r&b Archive
07 Nov 2012
Album Review: Akina Adderley & the Vintage Playboys – Say Yes
From a superficial standpoint, there’s not a huge amount of common stylistic ground between the music of Austin-based Akina Adderley (& the the Vintage Playboys) and Adderley’s grandfather Nat, or […]
30 Mar 2012
Album Review: Lou Ragland – I Travel Alone
Way back when I was nineteen, I was a full-time college student, but I also held down a part-time job in retail. I became friendly with a co-worker name Wade […]
09 Jun 2011
Album Review: Father’s Children – Who’s Gonna Save the World
The story of Father’s Children is fascinating, but not altogether unique. Group comes together, develops a style, records an album, sinks without a trace. This Washington DC-based group recorded an […]
30 Jun 2009
Album Review: Ray Charles — Genius: The Ultimate Ray Charles Collection
The word Genius is thrown around far too cavalierly. At this writing, Michael Jackson (the self-proclaimed King of Pop) has been dead only a few days, and tributes everywhere call […]
29 May 2009
Album Review: Wattstax: The Living Word
With apologies to Sir Walter Scott, “oh, what a tangled web we weave, when again we practice to re-release.” The 1972 Wattstax festival was black R&B’s excellent (if belated) answer […]
28 May 2009
Album Review: Stax: The Soul of Hip-Hop
This compilation would have been an inspired, brilliant idea, had it not been done already (see review of the 2008 Blue Note compilation Droppin’ Science). So instead it’s merely a […]
27 May 2009
Album Review: Various Artists — Stax Does the Beatles
Before succumbing to the vicissitudes of the record biz, Stax Records was one of the coolest labels in the 60s and 70s. Rawer and earthier than Motown, the black-oriented label […]
25 May 2009
Album Review: Droppin’ Science: Greatest Samples from the Blue Note Lab
This is one of those projects that makes you ask, “Why didn’t someone do this sooner?” Many artists on the famed Blue Note label have had their work sampled over […]
22 May 2009
DVD Review: Otis Redding — Respect Live 1967
This brief DVD is an effort to collect all extant performance footage of Otis Redding in the months before his untimely death. On that level, it succeeds, more or less. […]
11 May 2009
Album Review: Isaac Hayes — Juicy Fruit (Disco Freak)
It’s with some trepidation that this reviewer plays an album called Juicy Fruit (Disco Freak). Had said album been credited to anyone other than the estimable Isaac Hayes, the disc […]