Tag Archives: Cover Songs

Michael Martin Murphey: Buckaroo Blue Grass II – Riding Song

Leave a reply

Second helping of Murphey’s bluegrass reinterpretations

Michael Martin Murphey’s 1975 single “Wildfire” was only the most public aspect of a long and rich career. He appeared on the country charts throughout the 1980s and subsequently developed a deep affinity for cowboy songs. Over the years he’s revisited key parts of his catalog, and in 2009 produced a volume of tunes reinterpreted in a bluegrass style. A year later he’s back with a second volume that sounds even more confident. His latest concentrates on songs from the early-to-mid 70s albums Geronimo’s Cadillac, Michael Murphey, Cosmic Cowboy Souvenir, Blue Sky-Night Thunder and Swans Against the Sun. He picks up “Tonight We Ride” and “Running Blood” from more recent albums and covers the Glaser Brothers’ “Running Gun.” The latter was originally recorded by Marty Robbins in 1959 for his legendary Gunfighter Ballads and Trail Songs, closing the circle on Murphey’s love of western song.

Opening the disk with a hot-picked arrangement of 1975’s country-rock shuffle “Blue Sky Riding Song,” Murphey and his assembled musician friends serve notice that there are plenty of instrumental fireworks ahead. Pat Flynn on guitar, Ronny McCoury on mandolin, Charli Cushman on banjo and Andy Leftwich on fiddle warm up to a canter in 15 seconds flat, with Craig Nelson’s bass pushing Murphey’s exuberant vocals along the open trail. The instrumental break gives each player a chance to flash as the others provide progressive, ensemble backing. The group also turns it up for 1976’s “Renegade.” Though it’s lightened from its original country-rock sound, the acoustic instruments provide plenty of intensity as the players, including Rob Ickes on dobro, Sam Bush on mandolin, Charlie Cushman on banjo and Andy Leftwich on fiddle, stretch out for a length instrumental coda.

Murphey’s bluegrass reinterpretations provide a matured consideration of earlier performances, but also bring his songwriting into focus. Laying a bluegrass motif across twenty years of varied compositions highlights the consistent quality of his work. In some instances, like the Hot Club styling of 1985’s “Tonight We Ride,” the retooling is minimal, in others, such as the treatment of “Swans Against the Sun” and banjo lead of “Running Blood” the new arrangements bring out something new. Even the well-trod “Wildfire,” with its echoes of ‘70s soft rock, gets a fresh garland of twang and a powerful duet vocal from Carrie Hassler.

Murphey’s voice has gained an appealing edge over the years, and this set shows off both his adaptability as a performer and depth as a songwriter. His song notes show as much love for his material as does his singing; this is also evident in the feeling performances of songs he’s no doubt sung thousands of times. This is a great album for longtime fans, bluegrass listeners and all those top-40 ears that lost track of Murphey after “Carolina Pines” and “Renegade” slipped out of the Top 40 in the mid-70s. [©2010 hyperbolium dot com]

MP3 | Track Sampler for Buckaroo Blue Grass II
Michael Martin Murphey’s Home Page
Michael Martin Murphey’s MySpace Page

Randy Kohrs: Quicksand

Leave a reply

Bluegrass basics salted with country, soul and gospel

Randy Kohrs is a multi-instrumentalist who’s backed some of country music’s brightest luminaries, including Patty Loveless, Hal Ketchum, Dolly Parton and Jim Lauderdale. He’s also crafted a solo career that’s brought together his talent as a picker with vocals that are quite compelling. His music is solid on bluegrass fundamentals, but his resonator guitar adds a unique voice to the acoustic arrangements, and his singing ranges from traditional baritone/tenor harmonies to country twang and gospel. Highlights on his latest solo outing include country songs from Webb Pierce (“It’s Been So Long”) and Del Reeves (“This Must Be the Bottom”), up-tempo picking on the original “Time and Time Again,” and the blue gospel “Down Around Clarksdale” and “If You Think it’s Hot Here.” The terrific backing vocals of Scat Springs heard on this latter track can also be found on a cover of Tom T. Hall’s “More About John Henry.” Kohrs’ acoustic country tunes may be too contemporary for bluegrass purists, but with the traditional form well-covered by so many outfits, there’s something to be said for adding new ideas to the original framework. [©2010 hyperbolium dot com]

