Donnie Discography
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Albums| Singles
 DonnieColored Section Release Date 2002 10 29 Label Giant Steps Rating:  What a marvelously audacious introduction The Colored Section is. Emerging from the same Jazz Café-centered alternative Atlanta soul scene that nourished and nurtured fellow hippie-soul singer/songwriters like Joi and India.Arie all the way into the public consciousness, Donnie's first LP is a topical, unapologetically conscientious, and even righteously stinging declaration that, yes, can only be likened to the classic sociopolitical masterworks of spiritual predecessors Donny Hathaway and especially Stevie Wonder. Songs like &"Cloud 9" and &"Wildlife," in fact, may be too indebted to genius-era Wonder -- the former with its wah-wah guitar and warm gusts of squelchy synth vibrato, the latter with its prominent clavinet and crisp harmonica ad-libs -- but are such stunning vintage impersonations that both easily could have slipped somewhere onto Innervisions. No matter from which angle you choose to approach such a statement, it couldn't really be taken as a criticism, nor should it be with The Colored Section. The music is consistently empowered and empowering: gracefully buttery, always deeply moving, and at its core profoundly idealistic. Generous melodies abound, rising from a gospel-derived groundwork, spun around street-tinged jazz rhythms, and enlivened by wonderful touches of humor like the Dixie frills of &"Big Black Buck" that underscore an otherwise valuable criticism of consumerist society. And lest Donnie be dismissed as an imitator (a studied, well-versed disciple clearly, yes, but certainly not a clone), he explores a wealth of his own refreshingly original ideas, stretching out with genuine invention (the gorgeous cosmic explorations of &"Heaven Sent," the jittery electronic backdrop of &"Masterplan") as often as he reaches backwards into retro styles (invigorating bossa nova on &"Do You Know?," the romantic, Baroque string arrangement of &"Turn Around"). It is as bold and self-assured a debut as soul music has seen since D'Angelo's Brown Sugar. It falls just short of brilliance only because it borrows a few tricks too many from its obvious musical models, but even with its flaws, the album is such a vivid, radiant outpouring of soul-stirring talent and passion that it could fill two hearts. Stanton Swihart, Rovi |
Tracks:
| Title | Composer | Time | |
| 1 | Welcome to the Colored Section | Johnson | :52 |
| 2 | Beautiful Me | Johnson, Johnson | 4:07 |
| 3 | Cloud 9 | Johnson | 5:33 |
| 4 | People Person | Johnson | 6:24 |
| 5 | Big Black Buck | Johnson | 6:36 |
| 6 | Wildlife | Johnson | 6:52 |
| 7 | Do You Know? | Johnson | 5:11 |
| 8 | Turn Around | Johnson | 5:16 |
| 9 | You Got a Friend | Embry, Johnson | 5:59 |
| 10 | Heaven Sent | Johnson | 5:28 |
| 11 | Rocketship | Johnson | 3:24 |
| 12 | Masterplan | Grant, Tatham, Johnson | 5:12 |
| 13 | Our New National Anthem | Ellington, Johnson | 4:25 |
| 14 | Colored Section | Johnson | 5:56 |
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