Ruth Cameron Roadhouse (1999)

A follow on to Ruth Cameron's first album for Verve, First Songs, her latest album also features a class standard play list with some differences. The most significant one is playing time. Her first album didn't even hit the 26-minute mark, while this one offers more than an hour of music. The theme of this album is music one heard at road houses during the 1950's. The roadhouses I frequented during this period were noted for louder, more up tempo - in fact raucous - material, until around midnight. The music then got romantic and sexy to fit the mood of the dancers who by then were a bit boozy.

When it's quarter to three and there's no one in the place except you and me, drop another nickel in the machine and play some tracks from Bar Jazz, another smartly compiled entry in Verve's Jazz Club series. This 18-track collection of standards, ballads, and novelties celebrates the fine art of boozing, capturing in richly atmospheric detail the smoke, sex, and sorrow so pungent in corner bars and cosmopolitan nightclubs the world over. Toast to highlights including Antonio Carlos Jobim's "Captain Bacardi," the Three Sounds' "After Hours," and Shirley Scott's "Dreamsville."

Tenor saxophonist Reed was retired for a brief time while he wrote the songs for this recording, and then came back to live performing and touring. His band is a bit rough and a little out of control at times, as the backing guitars are sharp and out of tune. For the most part, though, things are together. There are two cuts from unearthed older sessions featuring the late Albert Collins, some neat horn charts, and cameos from singers Maurice John Vaughn, Sammy Fender, and Arthur Irby, which work to varying degrees. Reed's songs emphasize various social ills, some optimism, and a blues-chasing attitude that always feels good. Reed's signature funky blues crops up on the title track, a travelers anthem about Mickey D's, B.K., and similar places, during which he admits that he eventually "ate a foot long dog," knowing it wasn't good for him…

Tenor saxophonist Reed was retired for a brief time while he wrote the songs for this recording, and then came back to live performing and touring. His band is a bit rough and a little out of control at times, as the backing guitars are sharp and out of tune. For the most part, though, things are together. There are two cuts from unearthed older sessions featuring the late Albert Collins, some neat horn charts, and cameos from singers Maurice John Vaughn, Sammy Fender, and Arthur Irby, which work to varying degrees. Reed's songs emphasize various social ills, some optimism, and a blues-chasing attitude that always feels good. Reed's signature funky blues crops up on the title track, a travelers anthem about Mickey D's, B.K., and similar places, during which he admits that he eventually "ate a foot long dog," knowing it wasn't good for him…

Tenor saxophonist Reed was retired for a brief time while he wrote the songs for this recording, and then came back to live performing and touring. His band is a bit rough and a little out of control at times, as the backing guitars are sharp and out of tune. For the most part, though, things are together. There are two cuts from unearthed older sessions featuring the late Albert Collins, some neat horn charts, and cameos from singers Maurice John Vaughn, Sammy Fender, and Arthur Irby, which work to varying degrees. Reed's songs emphasize various social ills, some optimism, and a blues-chasing attitude that always feels good. Reed's signature funky blues crops up on the title track, a travelers anthem about Mickey D's, B.K., and similar places, during which he admits that he eventually "ate a foot long dog," knowing it wasn't good for him…

Ruth Brown (1957). Ruth Brown at her stinging, assertive, bawdy best, doing the sizzling, innuendo-laden R&B that helped make Atlantic the nation's prime independent during the early days of rock & roll. There's also plenty of equally fiery, hot musical accompaniment, with then-husband Willis Jackson sometimes featured on tenor sax.
Miss Rhythm (1959). Ruth Brown's second LP is a minor masterpiece, built around a handful of hit singles and B-sides from the prior year ("Book of Lies," "Just Too Much," "When I Get You Baby," "This Little Girl's Gone Rockin'," "Why Me") and containing a pair of current single sides, "Jack O' Diamonds" and "I Can't Hear a Word You Say." Brown is amazing in her range, from the upbeat, romantic "I Hope We Meet (On the Road Someday)" to the jaunty shouter "Why Me" - her timbre ranges from sweetly romantic to hard and raspy…