Music Week's round-up of the latest album reissues and catalogue releases. This week we take a look at 80 Brit Girl Sounds Of The 60s, Z.Z. Hill and Mr M's Northern Soul 1974-1981...
Various:
Am I Dreaming? - 80 Brit Girl Sounds Of The 60s (RPM RPMBX 538)
One of the admirable RPM label's most successful series of releases was Dream Babes, which ran from 1994 to 2009, making available 177 1960s recordings by British female singers, many of them previously unreleased on CD. Am I Dreaming presents a further 80 examples of the genre, spread across three CDs, in a clamshell box (Ringo Starr's first wife Maureen being the cover star) with a heavily-illustrated, information-packed booklet providing a wealth of background information. Duplicating some of the artists but none of the contents of the Dream Babes series, Am I Dreaming spreads? its tentacles a little further, with a few tracks from The Commonwealth gaining admittance. It is a fascinating, highly enjoyable and diverse collection, with recordings by singers who would later become stars, and many who wouldn't.
Beat, folk, mod, ballads and soul are among the styles explored. Enough with generalities, let's look at some of the tracks. Starting with the familiar artists, Petula Clark puts in a sterling performance with her own melodramatic song Love Is A Long Journey; Kiki Dee's version of I'm Gonna Run Away From You more than matches the hit version by Tami Lynnn; and Christine Perfect delivers a beautifully pastoral, heavily orchestrated version of When You Say, a song penned by Danny Kirwan for Fleetwood Mac's third album, Then Play On, which she recorded and released as a single before she joined the group herself. Among the lesser known acts., Hornchurch teenager Tammy St. John impresses with the funky Concerning Love; Cheshire girl group The Dollies deliver a raucous version of beat song You Touch Me Baby; and Rainbow is a lively, trumpet-driven track - one of five previously unreleased on the album - on which Folkestone sisters The Triplets maintain spirited if rather one dimensional formation vocals throughout.
Z.Z. Hill:
That's It! - The Complete Kent Recordings 1964-1968 (Kent CDTOP 2476)
As the liner notes rightly point out, Z.Z Hill was the go-to guy for blue-tinged soul, and there's a heap of it - all good - on this collection. The first CD contains all 27 sides he released on singles, in chronological order of release, and in original mono. They achieved very little success at the time but add up to an impressive body of work that, thankfully, has become widely appreciated more latterly. The rolling and raunchy Have Mercy Someone - a b-side - is excellent. Ditto What More, the first track on which his vocals are augmented and sweetened by backing vocals. Both were penned by Hill himself, but he is also a good interpreter of songs by others, including Tim Hardin's oft-recorded but rarely improved Don't Make Promises (You Can't Keep). CD2 consists of Hill's only Kent album, A Whole Lot Of Soul - a fine pot-pourri of Stax tracks and Sam Cooke songs but no originals - and bonus tracks. 14 of the 49 tracks are on CD for the first time, and all are worthy of inclusion.
Various:
Mr M's Northern Soul 1974-1981 (Soul Time TOCKBX 3)
Albums celebrating the musical legacy of The Wigan Casino are legion but this one lays claim to being the first to concentrate on what was played at the club within the club - that is, the oldies room, Mr M's. In existence from 1974 to 1981, it was a venue that is still fondly remembered by many and, luckily, this new box set is worthy of its memory. Presented by DJ Dave Evison, who observes in the liner notes that it could easily have been a 10 CD set, it is actually a 3 CD collection. Although it naturally revisits some of the Nothern Soul cuts which are to be found on numerous other compilations - The Night by Frankie Valli & The Four Seasons, A Touch Of Velvet A Sting Of Brass by Mood Mosaic and K-Jee by The Nite-Liters, to name but three - it is the less frequently compiled but equally fine tracks that make it such a good album. In that category, we can count J.J. Barnes' slow soulful spin on Ace's hit How Long; Dooley Silverspoon's Game Player, sourced from the master tapes for the first time; and Little Richard's stomping version of Larry Williams' Poor Dog (Who Can't Wag His Own Tail). 50 such selections fill the first two CDs of this set, which is accompanied by track-by-track annotations in a chunky booklet. The third and final CD is in the form of a radio show, with Dave Evison in discussion with radio station owner Robbie Benson. In a presentation lasting more than an hour, several of the tracks heard elsewhere on the set are giving another airing, albeit without 'clean' starts or finishes. Although initially attractive, the idea wears thin because you will only want to hear the show once, and some tracks not duplicated elsewhere are thus available only in slightly compromised versions with leading or trailing talk. Sadly, and most pertinently, that fate befalls the very last track played at the club, Bobby Bland's Call On Me.
