1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die: 32. Ray Charles – Modern Sounds in Country and Western Music (1962)

It was probably quite bold for Charles to take on the traditionally “white” form of music of Country and Western at the time, although it does mean that despite some more bluesy, jazzy takes on some of the songs the album tends to be largely comprised on maudlin ballads. Best known is I Can’t Stop Loving You, which provides a nice encapsulation of what this album does – Charles' soulful vocals over a lush orchestral arrangement and country-esque backing vocals. I thought at first it might be old Nelson Riddle on the arrangements as it brings the horn stings and mawkish strings of Wee Small Hours and Ella Fitzgerald Sings Gershwin, but it’s not, the arrangers are Gil Fuller and Gerald Wilson. Very Riddle-esque though. 

It’s not clear if Dimery recommends Volume One alone, or both Volumes One and Two. Two is worth it just for a swinging cover of You Are My Sunshine, which doesn’t really capture the darkness beneath a deceptively jaunty song (The Dead South do that very well), but is a nice duet (with Margie Hendrix) nonetheless. 

Overall, for me, this is one of those albums that dips back into the same well too many times to be truly interesting; it’s probably more a point for its social history than any true musical glory. If you like what it does, you’ll like it. I’m not a big fan of the lush orchestral production (you may have noticed), and Charles doesn’t get to play the piano nearly enough. He’s good, the production values are good, the (for the time) daring musical crossover is an interesting one, but it failed to stir me. 

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Dr Simon Reads... Appendix N. Part One: Poul Anderson

Image
Dr. Simon Reads Appendix N: Introduction This is a new series that will feature sporadically, in which I explore classic fantasy and science fiction works. You will either know what I mean by “Appendix N”, or you will have no clue. In the original Advanced Dungeons and Dragons Dungeon Masters Guide, Gary Gygax provided a large number of appendices, from random smells to reputed magical properties of herbs and gemstones. Appendix N was a bibliography of works that inspired him. Back in 1982 when I first got hold of this book, there were only a couple of items on there that I’d read, and only a few other authors that I’d even heard of. Many years later, after, much reading, I returned to Appendix N expecting to have added greatly to the works on there that I’d read; but actually, there were still very few. Many of the authors were obscure or out of print authors of, for want of a better expression, golden age pulp; the kind that feature in Amazing Stories and the like. Now, ...
Read more

An Atheist Explores the Qur'an Part 80: The Nineteen Guardians of Saqar (sounds cooler than it is) (Shrouded (al-Muddaththirl))

Shrouded (al-Muddaththirl) 1-56 The Nineteen Guardians of Saqar (sounds cooler than it is). Welcome to the next instalment of An Atheist Explores Sacred Texts (Qur’an version). In this series I work my way chapter-by-chapter through the Qur’an, commenting on it from the point of view of the text as literature and mythology. For more detail, see the introductory post https://bit.ly/2ApLDy0 For the online Qur’an that I use, see here http://al-quran.info and http://quran.com Shrouded (al-Muddaththirl) 1-28 “O you wrapped up in your mantle! Rise up and warn!” Like the previous surah , Enwrapped, this one starts with God addressing the Prophet as one wrapped in a mantle. Last time, because of the emphasis on praying at night, I took this to be a reference to a literal cloak against the cold night, but here it seems to be more metaphorical. Perhaps it was always meant to be both. I think metaphorical because the Prophet is told to “ purify your cloak ” and to avoid “ i...
Read more

An Atheist Explores the Qur'an Part 121: Closing Thoughts

It took half as many posts to tackle the Qur'an as it did the Bible, 120 compared to 248, but it felt like longer sometimes. Perhaps because the Qur'an is written by a single man and deals with pretty much the same topic over and over, whereas the Bible is a compilation of multiple works, some of which are historical, some apocalyptic, some laws or building instruction, some philosophical, some poetic, some a bit of each. From that point of view, I'd have to say that the Bible was the more interesting work to read. Have I learned any great wisdom from the Qur'an? I'd have to say … no, not really. Granted, I probably didn't approach it with a particularly deep understanding of the material in the first place, but that (as with the Bible readthrough) was always my intent. Picking through line by line is still something of a deep dive, and in both books I tried to be alert for symbol and metaphor. Doing it that way, however, it's easy to miss thematic callb...
Read more