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Music > R&B / Soul
Although there's much fine early-'60s soul music on this CD, it's a
curious and rather arbitrary pairing of two albums by different
artists, the slender common bond being that they happened to have
been issued in the U.K. by the Ember label. The first 12 tracks are
the ones that comprised James Brown's early-'60s LP The Amazing
James Brown, which was retitled Tell Me What You're Gonna Do when
it was issued in the U.K. in 1964 (as the first of Brown's studio
albums to become available in Britain). Under whatever title it was
released, this was about as good as an early-'60s soul album got,
catching Brown just at the point where he was moving from
gospel-fired R&B to dynamic, jazzy, and rhythmically innovative
soul. The ballads "I Don't Mind" and "Lost Someone" were pretty big
hits, but the rest of the tracks are in same ballpark of quality
and cover a lot of ground. Covers of jump blues (Roy Brown's "Love
Don't Love Nobody") and doo wop (Billy Ward's "The Bells") are
homages to Brown's roots, but the funky jazz licks and eccentric
tempos in "Dancin' Little Thing" and "And I Do Just What I Want"
are clear signposts to the singer's mid-'60s funk breakthroughs.
The eight Eddie Floyd tracks were recorded circa 1962-1964 (the
lengthy liner notes are frustratingly cloudy about the exact dates)
for the LuPine and SAFICE labels, and collected for an LP release
by Ember in the U.K. in the mid-'60s. Nowhere in the notes or
cover, mind you, is it divulged what the title of that LP was,
though a scan of available discographical references indicates that
this was probably the LP titled Looking Back. Anyway, these are
decent, though not great, early Floyd sides that show him, like
many singers of the era, moving from group vocal doo wop-soaked
sounds to early soul, sometimes awkwardly, but sometimes with
considerable elan. The up-tempo early Motown-like numbers ("The
Whip," "Bye Bye Baby") are quite good, and the ballads less
impressive. This isn't the optimum package for collecting either
the Brown or Floyd music, but if you're not too fussy about what
shape it arrives in, there are some very good sounds here,
particularly in the Brown portion. ~ Richie Unterberger
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I'm Your Baby Tonight
(CD)
Whitney Houston; Contributions by Clive Davis, Stevie Wonder
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R128
R112
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Save R16 (13%)
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Ships in 10 - 20 working days
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Wondem
(CD)
Dexter Story
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R340
Discovery Miles 3 400
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Out of stock
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Birth Of Soul Volume 2
(CD)
Trevor Chruchill, Adrian Croxsdell, Dave Godin; Performed by Various Artists
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R294
Discovery Miles 2 940
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Out of stock
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