A sizzling Nadine Sutherland performs 'It's My Day'. - photosby Colin Hamilton/Freelance Photographer Mel Cooke, Freelance Writer
Four energetically delivered songs, four outfits and appropriate hairstyles after her first turn at the microphone at the Grog Shoppe, Devon House, on Tuesday evening, Nadine Sutherland walked out quietly in a red, green and gold dress with blue bust highlights.
"I wanted to do it tonight because it reflects where I am as a person," she said of her final song. Accompanied by acoustic guitar and a pair of harmony singers, she sang the penultimate song on her new album, Call My Name. And when Where Did My Heart Go was over, she said thanks all around, making it clear "this album is a stepping out in faith".
After more thanks at the launch of the Eight76 Records production, currently 12 on the Billboard Reggae Charts, she said, "I think Nadine Sutherland, where she is now, is OK ... I am stepping strong in faith and I never ever stop moving".
"It is no more Starvation on the Land for it is Big Tingz time now," Clyde McKenzie, who hosted the launch, said, referring to Sutherland's first single and one of her latest, respectively, spanning nearly three decades.
Success over adversity
Kenroy 'YahBreeze' Archibald and Myshjua Archibald of Eight76 Records speak at the launch of 'Call My Name'.
Desmond Young, president of the Jamaica Federation of Musicians (JFM), said, "This lady has blossomed into one of the finest examples of success over adversity in our local music industry." Then after a recorded introduction by Cordel Green, Sutherland was out jogging on fairly high heels in a cream dress, smiling and singing the album's title track as she greeted many before making her way centre stage.
Keyboard player Robbie Lyn said, "This album comes quite a few years after her last, so we can quite understand what this means to Nadine. She has put her all into this and she is expecting the best ... "
Sutherland was soon back to deliver Big Tingz, looking athletic in loose brown pants and red top, chuckling when there was a pause before the reply of cheers after she sang "yardies, mek me hear you represent". "I'll be back. Got to change," she said, and McKenzie commented, "Nadine has quite a wardrobe back there."
Singer Pam Hall called Sutherland a musical triple threat, being "very, very good songwriter, very, very good singer, wicked dancer" and the main speaker, Winston Blake, said "the CD is indeed her best effort to date". He congratulated Eight76 as being "a young, energetic company that has done a good job in marketing it in Florida so far".
The new Nadine
He quoted from It's My Day and said "that epitomises the new Nadine", saying she "is poised to take her music to another level".
After pointing out that "the industry has not been very kind to female artistes", naming quite a few, Blake added that "the radio stations have been kind to our female artistes".
"The jocks have special people who they do special things for. If you cannot match these favours you can't get a lot of airplay," Blake pointed out later in his extensive address.
A black pants suit with a gold bustier was the outfit for It's My Day, Sutherland's right hand going skywards for a final "yeah, yeah, yeah". Remedy went back to last year's engagement ("I was supposed to be a married woman, but now I realise I am married to this album," Sutherland said). Myshjua Archibald of Eight76 said "it has been a pleasure to watch this album come together" and producer Kenroy 'YahBreeze' Archibald said "that is why this project was so exciting and so easy, because we had that connection".
And at the end Nadine Sutherland presented her 'Mama Bev', attributing the colours of her final outfit to her father.
Nadine Sutherland steps out for her first song at the launch of 'Call My Name' at the Grog Shoppe, Devon House, on Tuesday evening.
