Sons of Soul is the third studio album by American R&B group Tony! Toni! Toné!, released on June 22, 1993, by Wing Records and Mercury Records. It is the follow-up to their successful 1990 album The Revival. Recording sessions for the album initially took place in 1993 at several studios in California, including Westlake Recording Studios in Hollywood and Paradise Recording Studio in Sacramento. Jaded with the various people frequenting those studios, Tony! Toni! Toné! moved their sessions to Caribbean Sound Basin in Trinidad, where they ultimately wrote and recorded most of the album.
The album was produced entirely by the group, who worked with various session musicians and utilized both vintage and contemporary recording equipment. With Sons of Soul, they intended to pay homage to their musical influences—classic soul artists of the 1960s and 1970s. It also expands on the traditional R&B influence of their previous album and incorporates live instrumentation, funk, and hip hop elements such as samples, beats, and scratches. The album's songwriting was handled mostly by lead singer and bassist Raphael Wiggins and is characterized by quirky, flirtatious lyrics.
The album was a critical and commercial success upon its release. It charted for 43 weeks on the Billboard 200, peaking at number 24, and was certified double platinum by the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA). Sons of Soul received general acclaim from music critics and was named the best album of 1993 by both The New York Times and Time. With the album's success, Tony! Toni! Toné! become one of the most popular R&B acts during the genre's commercial resurgence in the early 1990s. However, after an ill-fated tour, the group went on hiatus and pursued individual projects before reuniting in 1995.
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