{"id":808111,"date":"2020-06-05T08:00:48","date_gmt":"2020-06-05T14:00:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.rollingstone.com\/?p=1010265"},"modified":"2020-06-05T08:00:48","modified_gmt":"2020-06-05T14:00:48","slug":"g-e-smith-leroy-bell-preview-first-album-together-with-black-is-the-color","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/music-news\/g-e-smith-leroy-bell-preview-first-album-together-with-black-is-the-color\/","title":{"rendered":"G.E. Smith, LeRoy Bell Preview First Album Together With \u2018Black Is the Color\u2019"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Guitarist G.E. Smith<\/a> and soul musician LeRoy Bell<\/a> have shared a rugged take on the traditional folk ballad, \u201cBlack Is the Color,\u201d that will appear on their debut album together, Stony Hill<\/em>, out August 28th via BMG.<\/p>\n

The age-old track originated in Scotland before making its way to the United States, where it became a staple of Appalachian folk music. Smith and Bell\u2019s new version boasts a simmering blues-rock groove that allows Smith to work his guitar from a tiptoe to a full-on sprint, while Bell bellows the lovelorn lyrics, \u201cBlack is the color of my true love\u2019s hair\/Her lips are like some roses fair\/The prettiest face and the daintiest hands\/I love the ground on where she stands.\u201d<\/p>\n

The pair released an animated lyric video to accompany the song, which was created by Gary Smith. The clip finds a pair of hands typing out the lyrics to the song as if they were a love letter to the woman in the picture by the typewriter.<\/p>\n

Smith and Bell both had lengthy and successful careers before linking up for Stony Hill<\/em>. Between 1985 and 1995, Smith served as the musical director at Saturday Night Live<\/em>, while he\u2019s also played with Bob Dylan, Roger Waters, David Bowie, Mick Jagger, Tina Turner, and Hall and Oates. Bell, meanwhile, was part of the soul duo Bell and James (with Casey James) and he\u2019s worked as a songwriter for artists as varied as Elton John and Teddy Pendergrass, Jennifer Lopez and the Three Degrees. In 2011, his band, LeRoy Bell and His Only Friends, were finalists on the first season<\/a> of the U.S. version of The X Factor<\/em>.<\/p>\n

It was Smith\u2019s wife, Taylor Barton, who introduced the pair, and in a statement Smith recalled hearing Bell sing for the first time in 2018, \u201cI\u2019ve been looking for a great singer for 30 years, at least \u2014 not just a good singer, but a great singer. I said: \u2018That\u2019s the voice \u2014 that\u2019s the one I\u2019ve been looking for!’\u201d<\/p>\n

Stony Hill<\/em> will primarily feature new songs written by Smith and Bell, both individually and together. Along with their rendition of \u201cBlack Is the Color,\u201d the duo also covered Buffy Saint-Marie\u2019s \u201cCod\u2019ine\u201d for the LP.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt really intrigued me to do something that\u2019s a little bit different and to bring my talent with his talent,\u201d Bell said of his collaboration with Smith. \u201c[To] try to make something new; make something happen. And I think we accomplished that.\u201d<\/p>\n

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Popular on Rolling Stone<\/h3>\n<\/p><\/div>\n

via:: Rolling Stone<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Guitarist G.E. Smith and soul musician LeRoy Bell have shared a rugged take on the traditional folk ballad, \u201cBlack Is the Color,\u201d that will appear on their debut album together, Stony Hill, out August 28th via BMG. The age-old track originated in Scotland before making its way to the United States, where it became a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[98],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-808111","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-music-news"},"acf":[],"publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-07-07 04:31:26","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category","extraData":[]},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"distributor_meta":false,"distributor_terms":false,"distributor_media":false,"distributor_original_site_name":"KSMT The Mountain","distributor_original_site_url":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt","push-errors":false,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/808111","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=808111"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/808111\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=808111"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=808111"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/alwaysmountaintime.com\/ksmt\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=808111"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}