Gospel-forged R&B crooners Jagged Edge included raps by Busta Rhymes, Da Brat and Jermaine Dupri on their hit debut album, A Jagged Era, but it isn't something they're likely to do again.

"We're going to try and break that mold," Jagged Edge member Case Dinero (born Brandon Casey, 21) explained last week from the Atlanta, Ga., offices of SoSo Def Records. "Right now the market is saturated with rap and R&B mixes. For our next album, I don't think we're going to use any rappers."

"We love rap," interjected Wingo Dollar (born Richard Wingo, 21). "We all grew up with rap, so I don't want to dis it, but we really want to stand on our own two feet."

And they have the vocal chops to do it. In fact, it's their refined voices that separate Jagged Edge from many others in the business.

All the members of Jagged Edge met while singing in church choirs in Decatur, Ga. Yet no traditional choir would be caught singing such Jagged Edge lyrics as "Girl it ain't no thing/ If you're with it we can swing/ I'm ready and willing/ I hope you feel what I'm feeling" (from their song "Ready & Willing"), but the group said that their gospel training helped them tremendously through the recording of their nearly gold-selling (500,000 copies sold) A Jagged Era.

"It helps a lot when you're putting songs together," Dollar explained. "Not to put a gospel feel on it, but when you've got to get in there and do the right stuff and put harmonies together."

The four members of the vocal quartet said that they believe A Jagged Era, executive-produced by Dupri, is a fine way to launch a career.

It's packed with sexual songs such as "Slow Motion" (RealAudio excerpt) and mid-tempo head-bobbers including "Addicted To Your Love." In addition, the album has those name rappers on board -- Da Brat and Dupri on "The Way You Talk" and Busta Rhymes on "I'll Be Right There" (RealAudio excerpt).

SoundScan reports that 400,000 people have picked up the album since its release in February of this year -- keeping it on Billboard's Heatseekers album chart for 28 weeks. Heatseekers tracks new and developing artists who have never been in the upper half of the Billboard 200 albums chart.

The majority of A Jagged Era was written in the studio in a casual, collaborative process that, the singers said, consisted of hanging out with Dupri for a couple of months before actually recording the album.

"We were just sitting around with [Dupri] for a long time, and before we knew it, we had three or four songs done," Brasco (born Brian Casey) said. "At that point, Jermaine was like, 'OK, let's do this.' "

The group, which also includes Quick (born Kyle Norman, 21), worked together on the songwriting and harmonies for three months, taking breaks to let Dupri work on his own solo album.

"We could've done it quicker," Dollar said. "But we have no complaints about working a couple days a week for less than eight hours a day."

Still, it's easy going for the members of Jagged Edge, according to Brasco. He asserted that their collective choir background gave them the technique and the stamina to take care of business.

"With other artists, they sing two or three tracks, and then their voice is shot," he said. "You can't be that way when you sing in a choir."