GOODBYE WORLD by THE RELATIVES

Goodbye World is the new album from the triumphantly unlikely gospel funk band The Relatives.The group started working on the record in the summer of 2014, but the late Reverend Gean West was able to lay down his signature gravelly vocals on only two songs before he became ill and fell into a coma. He remained unconscious for twelve days, and it was during that time he heard God's voice telling him to get back to work. "Don't let me down, son," the voice commanded. Gean took that admonition to heart. He and the band returned to the studio in January 2015, where he incorporated a riveting spoken-word account of his near-death epiphany into the band's reworking of Tim Maia's “Rational Culture.” After laying down vocals and hearing a rough mix of the song from fellow original Relatives member Earnest Tarkington, Gean—or God, or both—must have thought his work was finally done, because he died the next day.Goodbye World is their second full-length effort after releasing the Electric Word in 2013. Named for a song that Gean first cut over fifty years ago with the Southernaires and performed live with the Relatives in the 70s and at their first reunion show.