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Sweet Baby Of Mine – Ruth Brown Classics (1954-55)
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- 15 The Usual Thing - Marshall Crenshaw Marshall Crenshaw (1982)
- 16 Camptown – Joe Craven Camptown (1996)
- 17 Its Wonderful They Cant Take That Away From Me – Anita O’Day Jazz Club Vocals ()
- 18 Going Back To Okinawa - Ry Cooder Get Rhythm (1987)
14 Sweet Baby Of Mine – Ruth Brown Classics (1954-55) I remember Ruth Brown from my youth. She was one of the early R’n’R artists – back when black R&B artists started being accepted into traditionally white rock. Before that time, most of the good R&B stuff was just covered by white artists, e.g., Little Richard’s Tutti Frutti covered by none other than Pat Boone. I narrowed Ruth Brown’s selections down to: Daddy Daddy, Mambo Baby, Oh What A Dream, That Train Don’t Stop Here, and Sweet Baby Of Mine.
That left Sweet Baby Of Mine, which I think represents Ruth’s work very well. Hope you agree. This track was another download before retirement. They called Atlantic Records "the house that Ruth built" during the 1950s, and they weren't referring to the Sultan of Swat. Ruth Brown's regal hitmaking reign from 1949 to the close of the '50s helped tremendously to establish the New York label's predominance in the R&B field. Later, the business all but forgot her — she was forced to toil as domestic help for a time — but she returned to the top, her status as a postwar R&B pioneer (and tireless advocate for the rights and royalties of her peers) recognized worldwide. Young Ruth Weston was inspired initially by jazz chanteuses Sarah Vaughan, Billie Holiday, and Dinah Washington. She ran away from her Portsmouth home in 1945 to hit the road with trumpeter Jimmy Brown, whom she soon married. A month with bandleader Lucky Millinder's orchestra in 1947 ended abruptly in Washington, D.C., when she was canned for delivering a round of drinks to members of the band. Cab Calloway's sister Blanche gave Ruth a gig at her Crystal Caverns nightclub and assumed a managerial role in the young singer's life. DJ Willis Conover dug Brown's act and recommended her to Ahmet Ertegun and Herb Abramson, bosses of a fledgling imprint named Atlantic. Unfortunately, Brown's debut session for the firm was delayed by a nine-month hospital stay caused by a serious auto accident en route to New York that badly injured her leg. When she finally made it to her first date in May of 1949, she made up for lost time by waxing the torch ballad "So Long" (backed by guitarist Eddie Condon's band), which proved to be her first hit. Brown's seductive vocal delivery shone incandescently on her Atlantic smashes "Teardrops in My Eyes" (an R&B chart-topper for 11 weeks in 1950), "I'll Wait for You" and "I Know" in 1951, 1952's "5-10-15 Hours" (another number-one rocker), the seminal "(Mama) He Treats Your Daughter Mean" in 1953, and a tender Chuck Willis-penned "Oh What a Dream" and the timely "Mambo Baby" the next year. Along the way, Frankie Laine tagged her "Miss Rhythm" during an engagement in Philly. Brown belted a series of her hits on the groundbreaking TV program Showtime at the Apollo in 1955, exhibiting delicious comic timing while trading sly one-liners with MC Willie Bryant (ironically, ex-husband Jimmy Brown was a member of the show's house band). After an even two-dozen R&B chart appearances for Atlantic that ended in 1960 with "Don't Deceive Me" (many of them featuring hell-raising tenor sax solos by Willis "Gator" Jackson, who many mistakenly believed to be Brown's husband), Brown faded from view. After raising her two sons and working a nine-to-five job, Brown began to rebuild her musical career in the mid-'70s. Her comedic sense served her well during a TV sitcom stint co-starring with McLean Stevenson in Hello, Larry, in a meaty role in director John Waters' 1985 sock-hop satire film Hairspray, and during her 1989 Broadway starring turn in Black and Blue (which won her a Tony Award). There were more records for Fantasy in the '80s and '90s (notably 1991's jumping Fine and Mellow), and a lengthy tenure as host of National Public Radio's "Harlem Hit Parade" and "BluesStage." Brown's nine-year ordeal to recoup her share of royalties from all those Atlantic platters led to the formation of the nonprofit Rhythm & Blues Foundation, an organization dedicated to helping others in the same frustrating situation. Factor in all those time-consuming activities, and it's a wonder Ruth Brown has time to sing anymore. But she does (quite royally, too), her pipes mellowed but not frayed