Fats Domino

In what would become Fats Domino’s final public performance, he with his 9-piece band demonstrating why he is considered one of the pioneers of Rock and Roll. This previously unreleased album - Live at Tipitina’s - was multi tracked recorded and professionally mixed so you can feel like you were right there in the middle of it all.

Fats Domino - I've Been Around: The Complete Imperial and ABC-Paramount Recordings (2019) {12CD Set, Bear Family BCD17579}
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© 1948-65, 2015 Bear Family Records | BCD 17579
Early Rhythm & Blues / Rock & Roll / New Orleans R&B / Swamp-Pop / Piano Blues

We could have taken the easy way out. The original 1993 box set was out of stock. We could simply have printed more copies and filled orders. Of course, we didn’t. This is Bear Family Records and we don’t take shortcuts. We’ve invested more than 1000 hours in re-writing, recompiling and re-mastering this box. The brilliant engineering by Christian Zwarg will leave you shaking your head in admiration. You won’t quite recognize some of your favorite Fats Domino tracks because they’ve never sounded this good.

An amazing piece of work – a massive eight-disc boxed set that contains every one of Fats Domino's 1949-1962 Imperial waxings. That's a tremendous load of one artist, but the legacy of Domino and his partner Dave Bartholomew is so consistently innovative and infectious that it never grows tiresome for a second. From the clarion call of "The Fat Man," Domino's 1949 debut, to the storming "Dance with Mr. Domino" in 1962, he typified everything charming about Crescent City R&B, his Creole patois and boogie-based piano a non-threatening vehicle for the rise of rock & roll. A thick, photo-filled book accompanies the disc, and there's an exhaustive discography that makes sense of Domino's many visits to Cosimo Matassa's studios. If you care about Fats Domino, this is the package for you!

Fats Domino - Sweet Patootie: The Complete Reprise Recordings (1967-70) {Warner-Rhino Handmade Limited Edition rel 2004}
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© 1967-70, 2004 Reprise / Warner / Rhino Handmade | Numbered Limited Edition | 603497 788026
Rock & Roll / Rhythm and Blues / Boogie-Woogie / Piano Blues / Jazz

Of all the early rock & rollers, Fats Domino was the easiest to take for granted, since he made it all seem so easy. Even when it rocked hard, his music was so relaxed, so friendly that it sounded effortless and natural, which was part of the reason that his classic recordings for Imperial in the '50s were so consistently enjoyable. All the hits, many of their flips sides, and most of his album cuts were flat-out fun – maybe not as revolutionary as work by Little Richard, Buddy Holly, Chuck Berry, and the Everly Brothers, but his body of work for Imperial not only stands proudly next to theirs, but is just as influential. This much is clear after years of hindsight, but in the late '60s he was as passé as any of his peers, even if there were legions of new rockers, from the Beatles to Randy Newman, who were raised on his music.

Fats Domino - The Imperial Singles Vol. 2, 1953-1956 (1997) {Ace Records CDCHD 649}
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© 1953-56, 1997 EMI / Ace Records | CDCHD 649
Early Rhythm & Blues / Rock & Roll / New Orleans R&B / Swamp-Pop / Piano Blues

The second volume of Ace's comprehensive series spotlighting Domino's '50s singles has both sides of 14 of his singles from 1953 to early 1956, presented in chronological order. (A couple of songs from a 1956 LP are tacked on as the final two tracks.) Only one of these songs is likely to be familiar to the average rock & roll fan, that being "Ain't That a Shame," Fats' first really huge pop hit and indeed one of the first big rock & roll hits of any kind. Several other big R&B hits are sprinkled throughout the disc, though, these including "Going to the River" (which actually even made it to number 24 in the pop charts in 1953), "Please Don't Leave Me," "Don't You Know," "All By Myself," "Poor Me," "Bo Weevil," and "Don't Blame It on Me."

Fats Domino - The Imperial Singles Vol. 3, 1956-1958 (1998) {Ace Records CDCHD 689}
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© 1956-58, 1998 EMI / Ace Records | CDCHD 689
Rock & Roll / Early Rhythm & Blues / New Orleans R&B / Swamp-Pop / Piano Blues

The third of Ace's series covering all of Domino's A- and B-sides has the tops and flips of 15 singles from 1956-59. This was Fats' commercial peak, and some of his biggest smashes are here, including "Blueberry Hill," "I'm in Love Again," "I'm Walkin'," and "Whole Lotta Loving." For those listeners who weren't around during the era, however, many of the 30 tracks will be unfamiliar, as he had plenty of minor hits that haven't made it into oldies radio rotation; also, most of his B-sides were chart hits (almost always more on the R&B listings than the pop ones) in their own right.

Fats Domino - The Early Imperial Singles 1950-1952 (1996) {Ace Records CDCHD 597}
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© 1950-52, 1996 EMI / Ace Records | CDCHD 597
Early Rhythm & Blues / Rock & Roll / New Orleans R&B / Piano Blues

As a record of the earliest years of Domino's career, this 30-track CD couldn't be more thorough, presenting the A- and B-sides of his first 14 singles in chronological order (a couple of 1957 LP cuts, "The Fat Man's Hop" and "Hey! Fat Man," are added at the end). Domino's debut single, "The Fat Man," and perhaps "Goin' Home" (which actually got to number 30 in the pop charts in 1952) are the only songs from this period that are reasonably well known to all but the devoted rock & roll/R&B collector. Actually, a few of the other cuts were sizable R&B hits, like "Every Night About This Time," "How Long," and "Poor Poor Me." But it's safe to say that even the average Fats Domino fan will be unfamiliar with the bulk of this collection.

Fats Domino - The Imperial Singles Vol. 4, 1959-1961 (2011) {Ace Records CDCHD 1306}
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© 1959-61, 2011 EMI / Ace Records | CDCHD 1306
Rock & Roll / Early Rhythm & Blues / New Orleans R&B / Swamp-Pop / Piano Blues

The first three volumes of the Fats Domino Imperial Singles series (CDCHD 597, 649 and 689) saw New Orleans’ finest ascend from neophyte blues and boogie-woogie stylist to bona fide rock’n’roll star. With gold-plated hits of the calibre of ‘Ain’t That A Shame’, ‘Blueberry Hill’, ‘Blue Monday’ and ‘I’m Walkin’’ receding into history, it was assumed that Fats had peaked artistically. Wrong: One spin of this release will dispel that notion handsomely.

Fats Domino - The Imperial Singles Vol. 5, 1962-1964 (2012) {Ace Records CDCHD 1323}
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© 1962-64, 2012 EMI / Ace Records | CDCHD 1323
Rock & Roll / Early Rhythm & Blues / New Orleans R&B / Swamp-Pop / Piano Blues

The fifth and final volume in Ace's extensive series documenting Fats Domino's singles for Imperial covers the years in which the singer was settling into a slow and steady commercial decline after his mammothly successful first decade as a recording artist. When you were as big a star as Domino was, of course, that's relative. His final two Top 40 hits ("Jambalaya [On the Bayou]" and "You Win Again") are here, and several other tracks dented the charts, if in their lower regions. Still, not many of these show up on Domino best-ofs, not only because they weren't big hits, but because the early '60s found the Fat Man starting to tread water artistically.