"I started going to a church almost six years ago and they had a 'worship team' — two sets of musicians that would lead worship on Sundays," Vice recalls. "One day I was sitting there listening, and I had this little voice say, 'You need to go and sing on the worship team.' And I'm like, 'Oh no. Where is this coming from?'"
Vice auditioned, got in, and soon found music and performance flooding into her life. And a good thing, too, because talent this special deserves to be shared with the world. The connection between gospel music and 1960s soul is reaffirmed on There's a Light, a set of devout songs in vintage, tambourine-shaking soul style.
"I remember how nervous I was. It just felt like all the pores in my body opened up and then it was just me in a room alone and I was singing to Jesus. When the song was over, I realized I was in front of a congregation," recalls Vice. "Afterward, one of my friends came up to me and asked 'What was that?' She was teary and I said 'I don't know.' That was kinda the beginning of the beautiful journey."
There's a Light is the brainchild of Josh White, who wrote and produced each of the 10 tracks and released them under the Deeper Well label, a local gospel collective representing a number of faith-based musicians.
The first song White introduced Vice to was "Empty Me Out," a classically balanced, up-tempo song that seems pulled from the early days of Motown.
"'People love ‘Empty Me Out.' Out of all of the songs on the album, that is the one song that is brought up over and over," says Vice. "There is something about it that just penetrates the souls of people. It's a prayer."