Randy Kohrs’ Home Page
Randy Kohrs’ MySpace Page

Bill Emerson and Sweet Dixie: Southern

Leave a reply

Banjo legend leads his bluegrass band on a second outing

Bill Emerson is a legendary banjo player with roots stretching back to the late ‘50s. He co-founded the Country Gentlemen with guitarist Charlie Waller, held a featured slot with Jimmy Martin, and provided direction to musicians such as Jerry Douglas and Ricky Skaggs. He spent 20 years in the military, most of it in the Navy’s bluegrass band, Country Current, began recording as a leader in the early 90s, and formed Sweet Dixie for their eponymous debut in 2007. Emerson’s always stretched the edges of the bluegrass canon, mixing traditional material with songs drawn from country, folk and rock. Most famously, he’s credited with adapting Manfred Mann’s “Fox on the Run” into a bluegrass staple.

Sweet Dixie’s new album includes a few traditional sources, such as Alton Delmore’s “The Midnight Train,” Hazel Dickins’ “I Can’t Find Your Love Anymore,” and Tompall Glaser’s “I Don’t Care Anymore” the latter drawn from the catalog of Flatt & Scruggs. The nostalgia of Lionel Cartwright’s “Old Coal Town” is also a good fit, and the English folk of “The Black Fox” is augmented with mandolin and banjo spotlights. More inventively, the group reworks Marty Stuart’s rolling country-rock “Sometimes the Pleasure’s Worth the Pain” (originally from 1999’s The Pilgrim) into an up-tempo acoustic arrangement, and Chris Hillman’s “Love Reunited” is shorn of its original ‘80s production sound, trading the Desert Rose Band’s crystalline guitars for a more timeless banjo.

Highlights of the group’s new material include Vince Gill’s grievous “Life in the Old Farm Town,” reflecting the dismantling of American life in the parting out of a foreclosed farm. Sweet Dixie plays with tremendous group chemistry, adding solos that are compelling without giving into the flashiness that plagues many bluegrassers. They can pick up a storm, as heard on “The Midnight Train,” but “Grandpa Emory’s Banjo” and the instrumental “Grandma’s Tattooss” celebrate the musicality of their instruments rather than the breakneck speed at which the players’ fingers can fly. The latter features Emerson doubling the song’s writer, banjo instructor and fellow-picker Janet Davis.

Guitarist Tom Adams handles most of the lead vocals, with bassist Teri Chism and mandolinist Wayne Lanham each taking turns up front; the group’s energetic harmonies seque smoothly with the instruments. Lyrics of lost love, suicide, and a child’s funeral are sung with the tenderness of hope rather than the bleakness of depression. As the group’s visionary, Emerson balances innovation and tradition, pulling new material into the bluegrass orbit without sacrificing the warmth and comfort of tradition. His band has the confidence to let their playing serve the material, and though Emerson’s not written any new songs for this album, his ear for other writers’ works is unerring. [©2010 hyperbolium dot com]

MP3 | Track Sampler for Southern
Bill Emerson and Sweet Dixie’s Home Page

Frank Sinatra: Strangers in the Night

Leave a reply

Sinatra climbs past the Beatles to the top of the heap

By 1966 Frank Sinatra had ridden the roller coaster of artistic and commercial success to several high points, maintaining an unmatched profile of fame through radio, live performance, recording, television and film. He’d broken through as a swing-era big band singer, wowed bobby-soxers with his solo crooning, and reinvented himself (with the help of legendary arrangers such as Nelson Riddle) as a sophisticated interpreter of standards, a deep-feeling balladeer, and a ring-a-ding-ding hipster. In the last half of the 1950s he unleashed a string of iconic albums that showed his thorough mastery of down-tempo ballads, lush orchestration and snappy up-tempo romps, and in 1961 he literally became the chairman of the board, as he founded the Reprise record label.

