a fervent music maker, listener & chronicler from nyc, whose previous mixtapes I’ve also enjoyed.  Incidentally, he also was a member of the  nyc no-wave outfit  Jack Ruby back in the day, whose tracks have seen a resurgence of interest, an album re-release and appearances in the recent HBO series, Vinyl.

Future Soul is tailor-made for the thinking romantic soul-music lover; the mix takes us on a journey through passages of varying textures, tempos and styles, and includes many classic soul and early r&b tracks that somehow stand out in a brand new way.  walkerdad avoids many soul music’s less memorable cliches, and while it’s packed with soul’s passion, it steers away from the overly lush, sentimental or bawdy corners of the loose genre. If the title is to be read as a gentle manifesto is unclear, but as a listening experience, Future Soul posited a sonic world of love, sorrow, lust and ebullience that I was very happy to inhabit for its 2 hours and 58 minutes of running time.

Highly recommended.

Also, check out walkerdad’s other mixtapes on his Mixcloud channel:

https://beta.mixcloud.com/kingwinter/