Click Image to Download!

Nearly 70 years into his remarkable career, unsung soul hero Charles “Wigg” Walker may finally be getting his due.  

“I feel more appreciated now than ever,” Walker reflects. “There’s something different about this album. It just feels right.” 

That unflagging faith and dedication forms the bedrock of Walker’s thrilling new record, This Love Is Gonna Last, which marks the 84-year-old journeyman’s first new release in well over a decade. Recorded with longtime organist and creative partner Charles Treadway, the collection is a masterclass in old-school R&B, shifting seamlessly between styles and eras as it bounces from Philly and Detroit to Memphis and Oakland to New York and LA with preternatural ease. Despite the record’s joyful presentation, there’s a melancholy that flows beneath the surface, a recognition of time’s inexorable march and the lessons and losses that come with it. The album is dedicated to Walker’s late wife, who passed away in 2024, and the couple’s relationship looms large here in songs about love, trust, and commitment. The result is the kind of record Walker’s been building towards for his entire career, a showcase not only for his unforgettable vocals, but also for the unparalleled sonic and emotional range that’s defined his work for more than half a century. 

“As a singer, ‘Wigg’ is capable of so many things,” says Treadway, who co-produced the record alongside Gary Gold (Smokey Robinson, Ivan Neville). “He can be a soul shouter with the best of them, but he can also sing ballads and jazz standards, and I wanted to make sure that versatility shines through here.” 

Walker developed his diverse tastes growing up in Nashville in the 1940s and ’50s, where a mix of gospel, country, and soul music filled the airwaves. Nicknamed “Wigg” by his mother after he was born with a full head of hair, Walker was a performer from the start, singing and tap dancing whenever he wasn’t busy shining shoes. By the time he turned 15, Walker had landed a regular gig at the famed New Era Club, and at 19, he cut his first single for Ted Jarrett’s legendary Champion Label (home to The Fairfield Four, as well as Larry Birdsong, who sang on Walker’s debut release, “Slave To Love”). 

“I got a lot of good experience in Nashville because I would open for all the big acts that came through town,” Walker recalls, “but there was only so far you could go there. When I turned 20, I headed to New York, and that’s where I got hooked up with James Brown, who’d seen me perform back in Tennessee.” 

As frontman for the J.C. Davis Band, Walker began opening for Brown in addition to sharing bills with the likes of Jackie Wilson, Etta James, Wilson Pickett, Little Willie John, Otis Redding, and Sam Cooke. In 1964, Walker launched his own group, Little Charles and the Sidewinders, which became a staple of the New York nightclub scene and would go on to record for both Chess and Decca Records. After more than a decade of sweating it out on the road, Walker took a role as a staff writer for Motown in the ’70s before eventually moving to Europe in the ’80s, where he continued to find enthusiastic audiences, particularly in England and Spain. The blues and R&B revival of the ’90s ultimately brought Walker back home to Nashville, though, and he soon found himself as busy as ever fronting a new group called The Dynamites.  

“I first met ‘Wigg’ when I joined The Dynamites back in 2007,” Treadway explains, “and that’s what led me to discover his incredible catalog. I left The Dynamites a few years later, but I would still play regular gigs backing up ‘Wigg’ with an organ trio, which was really the perfect setting for him because the sound could go in so many different directions.” 

Inspired by the freewheeling range and energy of those Nashville shows, Treadway began writing new material for Walker to sing, first crafting musical beds and melodic hooks to fit his voice, then collaborating with Walker and friend Eric Pitarelli on the lyrics.  

“Whenever I came to ‘Tread’ with an idea, he’d jump on it right away,” Walker recalls. “And when he’d come to me with a song, I could see where he was writing about me and my life, but also about his life, too, which made it feel really personal and relatable at the same time.” 

That creative synergy is plain to hear on This Love Is Gonna Last, which opens with the stirring title track. Flush with cinematic strings and punchy horns, the tune feels vintage and modern all at once as Walker pays tribute to the power of a timeless romance, singing, “I know this love is gonna last / I can feel it inside / And I know this feeling will never pass.” 

“My wife and I were together for 30 years,” Walker recalls. “She was my backbone, always there for me. I remember telling ‘Tread’ that through all the ups and downs, I always felt like our love was going to last, and it did.” 

Like much of the record, the song features a rich arrangement drawn from Treadway’s years of meticulous genre study, but it’s Walker’s chemistry with the core trio—Treadway, guitarist Pat Bergeson (Chet Atkins, Lyle Lovett), and drummer Pete Abbott (The Average White Band, Tom Jones)—that truly drives the album. The intoxicating “Whatever It Is” blurs the lines between R&B and funk as Walker pledges to work through any obstacles standing between him and his lover; the rousing “Serendipity” taps into the blues while celebrating the power of fate to bring two people together; and the tender “It’s About Trust” slows things down for a bittersweet rumination on what really matters, with Walker professing, “I’ll always love you / And you can count on me until the very end.” 

“‘It’s About Trust’ was an idea I brought to ‘Tread’ because it felt important to my relationship with my wife,” Walker explains, “but the trust between ‘Tread’ and me is a big part of this project, too. When you can trust your band and your producer and the material, you can really put together a lineup of songs that flow and mean something.” 

Certainly the album has its moments of levity—the sultry “Midnight Rendezvous” is looking for one thing and one thing only, while the playful “I Like’em Like That” revels in the attention of a beautiful woman—but perhaps no track captures Walker’s buoyant spirit better than the blissful “(Feels Like) Things Are Comin’ Our Way,” which finds him proclaiming, “Feels like things are comin’ our way / We’ve got something girl that’s here to stay / Ain’t nothing stoppin’ us now.” 

“That song sums up this whole album for me really,” Walker reflects. “After all the places I’ve been and all the bands I’ve performed with and all the recordings I’ve made, it feels like things are finally starting to come my way.”  

It’s about time.