Sinatra’s Reprise albums of the early 1960s continued to sell well, but his action on the single’s chart had been curtailed by pop music’s skew to a younger audience, the arrival of the Beatles and the musical revolution that followed in their wake. Sinatra had scored recent Top-40 singles (and a chart-topper on the adult contemporary chart with “It Was a Very Good Year” earlier in ‘66), but his last major success on the pop hit parade remained 1958’s “Witchcraft.” As had been the case when the big band era closed, and again as Sinatra’s solo career wound down in the early 1950s, many thought that Sinatra had finally estranged himself from broad popular acclaim. But someone as talented and as artistically resilient as Sinatra couldn’t be counted out so easily.

The genesis of his mid-60s resurgence was the album’s title track, combining a memorable Bert Kaempfert melody (from the film A Man Could Get Killed) with lyrics by Charles Singleton and Eddie Snyder. The other key ingredient was producer Jimmy Bowen. Bowen had started out as a contemporary of ‘50s rock singer Buddy Knox, but edged his way into production as his singing career faltered. By the mid-60s he was working with all three members of the Rat Pack, and brought “Strangers in the Night” to Sinatra. Ken Barnes’ liner notes recall the urgent circumstances under which the single was recorded and distributed to radio, and how it scooped two contemporary versions to become Sinatra’s first pop chart topper. All of this was accomplished by a fifty-year-old Sinatra, who iced the cake by knocking the Beatles’ “Paperback Writer” from the top slot.

With the single winding its way to #1 – it took three months to reach the top – Sinatra returned to the studio with his regular producer, Sonny Burke, to record a supporting album. The sessions reunited Sinatra with Nelson Riddle, who’d helped Sinatra re-launch his career once before with 1954’s Songs for Young Lovers and the brassy swing of 1956’s Songs for Swingin’ Lovers! Here he and Sinatra split their attention between reanimating songs of the 1920s and 1930s, and finding something for Sinatra to say with a few contemporary numbers. In addition to the title track, Sinatra turned Johnny Mercer’s “Summer Wind” into an easy listening favorite, picked up Lerner and Lane’s “On a Clear Day” from the then contemporary Broadway show, and wrestled unsuccessfully with a pair of Tony Hatch tunes, “Call Me” and “Downtown.”

The pop tunes are given the full Riddle treatment, including a modern and soulful organ, but Sinatra isn’t impressed by either, and tosses off “Downtown” as a sop to the then-modern pop tastes. Riddle’s arrangements are typically energetic throughout, but his sublime take on “Summer Wind” inspires Sinatra’s most effortless and artful vocal in this set. Sinatra sings the older songs with a nod to their period origins, but also a free-swinging verve that brings them up-to-date. As an album this ends up schizophrenic as Sinatra moves through Bowen’s pop edgings, Riddle’s punchy charts and Hatch’s ill-fitting pop songs. The original album ends with a frenetic arrangement of “The Most Beautiful Girl in the World” which brought down the curtain. Concord’s reissue adds three bonus tracks: live takes of “Strangers in the Night” and “All or Nothing at All” that demonstrate Sinatra’s 1980s stage presence, and a previously unreleased first take of “Yes Sir, That’s My Baby” that doesn’t vary greatly from the master recording.

Though this LP was one of Sinatra’s most popular, his voice was in fine form and Nelson Riddle’s arrangements add some pizzazz, it wasn’t one of his truly great artistic achievements. The hit singles are memorable and essential elements of the Sinatra catalog, but the album cuts don’t match up with his earlier pioneering work. Unlike his Capitol albums of the 1950s, Sinatra wasn’t pushing forward anymore; he was looking back to earlier successes and looking sideways at popular music forms that didn’t excite him. This is certainly worth hearing, but if you’re just starting to build a collection of Sinatra albums, you’re better off starting with his key works of 1954-1961. [©2010 hyperbolium dot com]

