VARIOUS: Ready Or Not… Thom Bell (Kent)
The wonderful Thom Bell is the latest backroom boy to be honoured with a Kent compilation of some of his best songs, productions and arrangements. Can’t be too many soul fans/collectors who don’t know...
ROBERTA FLACK: ‘First Take: The 50th Anniversary Edition’ (Run Out Groove)
As debut albums go, Roberta Flack‘s ‘First Take,’ released by Atlantic Records in June 1969, is one of the most impressive in the history of soul music. It was a compelling showcase for the...
LEXSOUL DANCEMACHINE: Lexplosion II (Solid Gold/Funk Embassy)
The former Soviet republic of Estonia has been the source of some decent blue-eyed soul of late. That country’s Rita Ray impressed many with her ‘Our Love Will Rust’ album, while guitarist U-Nam’s collaboration...
VARIOUS: Soul Voices. 60s Big Ballads (Kent)
Ace/Kent get back into their stride with this wonderful 24 track compilation where the title is spot on for the music on the little silver disc. Soul voices? Well let’s mention just a few...
VARIOUS; Detroit Special (Jasmine)
The concept of the compilation album is as old as modern popular music. Record labels big and small have always used the compilation as a kind of shop window for what they have to...
PEGGY LEE: ‘Ultimate Peggy Lee’ (UMC)
Peggy Lee is right up there with Frank Sinatra, Aretha Franklin, Ella Fitzgerald, and Elvis Presley as one of the 20th century’s most important and influential voices. She was born Norma Delores Egstrom in...
MARIEA ANTOINETTE: All My Strings (Infinity/Maasai)
San Diego’s MARIEA ANTOINETTE is unusual amongst soul and smooth jazz instrumentalists; I’d venture to suggest unique. You see, her instrument is the harp. Ms A has a master’s degree in harp performance and...
MACEO PARKER: Soul Food – Cooking with Maceo (The Funk Garage)
Earlier this year the independent Mascot label group announced they were setting up a new subsidiary label specialising in funk and soul… the Funk Garage. Intriguingly we were told that a certain Bootsy Collins...
ROMINA JOHNSON: Heartbeat (J&J)
It was the back end of last year that ROMINA JOHNSON released a new single… ‘More’ … which we were told was from an “upcoming” album. Well in these tricky times, release schedules have...
