6. “Love Theory”

Kirk Franklin • LONG LIVE LOVE

I grew up in a Kirk Franklin household. You think “Melodies from Heaven” is Kirk’s best song? It’s not even the best song on that album. I’m old enough to remember the legitimate fear in black churches nationwide that Kirk Franklin by himself was ruining gospel music. (For what it’s worth — and to his credit — he leaned heavily into the troll, first building a song and then an entire album around the concept he was on trial for the crime of making gospel music too secular.) Kirk is, bluntly, the sole survivor (does Hezekiah Walker count?) of gospel music’s last golden era, shepherded by those 90s-era choir leaders whose live albums live on in the Gospel music canon. Kirk kept more children of a certain era in churches than I’m sure those pastors back in the day would want to admit. And nowadays, he’s keeping more than a few of those kids-turned-adults maintaining their relationship with a higher power, whomever that power may be.

“Love Theory” reminds me of old-school Kirk, something I can see my homegirls back at Northwest Unity liturgically dancing to. Simpler times, they were. I should probably go to church, huh?