B.J. Thomas: Most of All / Billy Joe Thomas

Leave a reply

Thomas parts ways with Chips Moman and Memphis

B.J. Thomas is often remembered for his biggest pop hits, “I’m So Lonesome I Could Cry,” “Hooked on a Feeling,” “Raindrops Keep Falling on My Head” and “(Hey Won’t You Play) Another Somebody Done Somebody Wrong Song.” But like many artists whose careers were longer than their pop chart success, there’s a lot more to Thomas’ catalog than these four songs. In addition to 1980s success on the country charts, Thomas recorded albums throughout the mid-60s and 70s that turned up lower-charting hit singles and terrific album sides. Collectors’ Choice has gathered Thomas’ first eight solo albums for Scepter as a series of four two-fers, starting with his 1966 label debut, I’m So Lonesome I Could Cry, and concluding with 1971’s Billy Joe Thomas.

After out-of-the-gate success with Huey Meaux in Texas, four albums and a hit singles with Chips Moman in Memphis, and a Los Angeles-based chart-topper with Burt Bacharach and Hal David, by the start of the 1970s B.J. Thomas was once again on the move. His 1970 release Most of All includes a few finished tracks recorded with Moman at American Studios, but also includes a stop in Atlanta and finally settles in at Doraville, Alabama’s Studio One. Here Thomas connected with producer Buddy Buie and the studio players who would form the Atlanta Rhythm Section. This new setting produced two hits, “Most of All” and “No Love at All,” both Top 40 pop and Top 5 adult contemporary. The former was written by Buie, the latter reunited Thomas with songwriter Wayne Carson, suggesting the track might have been started in Memphis.

Buie’s instrumentation wasn’t terrifically different than Moman’s, featuring guitars, bass and drums augmented by strings and horns. But Buie’s productions are smoother and not as deep in the soul-funk pocket as had been laid down in Memphis. Thomas responded by modulating his vocals with longer notes that edge into crooning. The material follows the familiar course of a few originals and cover songs that fit Thomas snugly enough to leave little leaving room for musical reinvention; James Taylor’s early “Rainy Day Man,” The Carpenters’ “Close to You,” and Brook Benton’s “Rainy Night in Georgia,” don’t add much to the originals. Neither does a cover of Mann & Weil’s controversial song of interracial romance, “Brown Eyed Woman,” which had scored on the coasts for Bill Medley.

The following year Thomas made another leap, recording in New York City, Los Angeles and Nashville, with Steve Tyrell and Al Gorgoni producing Billy Joe Thomas. Thomas continued to chart higher on the adult contemporary chart than the pop list, topping the former with the gorgeous “Rock ‘n’ Roll Lullaby.” The single’s Beach Boys-styled backing vocals lift Thomas as he stretches into falsetto and adds a new style to his catalog. Paul Williams’ “That’s What Friends Are For” (not to be confused with Burt Bacharach’s similarly titled song that was a hit for Dionne Warwick) revisits the Billy Joel inflections Thomas brought to 1968’s “Mr. Businessman,” and “Happier Than the Morning Sun” is given a sunnier, lighter arrangement than Stevie Wonder’s later recording.

For this last album on Scepter, Tyrell engaged the songs’ writers to perform, a plan that paralleled the emergence of singer-songwriters as a marketable quantity. Stevie Wonder, Carole King, Jimmy Webb and Paul Williams played and sang on their tunes, and guests included Duane Eddy, Darlene Love and Dave Somerville of ‘50s vocal group, The Diamonds. Tyrell and Gorgoni created the most consistent album to that point in Thomas’ career, seamlessly knitting together pop, blues and soul, while picking up songs from favorite sources Wayne Carson and Mark James alongside the famous singer-songwriters. Thomas shows himself ready for serious lyrics, including the terrific call-to-action “We Have Got to Get Our Ship Together” and John Sebastian’s “The Stories We Can Tell.” Pete Drake’s pedal steel on the latter all but pointed the way to Thomas’ future on the country charts.

