Billy Valentine - 'We The People Who Are Darker Than Blue' (45 Version)

'Billy and Bob Thiele Jr have been working together for some time, writing songs for amongst others Ray Charles, Joe Cocker and Axwell from the Swedish House Mafia.

During 2020 - lockdown and the protests around George Floyd and on behalf of BLM - the pair started working on an album of politically relevant covers from soul music’s past.

It was something that should have just been a diversion but the results were stunning and an album’s worth of material was recorded featuring amongst others Jeff Parker, Joel Ross, Theo Croker, Pino Paladino, James Gadson and Linda May Oh.

Bob and I had been working on the Flying Dutchman catalogue - Bob working with his father’s legacy for the first time - and he felt that this record could sit proudly and appropriately alongside that catalogue and that it should be the first new release on Flying Dutchman since 1976. Myself and Ed offered to release it on Flying Dutchman via Acid Jazz, a collaboration between two classic labels.

The first fruits were this stunning version of Curtis Mayfield’s ‘We The People Who Are Darker Than Blue’, where Billy is accompanied by The Larry Golding Trio and Blue Note Records recording artist and very special saxophone talent Immanual Wilkins.'

- Dean Rudland, August 2022