Billboard – At this point, if you’re Al Green, messing around with your formula isn’t so much unlikely as it is pure madness; it’d be like AC/DC deciding to add bassoons. Even the highly touted input of the Roots’ ?uestlove (producing with James Poyser, both in place of Green’s longtime go-to Willie Mitchell) results more in decoration than innovation. It’s not the new-blood-fueled revelation some might have hoped for, but who cares. Green’s voice remains lithe magic, and he’s brought in such contemporary all-stars as Anthony Hamilton (on the album’s two best tracks, “You’ve Got the Love I Need” and the slinky title song), John Legend and Corinne Bailey Rae for help. ?uestlove’s drums get a little boost in the mix, and Poyser’s B3 lightly brushes each song’s cheeks. But when it comes to Green, what more needs to be said? The reverend preaches on.
• Al Green – Take Your Time (with Corinne Bailey Rae)
Jeff Vrabel is a humor columnist for the GateHouse news service, editor-in-chief of Hilton Head Monthly magazine and a music writer whose work has appeared in Paste, RollingStone.com, Billboard, Playboy, All About Jazz, No Depression, the Chicago Sun-Times, Backstreets, brucespringsteen.net and several furious Neil Diamond fan message boards. 
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