Collectors’ Choice adds three bonus tracks to the original albums: a single and two B-sides of which the gospel “Mighty Clouds of Joy” makes the most lasting impression. All tracks are stereo, and the set’s 8-page booklet includes liner notes by Mike Ragogna and full-panel reproductions of the album covers. These albums find Thomas searching for direction after leaving Memphis and finding new confidence in New York City. He’d hook up with Paramount the following year, score an across-the-board success with “(Hey Won’t You Play) Another Somebody Done Somebody Wrong Song” with ABC in 1975, and top the country charts in the mid-80s, leaving Billy Joe Thomas to stand as a fitting end to his run with Sceptor. [©2010 hyperbolium dot com]

B.J. Thomas’ Home Page
B.J. Thomas Fan Page

B.J. Thomas: Raindrops Keep Fallin’ on My Head / Everybody’s Out of Town

Leave a reply

Thomas tops the charts with Bacharach and David

B.J. Thomas is often remembered for his biggest pop hits, “I’m So Lonesome I Could Cry,” “Hooked on a Feeling,” “Raindrops Keep Falling on My Head” and “(Hey Won’t You Play) Another Somebody Done Somebody Wrong Song.” But like many artists whose careers were longer than their pop chart success, there’s a lot more to Thomas’ catalog than these four songs. In addition to 1980s success on the country charts, Thomas recorded albums throughout the mid-60s and 70s that turned up lower-charting hit singles and terrific album sides. Collectors’ Choice has gathered Thomas’ first eight solo albums for Scepter as a series of four two-fers, starting with his 1966 label debut, I’m So Lonesome I Could Cry, and concluding with 1971’s Billy Joe Thomas.

By the time Raindrops Keep Fallin’ on My Head was released in 1969 Thomas had already recorded two Top-10 hits (“I’m So Lonesome I Could Cry” and “Hooked on a Feeling”) and a handful of lower-charting sides. But one hit was a Hank Williams cover and the other subsequently rehomed as a #1 hit for Blue Swede, it was this album’s Bacharach-David title tune that became Thomas’ long-term calling card. The Bacharach-David produced “Raindrops” is a departure in sound from the records Thomas had been making with Chips Moman in Memphis. The ukulele that opens the arrangement immediately announces something different, and Thomas’ delivery is softened along with horns that are Los Angeles smooth rather than Memphis punchy. Two other Bacharach-David productions, “Little Green Apples” and “This Guy’s in Love With You” feature similarly sophisticated pop arrangements.

The album has three tracks produced by Chips Moman, including a cover of Mark James’ “Suspicious Minds.” Moman reused Elvis’ backing track, but remixed in a way that turns the King into a ghost; the arrangement’s extended vocal coda is a great addition. Also good is a soulful take on Jimmy Webb’s “Do What You Gotta Do,” and the Mark James original “Mr. Mailman.” Four tracks produced by Stan Green and Scepter’s A&R head Steve Tyrell fill out the song list, highlighted by a take on “The Greatest Love” that’s musical but too brash to capture the vulnerability of Joe South’s original or Aaron Neville’s cover. The patchwork of three production teams makes this album feel more constructed than Thomas’ two previous outings. There are terrific individual tracks here, but the different album sections feel stitched together and leave Thomas searching for a signature identity.

Following a greatest hits album in early 1970, Thomas returned with Everybody’s Out of Town. The commercial success of “Raindrops Keep Falling on My Head” carried over, as he launched two more singles onto the Top 40 and found great success on the adult contemporary chart, topping it with “I Just Can’t Help Believing.” Bacharach and David returned to produce a pair of tracks, but their strings, horns and old-timey piano stick out like sore thumbs in sequence with Chip Moman’s Memphis sound. Mark James and Wayne Carson once again contributed songs, and Thomas picked covers that fit well, even if he didn’t find anything revelatory to say with “Everybody’s Talkin’” or “What Does it Take.” Paul Simon’s “Bridge Over Troubled Water” was a great pick for the American Studios sound and Thomas sings it with soul.

