VOTP VOCD105 | Billy Jenkins (g), (v), (hca), Nathaniel Facey (as), Gail Brand (tb), Oren Marshall (tba), Dylan Bates (vln), (pocket cnt), Charles Hayward (perc), with Dave Ramm (org), Jim Howard (t), Charlie Hart (vln), Carol Grimes, Ayanna Witter-Johnson, Merlin Hayward and the VOGC Junior League Choir (backing v). Rec. date not stated

A Jenkins album is always an event, and this is all the more special as he’s been off the scene caring for loved ones and following a fresh calling as a Humanist conductor of funerals. “It’s real jazz! I have to instantly assess the situation, write the words and you get paid up front: you don’t have to wait for the Arts Council funding to come through”, explains BJ about his new career move. I Am A Man From Lewisham, featuring the Songs Of Praise touring band brought together for Jenkins’ 50th birthday, continues his epic aural evocation of the south London he loves. Like one of his spiritual forefathers, Billy Blake, Jenkins finds the universe in a grain of sand (and a transit van, a fast food outlet…) and all humanity within the ever-rich surroundings of the 5-mile patch where he’s always lived.

So ‘Deptford Market’, a lopsided blues shuffle, or the title track (eat your heart out Muddy Waters, who’d get this album instantly) or ‘On (Catford) Broadway’ are at once as succinctly particular as they are timelessly universal. And, like another soul mate, John Bunyan, there’s an evangelical glee in the sheer vibrancy of a shared life, gathered together in a now traditional Jenkins jamboree of children’s voices, ecstatic vocals and a ferocious band (underpinned by Marshall’s gigantically nimble tuba).

If the voice of god is the voice of the people, then you’ll hear her in the climactic and aptly titled ‘Throw Them Blues In The Recycling Bin’. Until it’s time for Mr Jenkins to conduct you over Jordan, this will do for a slice of south London heaven on earth.

Andy Robson