Ronnie Lovejoy - Think About You All The Time

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I am thankful to KingCake for the invitation to contribute to this great blog.   I decided to dedicate my first post here to Ronnie Lovejoy, who I consider to be perhaps the last true giant of classic Southern Soul.   Ronnie Lovejoy came to prominence on the Chitlin' Circuit in the 1990s and sadly left us prematurely at the end of the decade at the age of 51.  During this time, he developed a strong following in the South.  His regional smash hit, "Sho Wasn't Me," is still a staple of the Circuit, and has been covered by the likes of Tyrone Davis and Otis Clay.  Nevertheless, Ronnie Lovejoy never achieved national fame or recognition.   He was just too Old School for the 1990s, a time when Dr. Dre, Snoop Dogg and the like were taking the R&B charts to new territory.  

Ronnie Lovejoy left us with six albums, all of which are very worthwhile.   Almost all of them had been long out of print and unavailable since the 90s.  I just noticed, however, that his two Avanti albums are now finally available for commercial download.  That is also true for his dynamite first album, "Suddenly," and his last album, "Still Wasn't Me."  For this post, I chose the better of his two albums for Ace, which still seem to be unavailable.    

"Think About You All The Time" is as good a place as any to begin an appreciation of the artistry of Ronnie Lovejoy.   Maybe a few of the later tracks are lesser material.  But this disc is still loaded with high quality original songs that are given the unique Ronnie Lovejoy treatment and delivery.   And check out some of Lovejoy's clever lyrical hooks (“I got three people sleeping in my bed: me, my woman, and the man that’s in her head” )