Collectors’ Choice adds five bonus tracks: two singles, a greatest hits album track and two previously unreleased sides. Best among these is the previously unissued country arrangement of Barry Mann and Cynthia Weil’s “There’s No Holding You” and a horn- and organ-filled take on Little Richard’s “The Girl Can’t Help It.” This album is a more consistent effort than the previous Raindrops Keep Fallin’ on My Head, but Thomas no longer seemed to be progressing under Moman’s direction. Like the preceding album the cover songs and some of the originals feel like album filler. All tracks are stereo, and the set’s 8-page booklet includes liner notes by Mike Ragogna and full-panel reproductions of the album covers. These first-time-on-CD albums offer some of Thomas’ biggest hits, supplemented by fine album tracks and filler. [©2010 hyperbolium dot com]

B.J. Thomas’ Home Page
B.J. Thomas Fan Page

B.J. Thomas: On My Way / Young and in Love

Leave a reply

Texas pop hit-maker finds his soul in Memphis

B.J. Thomas is often remembered for his biggest pop hits, “I’m So Lonesome I Could Cry,” “Hooked on a Feeling,” “Raindrops Keep Falling on My Head” and “(Hey Won’t You Play) Another Somebody Done Somebody Wrong Song.” But like many artists whose careers were longer than their pop chart success, there’s a lot more to Thomas’ catalog than these four songs. In addition to 1980s success on the country charts, Thomas recorded albums throughout the mid-60s and 70s that turned up lower-charting hit singles and terrific album sides. Collectors’ Choice has gathered Thomas’ first eight solo albums for Scepter as a series of four two-fers, starting with his 1966 label debut, I’m So Lonesome I Could Cry, and concluding with 1971’s Billy Joe Thomas.

After his 1966 breakthrough with a slow, pop-soul cover of Hank Williams’ “I’m So Lonesome I Could Cry,” Thomas’ subsequent singles charted lower and lower, dropping him out of the Top 40 for the latter half of 1966 and all of 1967. He returned in 1968 with On My Way and climbed back to #28 with the mid-tempo love song “The Eyes of a New York Woman.” Thomas was singing in a lower register, sounding remarkably like the Box Tops’ Alex Chilton; the single’s electric sitar even recalls the Box Tops’ “Cry Like a Baby.” That same sitar shines even more brightly opening the album’s breakout hit, “Hooked on a Feeling.” This Mark James penned number subsequently scored a European hit for Jonathan King and a U.S. #1 in 1974 for Blue Swede. King added (and Blue Swede copied) an “ooga chaka” chant and reggae rhythm that give the song a harder edge than Thomas original.

By the time Thomas recorded this pair of albums he’d relocated from Texas to Memphis where he landed at Chips Moman’s American Studio, meeting up with the studuio’s crack band and realizing crisper recordings and more commercially refined arrangements. More importantly, his previous source of original songs, Mark Charron, was replaced by a range of writers that included Ray Stevens, Wayne Carson (who wrote “Soul Deep” and “The Letter” for the Box Tops), Spooner Oldham, Ashford & Simpson, and Mark James (who wrote both singles, and would later write “Suspicious Minds” for Elvis to cut in the very same Memphis studio). Thomas continued to tread a line between pop, country, blues and soul, but the first and last resonated most deeply in his new Memphis setting.

As on his previous albums, Thomas turned a country classic to soul, this time with Ferlin Husky’s mid-50s hit, “Gone.” Since the original was already a ballad, Thomas and crew could only slow it so much and instead focused on a then-contemporary arrangement of reverb and fuzz guitar, strings, deep bass and soulful organ; it all ends up sounding a bit funereal. Better are horn-and-string covers of Jim Reeves’ “Four Walls” and the Platters’ “Smoke Gets in Your Eyes,” each giving Thomas a chance to really emote. Thomas’ material was notably more mature than his earlier work and reaches to social commentary (and Billy Joel-like stridency) with “Mr. Businessman” and philosophical introspection on “I’ve Been Down This Road Before.” The singer, songs, studio and musicians really fit together nicely for these sessions, but the dependency on covers that fail to expand on the originals keeps this album from being a deeper artistic statement.

