by Barbara Lynn (1962)Barbara Lynn played guitar like a boss, wrote her own songs, and gave us the wonderful You’ll Lose a Good Thing. She’s like a hero I never knew before and her hit song is the kind that makes the world stop for a few minutes then seem like a better place when it ends.
by Ray Charles (1959)My sticking point with Ray Charles has always been over-production. Those Disney-esque backup vocals and cascading orchestra? It’s too much and distracts from his voice.
So, a live album like Ray Charles in Person is perfect.
Same great songs minus all the fluffy polish. It’s a quick one, blink and it’s over, but you get some classic favorites ( “The Right Time”, “What’d I Say”, “Drown In My Own Tears”).
Most impressive? It was recorded on a rainy night by one guy in the audience with a microphone but it sounds amazing.
by Timi YuroTimi Yuro, where have you been all my life? So crazy that a voice this good is virtually unknown today (or am I wrong? Has everyone been dancing to a Yuro party without me?)
Sometimes the arrangements are dull in comparison to her dynamic voice, but there’s lots to love in Hurt, a long compilation of her peak recording years.
If you don’t trust my taste, Morrissey and Elvis were both huge fans. Plus, she looked like a real life Rizzo.
at NPRHaving not found a babysitter (and honestly, being ok not leaving Van with a stranger) we probably do not have a Raphael Saadiq concert on our horizon (though fans, take note! – he will be playing Webster Hall May 10th).
Lucky for us NPR came to the rescue with this SXSW set that includes rocking tunes from the new album Stone Rollin, some from his breakout solo hit Instant Vintage and a couple from that loveliest of soul revival albums, The Way I See It.
The showmanship is lively, exciting and perfected. Do enjoy!
from AV Club, ChicagoI’ve been friends with Billy since he was sporting a satin Batman bike cap and me, ignorantly, a Rasta skull cap solely because I liked the colors. In other words for a very long time. And if there’s one thing I know, he compiles a list of soul songs, you best listen. Which is just what Van and I have been doing with his AV Club recommendations all day.
From the dirty Mary Jane ditty you don’t know to a Gene Chandler song that will have you wishing summer was here, the list is great. The world kind of stopped around me though when I listened to his Sam Cooke selection, “Mean Old World”.
Other favorites of mine are The Mighty Clouds of Joy’s “I’m Glad About It” a gospel song which Billy describes as “like something Nick Cave would write” and the very pretty “Go Now” by Bessie Banks.
Van was not so divided about his favorite. He perked up, smiling and bouncing to Booker T And The MGs, “Sunday Sermon”, Billy’s “favorite Sunday chill-out song” and Van loves to chill out.
If any of my readers are in Chicago, he and his band are playing at the Double Door tonight.
by Bloodstone (1973)While Bloodstone might sound like a current goth pop outfit, it’s actually a Kansas City R&B, funk soul band who hit a career high with Natural High. The doo wop ballad is lovely and surely got lots of girls to go to the back seats in 1973.
Van and I were grooving to this on a classic soul internet station called Got Radio R&B Classics. It is probably well known from its inclusion in the Jackie Brown soundtrack. You have to admit Tarantino knows how to put some good tunes together.
by Alicia Keys (2009)One good thing about winter isolation is that I rarely have to inadvertently listen to the radio playing in stores, that plus an ability to fast forward commercials? I’ve heard nary a Sugar Ray or an American Idol winner song in months and months.
The down side is that once and a while an uplifting gem slips through my radar, like Alicia Keys’ Empire State of Mind Part 2.
I am not sure if it makes me lame to the broader world that I didn’t know this song (when I asked the manicurist who sang it, she was polite enough to not give me an “are you serious?” look, yet I could tell that something had been decided for her about me right then and there). It was, as I’ve since learned, all the rage almost two years ago.
But then again, among the I-only-listen-to-radio-for-NPR crowd, it might make me just as lame to be so in love with such a popular hit – after all, it played right after the Gin Blossoms’ “Hey Jealousy”.
But lame or not – this sounds like modern day Donna Summer and there’s not a thing wrong with that. It makes one feel all alive with excitement, teaming with the hope of Diana Ross’ Mahogany stepping out to make her dreams come true in a huge shawl and a maxi skirt.
It reminds me of the initial thrill of coming to New York, when it felt as exciting in it’s vast energy as it was intimidating. And while I don’t walk down a street in Soho with the same dreamy eyes I had back in those days, the city can still amaze: when you drive back home during dusk and the skyline welcomes you, when snow first starts falling in the night time street lights, when… see look at me. I am super sentimental and it’s all because of this song.
But not the original Jay-Z version, I get less emotional to raps about Robert DeNiro.
by Jon Brion, Cee-lo and Eva Mendes (2010)It used to be I didn’t know this Jon Brion, then I saw him perform and I loved him, now I am ready to take it to what ever the next step is, because his Pimps Don’t Cry, performed by Cee-lo and Eva Mendes is fabulous.
Is it weird that some of my favorite songs are “parody songs” (see One Track Lover and other Matt Berry, see Reggae Man, see the Nashville soundtrack, see Higher and Higher)?
by Darondo (1973)Darondo led an unusual life: according to wikipedia “Later he traveled the world collecting interesting artifacts, became the king of Bay Area cable with three shows per day, and worked as a physical therapist coaxing patients to walk again” this was after a brief but brilliant stint as a soul singer which left us Let My People Go, a solid, hip swaying album.
You’ll hear hints of James Brown, Prince and Al Green among these nine songs and some will surely become new favorites for any other lovers of the genre out there. Didn’t I, which brought Darondo back into the spot light thanks to radio play, is one of those favorites and the whole album starts off with a great bass line bang with the title track.
It took years for this virtually forgotten artist to get a rerelease – but I can’t claim I found the album having any knowledge of the history. I was just browsing emusic (a site I am sure to tell you about soon) and was struck by the album cover, that featured, to my mind, possibly one of the coolest men on earth. Lucky for me, judging a book by its cover worked out (I actually find it often does) because I found some excellent new music that I can’t wait to share with friends.
by Sam Cooke (1963, released 1984)Sam Cooke is considered one of the founders of soul music. His short career boasted many well known hits, most of which he plays here on One Night Stand! Sam Cooke Live at the Harlem Square Club including the toe tapping Twistin’ the Night Away, Having a Party, and Chain Gang as well as some great love songs like my favorite Bring It On Home To Me, It’s All Right and Cupid.
Even if you’ve heard these songs before, they have new life in this quick, dynamic live performance at the cramped, hot (and according to the liner notes, scorpion infested) Florida club. The audience is palpably enthusiastic, Cooke is charismatic, and it just sounds like tons of fun. Only a year before his untimely and sordid death, none of the impending tragedy hangs in the air – just a passion and energy that’s hard to capture on tape. It’s considered one of the best live soul performance albums of all time.