Seven Year Itch is the fifteenth studio album by Etta James, released in 1988 by Island Records. The title of the album refers to her comeback after approximately seven years without a major recording contract. The song "Come to Mama" was included on James's live album Burnin' Down the House: Live at the House of Blues in 2003.
After her tough blues and R&B records in the early years of the 21st century – 2003's Let's Roll and 2004's Blues to the Bone – Etta James throws a quiet storm changeup. All the Way's 11 tracks are pop songs – indeed, a few are standards – written between the 1930s and the 1990s. James song choices are curious. The Great American Songbook tunes include the title track (written by Samuel Kahn and Jimmy Van Heusen), Leonard Bernstein's and Stephen Sondheim's "Somewhere" from West Side Story, and even Bob Telson's "Calling You" from the score to the 1987 film Baghdad Cafe – it's been recorded by everyone from Barbra Streisand and Celine Dion to Jeff Buckley and Gal Costa.
Commercially, the 1970s weren't nearly as kind to Etta James as the 1950s and '60s had been. The sleekness that characterized Northern "uptown" soul and disco didn't appeal to the big-voiced belter, who stuck to her guns and continued to embrace the type of gritty, hard-hitting Southern soul and down-home blues that had earned her so devoted a following. Though absent from Black radio playlists, she had no problem attracting enthusiastic live audiences. At 41, James sounds like she's very much in her prime on this live recording from 1981. Whether tearing into an Otis Redding medley, her hit "Tell Mama" or Chicago blues staples like Willie Dixon's "I Just Want to Make Love to You" and Jimmy Reed's "Baby, What You Want Me to Do," the earthy singer clearly excels by sticking with what she does best. One of the CD's most pleasant surprises is a version of the Eagles' "Take It to the Limit," which works remarkably well in an R&B setting.
Love's Been Rough on Me is the twentieth studio album by Etta James, released in 1997 through Private Music. The album reached a peak position of number 6 on the Billboard Top Blues Albums chart. Love's Been Rough on Me is a terrific latter-day album from Etta James, capturing her at the peak of her powers. James' voice has diminished only slightly over the course of her career, and she knows how to make such warhorses as "I've Been Loving You Too Long" sound fresh. She also invests contemporary music, including John Berry's contemporary country hit "If I Had Any Pride Left at All," with real soul. The result is a record that delivers the real goods with grace and style.
Etta James was an American singer who performed in various genres, including blues, R&B, soul, rock and roll, jazz and gospel. James's powerful, deep, earthy voice bridged the gap between rhythm and blues and rock and roll. She won six Grammy Awards and 17 Blues Music Awards. She was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1993, the Blues Hall of Fame in 2001, and the Grammy Hall of Fame in 1999. Rolling Stone magazine ranked James number 22 on its list of the 100 Greatest Singers of All Time; she was also ranked number 62 on its list of the 100 Greatest Artists of All Time, but was removed from that list in the 2011 "Special Collector's Edition" update. Stickin' to My Guns is the eighteenth studio album by Etta James, released in 1990.
Universally hailed as the King of the Blues, the legendary B.B. King was without a doubt the single most important electric guitarist of the second half of the 20th century. His bent notes and staccato picking style influenced legions of contemporary bluesmen, while his gritty and confident voice -capable of wringing every nuance from any lyric- provided a worthy match for his passionate playing. In The Many Faces of B.B. King we will review many of his most celebrated collaborations including Stevie Ray Vaughan, Etta James, Chaka Khan and Pat Metheny, enjoy plenty of his hits that spanned a six-decade career and finally, enjoy a list of who’s who in The Blues Hall of Fame with names such as Howlin’ Wolf, Elmore James, Robert Johnson, John Lee Hooker, Slim Harpo and Sonny Boy Williamson. The Many Faces Of B.B. King is a fantastic album that showcases the work of one of the most celebrated musicians from our time.
A year after the release of the seminal Electro-Blues Volume 1, and following a summer of touring the chicken wire-covered stage around loads of the UK’s top festivals, we are delighted to present Electro Blues Vol 2. Continuing the 21st Juke joint experience, this must-have compilation features luminaries of the scene like Son of Dave alongside Freshly favourites Swing Republic and Future Shape of Side, rounded off with bonafide classic originals from Etta James and Booker T and the MGs…
Cafe R&B is a five-piece band from the Los Angeles area consisting of female singer Roach, guitarist Byl Carruthers, keyboardists John "JT" Thomas, Harry Cohen and Stevie Utstein, bassist Bobby Pickett, and drummer Don Swanson and Adam Gust. Longtime music fans may remember lead singer "Roach" from her days fronting Los Angeles' "Roach and the White Boys" in the early 1980s. Critics in the U.S. and Europe have compared her hard-rocking vocals to the likes of Etta James, Tina Turner and Aretha Franklin. HITS Magazine declared: "Imagine Etta James riding a Harley out of an active volcano, and you'll have some vague inkling as to the vocal power…"