“I’m just looking for some real love,” intones Toshi Reagon at the start of “Real Love,” the opening track to her latest release, The Righteous Ones.  Sweet Honey in the Rock, including Reagon’s mother, Bernice Johnson Reagon, adds their vocal contributions to that number.  Their smooth backing vocals allows Reagon’s own voice to soar and let loose. Susan Tedeschi rightfully has been acclaimed for her recent offerings to the new blues-rock scene.  While Reagon’s voice often is softer than Tedeschi’s (although it does sometimes feature a gravelly purr), she gives Tedeschi and other new blues artists some worthy competition.

After the opening number, Reagon is on her own vocally, but that doesn’t mean she’s lacking anything.  Her voice adapts various styles well, from the give-and-take and sheer fun rhythm of the radio-friendly “Happy and Satisfied”  (listen for Reagon’s acoustic guitar and Catherine Russell’s mandolin) to the almost-Dylanesque sound on “Like it That Way” (with Adam Widoff’s electric guitar).  Reagon’s quick transitions to very different musical genres may be disconcerting to some listeners.  (Of course, she does offer her listeners thirty seconds of “Somespace” -- blank space -- between the slow bluesy “Darling” and the wild headbanging closing track, “I’m Just an Egg Don’t Mind Me.”)

A cynical take on Toshi Reagon  and *The Righteous Ones* is that she’s a talented singer-songwriter who needs to settle down and decide on one musical style, but that perspective doesn’t need to be the case.  She’s simply difficult to pigeonhole.  Reagon can’t be stereotyped merely as a folk nor blues nor rock artist. Listening to this CD is a welcome reminder that there still are some remarkable performers who can work well within many genres and appeal to a number of different tastes.

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