Rhythm Country and Blues

by

Various Artists

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Did you ever read a book -- then read it again ten years later, and make the pleasant discovery that the parts you'd mentally underlined or highlighted years earlier, are NOT the same ones that `reach' you today? Witness, if you will, this amazing concept album, you may have forgotten (I had, almost.)

If you are like me, you may have almost forgotten this gem. If you're like my sister Andrea (who has the most amazing singing voice I've ever heard) you've NEVER tasted of its amazing grace.

'Sis,' who has refined musical tastes, last night dignified my latest review (for a Tom T. Hall compilation) by sniffing: "YOU'RE listening to country music now?? Ouch!!!" I resisted the urge to remind `Anra' about Ray Charles' classic country music album of 40 years ago (with the definitive version of Eddy Arnold's "You Don't Know Me").

Her comment made me go and rummage out this CD. Sure enough, there there it was: something I'd vaguely recalled from the superb liner notes, by James Hunter. A short quotation of the album's co-producer Tony Brown, from the days when he first worked with Gospel singer Shirley Caesar: "She had ALWAYS loved country music!"

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Back in late 1994 when this album was released, it was Chet Atkins' duet with Alain Toussaint (on the latter's best selling composition, "Southern Nights") that prompted me to track down this disc in the first place. I'm pleasantly surprised to find this very day that, some tracks I didn't give a second listen to, back then, are now at center stage in my heart: As with good spiritual reading, when the light goes on, I am `lifted up.'

First things first: Amazingly, most of the singers featured here had never met before they got together in the studio with co-producer Don Was. The producer(s) had to guess at which artists might have `chemistry' at their first time meeting.

In this firmament there are stars in ascension -- Trisha Yearwood & Aaron Neville singing "I Fall to Pieces." And others, perhaps in decline but still able to shine brightly as they `rise to the occasion' -- Sam Moore & Conway Twitty, in harmony and `sync' - for a "Rainy Night in Georgia."

Some pairings are timeless and shine as brightly as ever - Natalie Cole & Reba McEntire caressing Buddy Johnson's (blues band) beautiful chestnut from 1948, "Since I Fell for You." And Gladys Knight and Vince Gill agreeing that "There Ain't Nothin' Like the Real Thing."

Only one track here might underline (for someone like my sister) the difference between talent and kitsch; and it's literally "Something Else" by Little Richard & Tanya Tucker. But, hey --- ten out of eleven ain't bad!

Ten years on . . . and what's my new favorite? A four-leaf clover I managed to overlook before. Then-rising-star Marty Stuart conjures up magic with the heart of a Soul/Gospel band who hadn't had a hit in years - the Staple Singers, Mavis and `Pops'. Marty (a superb instrumentalist in his own right) elevates the introduction to Robbie Robertson's "The Weight" . . . . "I pulled into Nazareth, was feelin' `bout half past dead' . . . and soon enough, Pops & Mavis seize control of the narrative, and the whole group (as James Hunter puts it, "rejoices throughout the chorus. These people are like pilgrims on the road . . . turning plain plights and shifting responsibilities into Gospel Good News."

`Anra,' my dear sister, you may never know what you missed.

Mark Blackburn

Winnipeg