by the ensuing decades that have seen her rise to stardom not once, but twice. The Best of Ruth Brown [Rhino] Artist Ruth Brown Date of Release May 25, 1949 - May 1959 inprint AMG Rating 5* Selected For those who want a cheaper and more concise collection of her best Atlantic cuts than the two-CD Miss Rhythm, this superb 23-track CD has the cream of her '50s work, including no less than 19 Top Ten R&B singles. Charting her evolution from her jazzy debut, "So Long, " through jump blues and early rock'n'roll, it also adds a bonus of two previously unissued live cuts from 1959. — Richie Unterberger 1. So Long (Harris/Melsher/Morgan) 2. Teardrops from My Eyes (Toombs) 3. I'll Wait for You (Toombs) 4. I Know (Abramson/Ertegun/Toombs) 5. Shine on (Bright Moon Shine On) (Whittaker) 6. 5-10-15 Hours (Toombs) 7. Daddy Daddy (Toombs) 8. (Mama) He Treats Your Daughter Mean (Lance/Singleton/Wallace) 9. Wild, Wild Young Men (Ertegun) 10. Mend Your Ways (Chase/Kirkland) 11. Oh, What a Dream (Willis) 12. Mambo Baby (McCoy/Singleton) 13. I Can See Everybody's Baby (Kirkland/Thomas) 14. As Long as I'm Movin' (Calhoun) 15. It's Love Baby (24 Hours of the Day) (Jarrett) 16. Love Has Joined Us Together (James/Smith) 17. I Want to Do More (Leiber/Stoller) 18. Sweet Baby of Mine (Sharp) 19. Lucky Lips (Leiber/Stoller) 20. This Little Girl's Gone Rockin' (Curtis/Darin) 21. I Don't Know (Benton/Stevenson) 22. (Mama) He Treats Your Daughter Mean [live] (Lance/Singleton/Wallace) 23. Oh, What a Dream [live] (Willis) Clyde McPhatter - Performer Ruth Brown - Vocals King Curtis - Saxophone 15 The Usual Thing - Marshall Crenshaw Marshall Crenshaw (1982) I don’t know how popular this track is (was), but I do know it is popular in this house. We both fell in love with it on first hearing. I got it from “Music Man’ Mahoney – thanks Bob. It is one of several new-to-me tracks that I try to include on each Naweedna CD. I’ve got a few more to salt into future compilations. Hope you all don’t find them too trite or over-played. Singer/songwriter Marshall Crenshaw has built up an impressive body of work over the course of his career, showing a fine craft for everything he approaches while stubbornly following his own creative muse to reach that end. To say that Crenshaw has had an interesting career so far would be putting it mildly. He's been in the movies and he's been in the road-show version of Beatlemania. His songs have been plastered all over the soundtracks to several hit movies and covered by artists as diverse as Robert Gordon, Bette Midler, Kelly Willis, Marti Jones and the Gin Blossoms. He got a bunch of his like-minded show business acquaintances together and put out a book on all the great and lousy rock & roll movies in existence called Hollywood Rock & Roll. He's put together comps of his own for record companies (most notably Hillbilly Music, Thank God! for the short lived Bug Music label) and has contributed chapters to books on vintage guitar collecting. Crenshaw is a true rock & roll renaissance man while still remaining the everyman. Born in Detroit and raised in the surrounding area, Marshall played ina number of different bands in high school, eventually landing in his first professional combo, ASTIGAFA (an acronym for "A Splendid Time Is Guaranteed for All," cribbed from the back of Sgt. Pepper). Although nothing releasable came of this venture, it surely cemented the basic ingredients of his style that would surface full bloom at the dawn of his solo career. According to Crenshaw, "That band really didn't have a high profile in Detroit, but I was using that time, working alone, woodshedding, gathering information. Around '73, I just stopped listening to the radio and just became immersed listening to old 45s from the '50s and early '60s. It seemed to me that there was more immediacy in those records than the stuff that was on the radio at that time." But just as his ears learned to love echoey mono '50s records, his songwriting influences went in an opposite direction: "One batch of stuff that I really feel that I was strongly influenced by was a lot of the R&B-pop kind of stuff that was around in the early '70s. I just love that romantic kind of R&B kind of sound, all those chord changes in those tunes." But Detroit was not a musical hotbed by the late '70s, so Crenshaw responded to an ad in Rolling Stone and auditioned for the Broadway musical Beatlemania. Hired as a John Lennon understudy, Crenshaw moved to New York City and quickly found himself in a heady, competitive situation. After serving a six-month "Beatle boot camp" training, he appeared