Jimmy Liggins

When 33-year-old bandleader Curtis Liggins was killed in automobile accident outside Plattsmouth, Nebraska, in June 1972, he left behind a lone 45 as proof of his potent stage show. Issued on Louie Brown’s Kaycee-Soul in 1969, "Funky Monkey Right On" b/w "What It Is?" disappeared into the Kansas City underground, only to reappear 40 years later in our sprawling Eccentric Soul: Omnibus box set. Turned up in that process was an acetate of cover songs featured in the Indications' live set, including soulful takes on Ides of March's "Vehicle" and Jimmy Webb's "By The Time I Get To Phoenix." Elsewhere The Impressions' "Gypsy Woman" gets a dirge-y makeover, while The Temptations' "Just My Imagination" is reimagined as a top-down cruiser. What It Is? compiles the best of Liggins' stage set and his only original material, a sonic time machine back to those smoky, late-'60s club nights.

The forgotten superheroes of 20th-century black music, the leather-lunged blues shouters, dominated the US nightclub stages and R&B charts for half-a-dozen years or so following World War II, before being side-lined by the bourgeoning rock n roll storm in the early 1950s. Still considered a force with which to be reckoned in the US music industry of the mid-fifties, and still at the height of their vocal prowess, many of the biggest stars were granted one or two final shots to save their flagging recording careers during rock n roll s heyday - their Last Shout.

Following 2011's highly-successful Jumping The Shuffle Blues, Fantastic Voyage takes another dip into the bubbling cauldron of R&B which sewed the seeds for ska on Jamaica's sound systems in the 1940s and 50s, lashing together 85 sizzling biscuits from that formative, feet-finding era. It's well established that the US R&B which started bombarding the island through radio after World War II was picked up by sound systems such as Clement Coxsone Dodd and Prince Buster, germinating into ska after mating with the Caribbean's own calypso and other local musical strains.

Following 2011's highly-successful Jumping The Shuffle Blues, Fantastic Voyage takes another dip into the bubbling cauldron of R&B which sewed the seeds for ska on Jamaica's sound systems in the 1940s and 50s, lashing together 85 sizzling biscuits from that formative, feet-finding era. It's well established that the US R&B which started bombarding the island through radio after World War II was picked up by sound systems such as Clement Coxsone Dodd and Prince Buster, germinating into ska after mating with the Caribbean's own calypso and other local musical strains.

Following 2011's highly-successful Jumping The Shuffle Blues, Fantastic Voyage takes another dip into the bubbling cauldron of R&B which sewed the seeds for ska on Jamaica's sound systems in the 1940s and 50s, lashing together 85 sizzling biscuits from that formative, feet-finding era. It's well established that the US R&B which started bombarding the island through radio after World War II was picked up by sound systems such as Clement Coxsone Dodd and Prince Buster, germinating into ska after mating with the Caribbean's own calypso and other local musical strains.

200 unusual songs on the then taboo subjects of sex, drugs and alcohol in a 10 CD box. This box deals with the "dirty and ambiguous" side of Rhythm & Blues and Rock & Roll. But the music is unambiguously great. Featuring songs by The Dominoes, Eddie "Cleanhead" Vinson, Big Joe Turner, Hank Ballard & The Midnighters, Etta James, Sarah Vaughan, Cab Calloway, Barney Bigard, Stick McGhee & The Buddies, Dave Bartholomew and His Orchestra, Sam Theard, Annisteen Allen, The Ink Spots and others.

Rhythm & Blues Records Presents A Rhythm & Blues Chronology 7: 1950, Vol. 1 album original hits and the original artists genre RnB, Soul, Funk, Pop.

Specialty Sampler is a sampler CD Specialty Records released in 1990 to commemorate some of the reissues they were releasing for music on their catalog, covering classic R&B, blues, doo-wop, and jazz. Music from Little Richard, Lloyd Price, Professor Longhair, Clifton Chenier, Larry Williams and many others are featured here.

The crazy holiday season is upon us, and us blues lovers might be a little reluctant to have the soundtrack at our holiday party be the same old songs that everybody hears on the radio. There is a cool bluesy solution to this conundrum: Boogie Woogie Santa Claus, an R&B Christmas from Richard Weize Archives. This CD provides well over an hour of Christmas-themed entertainment that includes 29 vintage songs in a format that both you and your guests will appreciate!