1969’s Young and in Love followed the template of its predecessor, combining tunes from Mark James with selections from songwriting legends (Paul Williams, Jimmy Webb, Neil Diamond), and a country hit turned to soul with a cover of Henson Cargill’s “Skip a Rope.” Unlike Thomas’ previous (and next) album, the original material here was good, but failed to burn up the charts: the pop-soul “Pass the Apple Eve” barely made the Top 100, and the ballad “It’s Only Love” only cracked the adult contemporary Top 40. The covers are professional, but again not always artistically definitive; the Carpenters wrenched much more out of “Hurting Each Other” a few years later, and “Solitary Man” didn’t improve on Neil Diamond’s original. Thomas’ connection with the Box Tops is renewed through a cover of Spooner Oldham & Dan Penn’s “I Pray for Rain,” which Chilton and company had recorded a few years earlier.

Chips Moman’s studio and players continue to provide superb accompaniment, furthering Thomas development as a soul singer. The electric sitar wears thin by album’s end, but for the arrangements mostly have a timeless Memphis sound. Collectors’ Choice adds six bonus tracks: a single, three B-sides and two previously unreleased sides. Top of the heap is a cover of Conway Twitty’s (and Wanda Jackson’s) “I May Never Get to Heaven” featuring superb guitar from Reggie Young. Also tasty is a cover of Luther Dixon’s blue “Human” and the airy Mark James waltz “Distant Carolina.” Creepiest is “You Don’t Love Me Anymore,” ending with a frenetic vocal and a railroad train (complete with sound effects) bearing down on the dreaming protagonist. All tracks are stereo except 22, and “I Saw Pity in the Face of a Friend” features some odd panning and phasing. The set’s 8-page booklet includes liner notes by Mike Ragogna and full-panel reproductions of the album covers. These first-time-on-CD albums offer a great picture of Thomas’ emergence as a soul singer. [©2010 hyperbolium dot com]

B.J. Thomas’ Home Page
B.J. Thomas Fan Page

B.J. Thomas: I’m So Lonesome I Could Cry / Tomorrow Never Comes

Leave a reply

Future chart-topper warms up with country, soul and blues

B.J. Thomas is often remembered for his biggest pop hits, “I’m So Lonesome I Could Cry,” “Hooked on a Feeling,” “Raindrops Keep Falling on My Head” and “(Hey Won’t You Play) Another Somebody Done Somebody Wrong Song.” But like many artists whose careers were longer than their pop chart success, there’s a lot more to Thomas’ catalog than these four songs. In addition to 1980s success on the country charts, Thomas recorded albums throughout the mid-60s and 70s that turned up lower-charting hit singles and terrific album sides. Collectors’ Choice has gathered Thomas’ first eight solo albums for Scepter as a series of four two-fers, starting with his 1966 label debut, I’m So Lonesome I Could Cry, and concluding with 1971’s Billy Joe Thomas.

1966’s I’m So Lonesome I Could Cry reprised the title song with which Thomas reached #8 on the charts as the lead singer of the Houston-based Triumphs. Thomas re-imagines Hank Williams’ country classic as pop-soul with slow, measured vocals underlined by a mournful organ, low bass and drums lightly counting out the waltz time. A falling horn line at the end of each verse adds some Stax flavor, and the song’s heartbreak is brought to a head in the anguished wails with which Thomas takes the song out. He takes Williams’ “There’ll Be No Teardrops Tonight” similarly down-tempo, with a harpsichord in place of organ, a guitar carrying the blues and Jordanaires-styled backing vocals adding their moan.

Thomas proved himself a fetching blue-soul singer on the jukebox themed “The Titles Tell” and adds punch to a cover of “Midnight Hour” with horns, handclaps and female backing singers. The album spun off a minor hit in Mark Charron’s sentimental original “Mama,” and his other titles, though a bit maudlin in tearjerkers like “I Wonder” and “Bring Back the Time,” are good vehicles for Thomas. There’s frat-rock energy in “Wendy,” a pre-Beatles boy-singer pop melody in “Terri,” and a Texicali-tinge to “Maria.” Thomas also sang covers of Tom Jones’ “It’s Not Unusual” and Freddie Scott’s “Hey Girl,” mostly following the originals but adding a distinctive touch with his vocal tone.

