Blige and achieved some visibility as the distinctive lead of the first incarnation of Teddy Riley’s Blackstreet (see “Before I Let You Go”). Hollister who began his career in the recording industry singing back-up for the likes of gospel diva Vanessa Bell Armstrong and Mary J. Kelly consistently reminds us, even “Thug Niggas” need to get on their knees and pray once and awhile to the creator. Rest assured, as Bone, Thugs and Harmony so brilliantly portrayed in their song “Crossroads” and fellow Chi-town native R. Hollister took seriously his connection to the worlds of the storefront churches that have historically been so important to the development of the music we simply call “Soul”, and of the black working poor of Chicago that Sudhir Alladi Venkatesh, documents in his new ethnography American Project: The Rise and Fall of a Modern Ghetto. With Ghetto Hymns Hollister made a blatant attempt to covey the “gospel” of the ghetto - a streetwise ghettocentric spirituality if you will. There is a moment towards the end the track “Baby Mama Drama”, the lead single from Dave Hollister’s debut solo recording Ghetto Hymns in which the singer pauses and reflects out loud “somebody out there knows what I’m talking about”, which is then punctured with a soulful cry “can I get a witness?” No longer than 15 or 20 seconds, Hollister’s closing riff served to encapsulate the ambitions of the project.
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