……hostility peaking during the holidays has become a troubling modern tradition. Christmas trees, Kwanzaa candles and home cooking aren’t always enough to lighten the mood and music has to create a bridge, which is what R&B band Mint Condition is offering on their 9th studio CD and first-ever yuletide release, Healing Season.

It probably would have been easy for the esteemed St. Paul MN quintet to pull a total ‘sing-and-play-by-numbers’ act, assembling the most beloved hymns and recycling them with a few splashes of their ‘mint gumbo’ and little more, but three years passing between ….Season and their competent 2012 effort, Music At The Speed of Life, broadened perspectives and enhanced their creativity, resulting in an even split of classics and originals that encapsulate the optimism, and the anguish, that ‘the most wonder time of year’ often represents.

The enthusiasm and novelty of the arrangements are what fuel the collection, starting with the plucky and percussive send-up of James Brown’s “Santa Claus Go Straight To The Ghetto” and nimble, yet stirring take on Stevie Wonder’s “Someday At Christmas” that echoes the fervent hope of every new generation of “no hungry children, no empty hands/One happy moment people will share, a world where people care.” Besides the step-worthy version of “Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas”…….(click here for the full-length CD review at soultracks.com)