with the show for six months in Hollywood and San Francisco, then finished up his last six months with the production on the road. Though he found the show creatively stifling, it made him sit down and figure out what kind of music he wanted to do and eventually — after buying a four-track recorder — started making demos whenever he was home. Soon Marshall was armed both with demos galore — dropping them off to any show business connection that might listen — and his younger brother was playing drums in his trio, which was starting to plug into New York City's burgeoning new wave club scene. About that time Crenshaw hooked up with local scenester Alan Betrock, who had recently started his own label, Shake Records. It was Crenshaw's debut single "Something's Gonna Happen" on Betrock's label that kicked up enough noise to bring major label interest knocking at his door. Signing with Warner Brothers in 1982, Marshall recorded five superbly crafted studio albums before parting ways seven years later to sign with MCA for one album, Life's Too Short. During this flurry of activity, Crenshaw also flexed his acting muscles, portraying a high-school bandleader in Peggy Sue Got Married, Buddy Holly in La Bamba and a guest appearance on the Nickelodeon series Pete and Pete. Emerging from a three-year hiatus, Marshall signed with the independent label Razor & Tie label, released a live album (Live: My Truck Is My Home) in 1994 and in 1996, released a new studio effort, Miracle of Science. The 9 Volt Years, a collection of demos and home recordings, followed in 1998, and a year later Crenshaw returned with a new studio effort, #447. Marshall Crenshaw [1982] Artist Marshall Crenshaw Date of Release Apr 28, 1982 (release) AMG Rating 5 * checked Genre Rock Time 33:28 On the cover of his self-titled LP, Marshall Crenshaw — complete with crew-cut, thick glasses and unfashionable suit — looks like nothing so much as the second coming of Buddy Holly, or possibly an Americanized Elvis Costello; listening to the record itself does little to alter those first impressions, and even if his subsequent LPs failed to live up to such immense promise, there's no doubting this debut release's enduring greatness. Working without any kind of smoke or mirrors, Crenshaw delivers simple, straightforward pop music invested with remarkable melodic ingenuity; his material is timeless and fresh — gems like "Someday, Someway," "She Can't Dance," and "Not for Me," are the kinds of songs which would fit like a glove on both oldies radio and contemporary Top 40 play lists in any era. Witty, assured, and utterly infectious, Marshall Crenshaw remains among the finest debuts of its day. [Rhino reissued Marshall Crenshaw in 2000 with nine bonus tracks, including demos, live cuts, and non-LP B-sides.] — Jason Ankeny 1. There She Goes Again (Crenshaw) - 2:39 2. Someday, Someway (Crenshaw) - 2:53 3. Girls (Crenshaw) - 3:04 4. I'll Do Anything (Crenshaw) - 3:03 5. Rockin' Around in N.Y.C. (Crenshaw) - 3:10 6. The Usual Thing (Crenshaw) - 3:06 7. She Can't Dance (Cioffi/Crenshaw/Todd) - 2:47 8. Cynical Girl (Crenshaw) - 2:37 9. Mary Anne (Crenshaw) - 2:57 10. Soldier of Love (Lay Down Your Arms) (Cason/Moon) - 2:39 11. Not for Me (Crenshaw) - 2:38 12. Brand New Lover (Crenshaw) - 2:39
Artist Joe Craven Date of Release 1996 AMG Rating 4 * Genre Rock Time 59:47 Versatility is the dominating word to describe this disc. Multi-instrumentalist hardly begins to describe Joe Craven. Perhaps he is best known for his performances with Jerry Garcia, David Grisman and his band Psychograss. On this CD he steps dramatically to the forefront. He plays upwards of 30 instruments; predominately known for his mandolin and fiddle playing, he strides to the center on a number of other stringed instruments such as the banjolin and ukulele, while providing most of the percussion on a astounding variety of instruments. The number of instruments played well is complemented by the plethora of styles he plays in. This is music that encircles the world; all aboard for Australia, India, Japan, Ireland and South Africa to name five of the stops on this journey of 14 songs in as many musical styles. All are done with an exhilarating love for the music which shines through. Why did I give it eight and not nine stars if I love it this much? It sometimes shifts styles just a bit too abruptly for my mind. I would prefer to make the journey in two or three discs. But that is personal. This is a journey not to be missed on any account. — Bob Gottlieb 1. Soldiers of Joy (Public Domain [1]) - 4:58 2. Uke Pick Waltz (Public Domain [1]) - 3:32 3. Camp Town (Public Domain [1]) - 3:37 4. Rites of Man (Public Domain [1]) - 4:48 5. Hot Turkey (Public Domain [1]) - 3:39 6. Shake in the Barley (Public Domain [1]) - 3:25 7. Star of the Country Down (Traditional) - 5:55 8. Liberte (Public Domain [1]) - 3:29 9. The New Iberians (Public Domain [1]) - 3:46 10. Combole (Public Domain [1]) - 6:07 11. The Fez of Abu (Public Domain [1]) - 3:33 12. Old Joe's Delhi (Public Domain [1]) - 4:02 13. Kitchen Girl (Traditional) - 4:31 14. Bonaparte (Public Domain [1]) - 4:25 17 It's Wonderful & They Can't Take That Away From Me – Anita O’Day Jazz Club Vocals (??) We lost Anita this year … another great female jazz voice has been silenced. I got this track from one of Jason’s CDs. I can’t seem to find the exact CD now, so I can’t find a release date for this particular Jazz Club compilation CD. A little Internet research revealed that this is one of her signature tracks, so I think I made a pretty good choice. Goodbye, Anita, you will be missed. Few female singers matched the hard-swinging and equally hard-living Anita O'Day for sheer exuberance and talent in all areas of jazz vocals. Though three or four outshone her in pure quality of voice, her splendid improvising, wide dynamic tone and innate sense of rhythm made her the most enjoyable singer of the age. O'Day's first appearances in a big band shattered the traditional image of a demure female vocalist by swinging just as hard as the other musicians on the bandstand, best heard on her vocal trading with Roy Eldridge on the Gene Krupa recording "Let Me Off Uptown." After making her solo debut in the mid-'40s, she began incorporating bop modernism into her vocals and recorded over a dozen of the best vocal LPs of the era for Verve during the 1950s and '60s. Though hampered by heavy drinking and later, drug addiction, during her peak period, she made a comeback and continued singing into the 1990s. Born Anita Belle Colton in Chicago, she was raised largely by her mother, and entered her first marathon-dance contest while barely a teenager. She spent time on the road and occasionally back at home, later moving from dancing to singing at the contests. After bad experiences amid brief tenures with Benny Goodman and even Raymond Scott, O'Day earned a place in Gene Krupa's band in 1941. Several weeks later, Krupa also hired trumpeter Roy Eldridge, and the trio combined to become an effective force displayed on hits like "Let Me Off Uptown," "Boogie Blues" and "Just a Little Bit South of North Carolina." She spent a brief period away from Krupa with Woody Herman, but returned to the band, only to have it break up by 1943. After moving to Stan Kenton, she starred on Kenton's first big hit, 1944's "And Her Tears Flowed Like Wine." Another stint with Krupa presaged her solo debut in 1946, and with drummer John Poole as her accompanist, she recorded a moderate hit one year later with the novelty "Hi Ho Trailus Boot Whip." Her career really ignited after her first album (and the first LP ever released by Verve), 1955's Anita (also known as This Is Anita). Much more successful in the jazz world than she was in its pop equivalent, she performed at jazz festivals and jazz-oriented concerts, appearing with figures including Louis Armstrong, Thelonious Monk, and George Shearing. Her performance at 1958's Newport Jazz Festival made her fame worldwide after being released on film titled Jazz on a Summer's Day. O'Day's series of almost twenty Verve LPs during the '50s and '60s proved her to be one of the most distinctive, trend-setting, and successful vocal artists of the time, arguably surpassed only by Frank Sinatra and Ella Fitzgerald. She worked with a variety of arrangers and in many different settings, including a hard-swinging Billy May collaboration (Anita O'Day Swings Cole Porter with Billy May), an excellent, intimate set with the Oscar Peterson Quartet (Anita Sings the Most), several with the mainstream Buddy Bregman Orchestra (Pick Yourself Up, Anita), one with the cool-toned Jimmy Giuffre (Cool Heat), and a Latin date with Cal Tjader (Time for Two) as well as a collaborative LP with the Blue Note instrumental trio the Three Sounds. Even by the early '60s however, her ebullient voice had begun sounding tired; the cumulative effects of heroin addiction, its resulting lifestyle, and a non-stop concert schedule forced her into a physical collapse by 1967. 