BILLY HAWKS - THE NEW GENIUS OF THE BLUES / HEAVY SOUL
Tasty
bluesy organ material from Prestige, featuring 2 hard-to-find records,
back-to-back in a single set! Billy Hawks sings and plays organ with a groove
that's in between jazz, blues, and deep soul. On New Genius Of The Blues he's
fronting a trio that includes a young Ivan "Boogaloo Joe" Jones on
guitar, and the group plays a few instrumentals with some excellent
organ/guitar interchange. Some of the material here is a bit bluesy, but
there's also still a relatively strong soul jazz component as well – one that
comes through in the overall structure of the tunes, and in the lean style in
which they were recorded. Titles include "Hawks Blues", "Let Me
Love You Before You Go", "Got My Mojo Working", "Mean Woman
Blues" and more. More Heavy Soul is the rarest of his albums for Prestige
– and on this one he plays organ in a style that's more in keeping with some of
the funky jazz artists on the label – especially on the instrumental tracks,
which give a lot more room to the instrumental solos. There's a great instrumental
groover called "That's Your Bag" that's right up with the best of the
Prestige funky jazz tracks from the 60s, and even the vocal cuts are really
nice, as Billy has a good soulful singing style. He's backed here by Buddy
Terry and Maynard Parker, and other tracks include "Heavy Soul",
"Whip It On Me", and "I'll Be Back". 19 tracks in all! ~ Dusty Groove
RAMSEY LEWIS - SUN GODDESS (BONUS TRACKS)
One of
our favorite Ramsey Lewis albums ever – and a perfect summation of the genius
that was brewing on the Chicago scene in the late 60s and early 70s! The album
has Ramsey working strongly with Earth Wind & Fire – no surprise, given his
close ties to Maurice White, who was the drummer in Ramsey's trio before
starting his own group – and the shared relationship both artists had with
producer Charles Stepney! The three were all key parts of the late 60s sound at
Chess Records – but here, they've brought the same soulful energy to Columbia –
working in a wider, more mature groove for the 70s – one that has Lewis' wicked
Fender Rhodes lines stretching out strongly over tight, compressed, funky lines
from EWF! The centerpiece of the set is the massive 7 minute "Sun
Goddess", but there's lots of other nice ones like "Living For The
City", "Gemini Rising", and "Jungle Strut". Funky,
electric, and sublimely wonderful all the way through! This FTG CD edition
includes 3 bonus tracks: 7" versions of "Sun Goddess" and
"Jungle Strut",plus the UK 7" version of "Sun
Goddess". ~ Dusty
Groove
EDDIE 'CLEANHEAD' VINSON - THE ORIGINAL CLEANHEAD
A really
sweet late effort from bluesy soul singer and sax player Eddie Cleanhead Vinson
– his dawn of the 70s comeback! Cleanhead covered a whole lot of stylistic
range in earlier years, from big band vocalist, to R&B shouter, to bebop
era alto sax player – and he comfortably displays that range here, albeit in a
loose, easygoing soul mode – backed by a great group of session players that
includes Joe Pass, Artie Butler, Arthur Wright and Plas Johnson. Bob Thiele
produced, and the titles include "Cleanhead Blues", "Pass Out",
"Alimony Blues", "Cleanhead Is Back", "Juice Head
Baby", "Old Maid Boogie", "One O'Clock Humph" and
"I Needs To Be Be'd Wid". This great Ace CD version includes 3 bonus
tracks: live versions of "Cleanhead Blues", "I Had A Dream"
and "Person To Person". ~ Dusty Groove
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