Thomas followed up the same year with the album Tomorrow Never Comes. The track list once again includes a slow, soulful pass at a country legend’s song, this time building Ernest Tubb’s “Tomorrow Never Comes” to a show-stopping crescendo. Mark Charron once again supplies most of the originals, this time writing about the supercharged emotions of teenagers and young adults. The little known “Plain Jain” is the story of a lonely girl who kills herself after falling for a prank prom invitation; though only charting to #129, it’s a worthy entry in the death-song genre. Charron captures the end-of-the-world melodrama of found love, broken hearts, friendlessness, failure and occasional moments of self realization, youthful optimism and redemption.

Thomas’ style was all over the map at these early points in his career, crooning, rocking and emoting atop pop, soul, blues and country arrangements of guitar, bass, drums, strings and horns. Those horns come to the fore on a rousing cover of Timmy Shaw’s “Gonna Send You Back to Georgia,” and the album closes with the fine, bluesy frat-rocker, “Candy Baby.” Collectors’ Choice adds two bonus B-sides, the countrypolitan kiss-off “Your Tears Leave Me Cold” and a torchy cover of Robert Thibodeux’s “I’m Not a Fool Anymore.” All tracks are stereo except 1, 2, 8, 21 and 24, and the set’s 8-page booklet includes liner notes by Mike Ragogna and full-panel reproductions of the album covers. Making their first appearances on CD, these are two great places to start an appreciation of Thomas that extends deeper than his well-known hits. [©2010 hyperbolium dot com]

B.J. Thomas’ Home Page
B.J. Thomas Fan Page

Blind Pilot: iTunes Session EP

Leave a reply

Band remakes of three album tunes, a cover and a new title

Portland’s Blind Pilot returns with a 5-song EP to complement their debut album, 3 Rounds and a Sound. The group has been touring as a sextet and with this EP take the opportunity to revisit three tracks (“The Story I Heard,” “One Red Thread” and “3 Rounds and a Sound”) from the album that were originally recorded as  a duo in the process of taking on additional musicians. The airy genteelness that underlined Israel Nebeker’s album vocals is replaced here by fuller, more aggressive playing and rougher productions, altering the songs’ moods. This is the sound of a band taking their songs from studio to stage, adding new dimension to the originals. The group’s cover of Gillian Welch’s “Look at Miss Ohio” (which was also covered recently by the Band of Heathens) opens with a terrific a cappella harmony, and the guitar-bass-drums is given additional lift by Ian Krist’s vibraphone. The lone new title, “Get it Out,” closes the EP with a contemplative shuffle. Those who haven’t heard Blind Pilot should start with the debut LP. Fans will enjoy this EP as a way to wait out their next tour and album release. [©2010 hyperbolium dot com]

MP3 | The Story I Heard (original album version)
Blind Pilot’s Home Page
Blind Pilot’s MySpace Page

The Friends of Distinction: Grazin’

Leave a reply

The easy soul album behind the stellar funky hit

The Friends of Distinction were a Los Angeles vocal quartet, two men and two women, whose funky hit single, “Grazing in the Grass,” belied the smoother, easy soul of this debut album. Produced by John Florez, the group picked a lead vocalist from among the four to match each track, and then surrounded them with fetching harmonies. Their material ranged from Hugh Masekela’s title song (to which group founder/vocalist Harry Elston added lyrics) to a slow and sensual cover of Lennon & McCartney’s “And I Love Her.” They created a vocal jazz arrangement of Cole Porter’s “Lonesome Mood” that suggests Lambert, Hendricks & Ross, as does the waltz time “Baby I Could Be So Good at Loving You.” The parallel with the Fifth Dimension is reinforced by the group’s stellar cover of Laura Nyro’s “Eli’s Coming,” featuring a supercharged falsetto lead by Jessica Cleaves against intricate backing vocals and an arrangement that alternates between slow soul and fervent revival. The album’s second single “Going in Circles” charted into the Top 20 with a superb arrangement that combines strings, horns and woodwinds behind a feeling lead vocal and soulful harmonies. It’s a shame that the group’s follow-up album Highly Distinct was rushed out by the label, as given time to create, this debut shows how brilliantly they could select and sing light soul. [©2010 hyperbolium dot com]