Coko

Born June 13th, 1970 in The Bronx, New York singer-songwriter Cheryl “Coko” Gamble was raised on a diet of soul and gospel, joining a local choir aged just three with encouragement from her musical mother. By the early 1990s, she had co-founded the R&B trio Sisters With Voices (SWV), with whom she soared to success over the course of an eight-album deal with RCA. As the group’s lead singer, Gamble went on to secure several multi-platinum hits and four GRAMMY nominations, simultaneously sourcing additional opportunities to thrive in her own right. A pair of contributions to film soundtracks toward the end of the decade – the UK chart-topping Will Smith collaboration “Men in Black” and the Jon B and JAY-Z tag-team “Keep It Real” – hinted at her promising prospects as a soloist and, by the time that SWV called an extended hiatus in 1998, she had begun work on a debut album. The uptempo R&B effort Hot Coko arrived in 1999, producing her first and only Hot 100 solo hit in the form of “Sunshine”. SWV reunited in 2005, with Gamble juggling her contributions to the group alongside her own career. Her second solo album, Grateful, emerged in 2006 via specialist label Light Records, signalling a shift toward gospel which would become a common theme throughout much of her later oeuvre. Recorded alongside Rev. James Cleveland’s GMWA Mass Choir, the LP included the minor hit “Endow Me”, a high-profile rendition of the Clark Sisters song which saw Gamble joined by R&B contemporaries Faith Evans, Lil’ Mo and Fantasia. After releasing two more solo works – the 2008 covers album A Coko Christmas and the deeply religious 2009 LP The Winner in Me – she regrouped with her SWV colleagues, signing to eOne and sharing the new joint album I Missed Us (2012). Four years on, the trio returned with another all-new album entitled Still.

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