18 Going Back To Okinawa - Ry Cooder Get Rhythm (1987) This is the fourth Cooder to be included on a Naweedna CD. The other three are Cherry Ball Blues (2002A), See You In Hell Blind Boy (2002B), and Chloe (2003). There will be more. Okinawa came from a tape of a vinyl Kilbury bought and gave to me to record. We used to go to Buzzo’s and each buy an album to share – back in the day. Okinawa is one of those tunes that grows on you with repeated listenings. It has particular relevance for us because Janie spent her formative years in Okinawa where her father was stationed. Whether serving as a session musician, solo artist, or soundtrack composer, Ry Cooder's chameleon-like fretted instrument virtuosity, songwriting, and choices of material encompass an incredibly eclectic range of North American musical styles, including rock & roll, blues, reggae, Tex-Mex, Hawaiian, Dixieland jazz, country, folk, R&B, gospel, and vaudeville. The 16-year-old Cooder began his career in 1963 in a blues band with Jackie DeShannon and then formed the short-lived Rising Sons in 1965 with Taj Mahal and Spirit drummer Ed Cassidy. Cooder met producer Terry Melcher through the Rising Sons and was invited to perform at several sessions with Paul Revere and the Raiders. During his subsequent career as a session musician, Cooder's trademark slide guitar work graced the recordings of such artists as Captain Beefheart (Safe As Milk), Randy Newman, Little Feat, Van Dyke Parks, the Rolling Stones (Let It Bleed, Sticky Fingers), Taj Mahal, and Gordon Lightfoot. He also appeared on the soundtracks of Candy and Performance. Cooder made his debut as a solo artist in 1970 with a self-titled album featuring songs by Leadbelly, Blind Willie Johnson, Sleepy John Estes, and Woody Guthrie. The follow-up, Into the Purple Valley, introduced longtime cohorts Jim Keltner on drums and Jim Dickinson on bass, and it and Boomer's Story largely repeated and refined the syncopated style and mood of the first. In 1974, Cooder produced what is generally regarded as his best album, Paradise and Lunch, and its follow-up, Chicken Skin Music, showcased a potent blend of Tex-Mex, Hawaiian, gospel, and soul music, and featured contributions from Flaco Jimenez and Gabby Pahinui. In 1979, Bop Till You Drop was the first major-label album to be recorded digitally. In the early '80s, Cooder began to augment his solo output with soundtrack work on such films as Blue Collar, The Long Riders, and The Border; he has gone on to compose music for Southern Comfort, Goin' South, Paris, Texas, Streets of Fire, Bay, Blue City, Crossroads, Cocktail, Johnny Handsome, Steel Magnolias, and Geronimo. Music By Ry Cooder (1995) compiled two discs' worth of highlights from Cooder's film work. In 1992, Cooder joined Keltner, John Hiatt, and renowned British tunesmith Nick Lowe, all of whom had played on Hiatt's Bring the Family, to form Little Village, which toured and recorded one album. Cooder next turned his attention to world music, recording the album A Meeting by the River with Indian musician V.M. Bhatt. Cooder's next project, a duet album with renowned African guitarist Ali Farka Toure titled Talking Timbuktu, won the 1994 Grammy for Best World Music Recording. Get Rhythm Rating 3 Stars Release Date 1987 Time 40:43 "The Musician's Musician." "The Master of the Eclectic." There are probably a dozen more titles by which this "guitar player" is known. To even refer to him as a guitar player is probably a gross mislabeling of this musician. He defies any sort of categorization; this is his greatest strength and for some his weakness. The theme for these nine cuts is rhythm of all different ilk. I won't even give the parameters because he seems to have none. I wondered how many different instruments he played on this album (I thought I counted five different types of guitar); it only says guitar and vocal for his credits. Listen to his version of "All Shook Up," more bop and rhythm than Elvis could put into four of his songs. It seems musicians line up to play with him, and they feel he did them a favor by letting them play on his albums. He always gives them plenty of space to do what they do. This CD will make the dead start tapping their toes. 01-Get Rhythm (Johnny Cash) 02-Low-Commotion (Cooder-Keltner) 03-Going Back To Okinawa (Cooder) 04-13 Question Method (Chuck Berry) 05-Women Will Rule The World (Raymond Quevedo) 06-All Shook Up (Otis Blackwell-Elvis Presley) 07-I Can Tell By The Way You Smell (Walter Davis) 08-Across The Border Line (Cooder-Dickinson-Hiatt) 09-Let's Have A Ball (Bunn) Directory: ~boger -> SaturdayAM -> Saturday%20AM%20Downloads -> music music -> General Comments for all Naweedna cds Download 247.48 Kb. Share with your friends:
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