Lola Give Her What She Wants

One of the best southern albums around a the moment is Lola Gulley's Give Her What She Wants on William Bell's Wilbe label.

Check out Lola's MySpace where you can listen to tracks and catch up with her:

Lola (just Lola) is a dynamic blues and R&B singer/keyboard player who has been igniting stages in the Atlanta area and is just beginning to break out as a national artist. Blessed with a deep soul voice, a funkified keyboard style and an intense, high energy stage presence, Lola combines traditional blues with hard-edged R&B to create her own brand of contemporary, tough music.
Lola was born in the back seat of an Olds 98 in New York and grew up as a "military brat" in Oceanside, CA before her parents moved to Mobile, AL. It was there that she began sitting in with her father's funk band, playing trumpet and drums before switching to keyboards. Stevie Wonder, Donnie Hathaway, Jimmy Smith and Joe Sample were her key piano influences, along with her father's favorite, bluesman Amos Milburn. She worked her way through college playing in three different Mobile churches, absorbing a huge dose of gospel influence that you can hear every time she sings. Her other vocal inspirations include Aretha Franklin, Bonnie Raitt, B.B. King and Stevie Wonder.

Finishing college, Lola won a berth as a keyboard player with the late soul great Johnnie Taylor, touring across the country and learning first hand how to work a crowd into a frenzy.
In 1996, after winning a nationwide talent contest on BET television contest, she was signed by Andre Harrell to a Motown recording contract, but the album remains unreleased since Harrell's departure from the company.

Since striking out on her own as a band leader, Lola has shared the stage with The Pointer Sisters, Bobby Womack, Bobby "Blue" Bland, Betty Wright and Chubby Checker. Now she's ready for the spotlight herself. With her firebrand stage presence, a heap of original songs, high powered keyboards, a tight band and, most of all, her deeply soulful, rich and powerful voice, Lola is a major new figure stepping on to the national and international blues scene.