Description
"Son, just keep on, keep doing what you're doing. Let it be good," sings the father, and his grown children, standing close by, echo his words. "Let it be good." It's a moment of faith in both God and the father, for the younger ones seem to know the message of this song in their hearts already. They are already living it. To some it may be only a track on an album, the first release of the new Bible and Tire Recording Co. label. But for the Sensational Barnes Brothers, it expresses an unbreakable bond with their own father, Calvin "Duke" Barnes. As with all the songs on this, their debut LP, produced by Bruce Watson of Bible and Tire Recording Co./Big Legal Mess Records at Delta-Sonic Studios in Memphis, it was chosen from the oft-forgotten 1970s catalog of the Designer Records label, but it could well have been written by the Barnes family themselves. For there, in a nutshell, are all the bonds that hold them close.Chris Barnes was a little stunned to hear the song as they combed through hundreds of Designer tracks with Watson one day. "We were listening to the song and the guy on the recording sounded just like my daddy. I was like, 'We gotta do this song!' And the message really stuck out to us.""It's crazy for that to be the song he sang with us. You can hear all the conversations he used to have with you through that one piece of music," adds brother Courtney. It's a poignant moment, for only three months after the brothers invited him to sing on their album, Duke Barnes passed away. "It was out of the blue-very unexpected. He was 65. Fairly young, really," notes Chris."You're always counting your days, learning how to number your days," reflects Courtney. "Count it all joy, and we're thankful for the life that he lived and that he gave."And give he did, as Duke made his way through the world with his beloved wife Deborah. She was the daughter of Rev. James L. Gleese, who founded the Beale Street Mission for Blacks/Negroes, and music came to her even more naturally. But though she had studied pi
