A gospel-rooted, vocal-forward strain of house took root in two New York rooms across the 1990s. The rooms were Timmy Regisford's Shelter, founded in 1991, and Body & Soul, the Sunday-afternoon party launched in 1996 by Francois Kevorkian and promoter John Davis at Club Vinyl in Tribeca, where residents Danny Krivit, Francois K, and Joe Claussell held the floor until the weekly run at Vinyl ended in 2002. The sound prized hypnotic vocal arrangements, live-feeling percussion, and spiritual, Afro-Latin, and jazz textures over peak-time utility. Its lineage runs back through Larry Heard's Chicago deep house and Kerri Chandler's New Jersey garage sound, and forward into the rooms that came after. These are records of that continuum, not a setlist tied to any one night.
Where a general NYC house edition spans the city's whole house ecosystem, this lane isolates the gospel-vocal, spiritual, marathon-set underground: the specific Shelter and Body & Soul resident continuum, where depth, patience, and the soul vocal held in a long groove mattered more than peak-time spectacle.
Plays straight through on YouTube. Starting a track below stops it.
- 01
When Can Our Love Begin — Kimara Lovelace
Timmy Regisford Shelter Anthem · King Street Sounds, 1998 · Shelter, Timmy Regisford
High confidenceHeard in the room · ShelterOfficial Armada Music / King Street Sounds channel upload.
The Shelter Anthem mix in full: Regisford's deep, churchy 13-minute reworking of Kimara Lovelace's vocal.
on YouTube - 02
Bar A Thym — Kerri Chandler
Nite Grooves, 2005 · the New Jersey to New York deep-house axis
High confidenceOfficial visualizer from the Armada Music / King Street Sounds channel.
Chandler's pared-down keys and Jersey weight, a later Nite Grooves cut from the producer who carried the garage gospel into a new decade.
on YouTube - 03
To Be In Love — Masters At Work feat. India
MAW Records, 1997 · the mid-90s NYC underground, cross-room
High confidenceOfficial Defected Records video upload.
Louie Vega and Kenny Dope behind India's voice, a 1997 MAW Records single from the New York underground, later reissued by Defected.
on YouTube - 04
Can You Feel It — Mr. Fingers (Larry Heard)
Trax, 1986 · Lineage: Chicago deep house
High confidenceOfficial, label-delivered upload on the Mr. Fingers Topic channel.
One of the first deep house records, from Chicago, and an ancestor of the New York spiritual rooms' sound. Included as the ancestral root, not a room exclusive.
on YouTube - 05
Mystery of Love — Mr. Fingers (Larry Heard)
Alleviated, 1985 · Lineage: Chicago deep house
High confidenceMr. Fingers Topic channel upload. A 1986 Fingers Inc. vocal version with Robert Owens also exists.
Heard's slow, synth-built instrumental, one of two tracks he worked up in a single night. The lineage these New York rooms descend from.
on YouTube - 06
Cascades of Colour — The Ananda Project
Wamdue Black Mix · Nite Grooves, 1998 · Body & Soul-era deep house
High confidenceReplaced on Oct 13, 2026 after the earlier Topic upload of the Extended Mix went dead and no official upload of that mix remained. Now the King Street Sounds channel visualizer of the Wamdue Black Mix, from the 1998 EP, which lists no Extended Mix.
The Ananda Project's debut, Chris Brann's production with Gaelle Adisson's vocal, on the King Street sub-label Nite Grooves.
on YouTube - 07
Je Ka Jo — Joe Claussell, Vera Mara
Vocal · Ibadan, 1999 · Body & Soul, Joe Claussell
High confidenceOfficial Ibadan Records channel upload.
The Body & Soul resident setting Vera Mara's vocal over live percussion in a long spiritual workout, the Sunday-afternoon aesthetic distilled to its source.
on YouTube - 08
Casa Forte — Snowboy
Joe Claussell's Spiritual Life Samba Remix · Ubiquity, 1999 · Body & Soul, Joe Claussell remix
High confidenceOfficial Ubiquity Records channel upload.
Claussell's Afro-Latin samba reconstruction of Snowboy's take on Edu Lobo's Casa Forte, the live-percussion texture that was a Body & Soul signature.
on YouTube - 09
That's The Way Love Is — Ten City
Underground Mix, Extended Version · Atlantic, 1989 · Chicago-to-New York garage gospel claimed by the deep rooms
High confidenceOfficial upload on the Ten City Topic channel.
Byron Stingily's falsetto over Timmy Regisford's string-led Underground Mix, the Chicago-to-New York garage gospel that the deep New York rooms claimed as their own.
on YouTube
How this edition was sourced
Every track carries one of two confidence flags. This edition: 9 high, 0 medium.
- High confidence
- Version and source are not marked unconfirmed. Some notes still list an open check; they are shown as written.
- Medium · version unconfirmed
- The exact version or source still needs a human ear-check.
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