A really great little album from Georgie Fame – one that has moving past the swinging Mose Allison-inspired jazz vocal mode of earlier records, into a groovier style that picks up a range of different sounds! Georgie kicks off the album with his version of the ever-popular late 60s "Ballad Of Bonnie & Clyde" – and seems to use that tune as an excuse to explore a nice range of older jazz vocal approaches, including one tune that even has him reciting the lyrics in a Beatles-sounding monologue! Arrangements are by Harry South, with players that include Gordon Beck, John McLaughlin, Ronnie Scott, Tony Coe, and Ian Hammer – and titles include "Ballad Of Bonnie & Clyde", "Ask Me Nice", "When I'm Sixty Four", "Someone To Watch Over Me", "Blue Prelude", "Bullets Laverne", "This Is Always", "Mellow Yellow", and "Side By Side". CD

A nice little package, one that brings together three American releases of music by London's legendary Georgie Fame! First up is the classic Yeh Yeh – a brilliant mix of jazz, soul, and R&B – all filtered through a mod sort of London freshness, as early proof that the city could always take some great things from our own musical roots, and feed it back to us with a whole new flavor! Georgie Fame's no copycat here, though – and the sound is instantly Fame-like – a style that's really not the sort that any Americans were doing at the time, and certainly never this well. Hard-burning Hammond colors most of the tunes here – played with a tightly vamping quality – but it's Georgie's charmingly crackling vocals that really win us over! Titles include "Gimme That Wine", "Pink Champagne", "Monkeying Around", "I Love The Life I Live", "Point Of No Return", "Preach & Teach", "Get On The Right Track Baby", and the hit "Yeh Yeh". Next is Get Away – a great little album from Georgie Fame – with a hard raw soul sound that shows what a big crossover potential he had with the UK soul market – so much so that this batch of material was issued in the US as well! The album's got some wonderful arrangements – quite raw, with some nice organ, and plenty of heavy vocals from Georgie in a strong blue eyed soul mode. Titles include "Sitting In The Park", "Get Away", "Sweet Thing", "Ride Your Pony", "The In Crowd", "Last Night", and "Music Talk". Hall Of Fame is a bit of a best-of – a record that features some singles, and some album tracks – the latter of which aren't included here, as they'd be duplicated. The remaining material is Fame at his raw early best – working in a great soulful style, with plenty of jazzy charms – on cuts that include "Outrage", "Lil Darlin", "Sunny", "In The Meantime", "Something", "Do Re Mi", and Fame's own "Like We Used To Be". CD also features 9 more bonus tracks, some live recordings – titles that include "Bend A Little", "Telegram", "It Ain't Right", "Don't Make Promises", "Many Happy Returns", "I'm In Love With You", "Shop Around", "Green Onions", and "Do The Dog". CD

(Funky 45's, Vocalists) 7-inch, Vinyl record

Some of our favorite work ever from the mighty Georgie Fame – key tracks from his years on CBS – when he was really moving past straight jazz, into a whole great style of his own! First up is the full album Georgie Does His Thing With Strings – a set that has Georgie Fame singing with a host of string-heavy backings from the great Keith Mansfield! Given Mansfield's roots in the sound library scene, the style here is never as sleepy or hokey as you might expect from the "strings" in the title – but there is a moodier, mellower approach than you'd hear on other Fame albums – a style that's partially aimed at older jazz vocal modes, but which also echoes with sounds of the Scott Walker generation – a newly mature mode that's a really great fit for Georgie's unique style of singing, and which exposes yet another amazing side of his seemingly limitless talents! There's always a nice sense of warmth and wit going on – one that keeps these tunes from just being the usual sort of standard vocal fare of the period – and Mansfield's backings have a lean quality that often pulses with a very gentle groove at the bottom. Titles include "Who's Kissing You Blues", "Girl Talk", "This Guy's In Love With You", "A House Is Not A Home", "Woe Is Me", "Need Your Love So Bad", and "Guess Who I Saw Today". Next is the rare Knock On Wood EP – with four songs that include the title track, plus "Close The Door", "All I'm Asking", and "Didn't Want To Have To Do It". THEN – the CD adds in 21 more bonus tracks – almost all non-album single cuts by Fame from the late 60s and start of the 70s – most of which have never been reissued, and are a flurry of mad soul, clever vocals, and lots of hip instrumental twists – all delivered with that undeniable Georgie Fame charm. Titles include "Down Along The Cover", "Seventh Son", "No Thanks", "Try My World", "Bidin My Time", "For Your Pleasure", "Kentucky Child", "Peaceful", "Entertaining Mr Sloan", "Someday Man", and "The Movie Star Song". CD

Completely wonderful work from Georgie Fame – a stone cooking collection of his mid 60s mod recordings for Columbia Records in the UK – a unique combination of jazz, soul, and R&B – all delivered with a style so original, it can only be dubbed Fame-like! Georgie's approach really digs deep on the American scene – a bit of New Orleans soul, a dose of New York soul jazz, all filtered together with a London appreciation of the best elements of both, and delivered with a tightness that almost beats out most US recordings that even try to come close! The collection does a great job of avoiding material already compiled on the Polydor Fame set from years back – and really goes for upbeat, hard-grooving numbers that show why Georgie's music had such a big role in the hippest sides of the London scene of the 60s. Titles include "Sweet Thing", "Something", "Point Of No Return", "Lil Darlin", "El Bandido", "Dawn Yawn", "Music Talk", "Outrage", "It's Got The Whole World Shakin", "Move It On Over", "Last Night", "The World Is Round", and "See Saw". LP, Vinyl record album

A pair of late 60s Columbia classics from Tony Bennett – back to back on a single CD! First up is Tony Makes It Happen – a very jazzy album, with a group that features Joe Wilder and Joe Newman on trumpets, Urbie Green on trombone, Joe Soldo on flute, and orchestrations from Marion Evans – all of whom really bring out those unique qualities that set Bennett apart from so many other singers in his generation! Where a Vic Damone might have used his inherent richness to push things over the top, the maturing Tony is a master of restraint – still able to run the full gamut of his amazing range, but set up with these beautiful arrangements that bring some adult understanding to the tunes, in a beautifully subtle vibe. Titles include "What Makes It Happen", "I Don't Know Why", "Can't Get Out Of This Mood", "She's Funny That Way", "A Beautiful Friendship", and "Don't Get Around Much Anymore". Next is Yesterday I Heard The Rain – fantastically mature work from Tony Bennett – a record that follows in that great direction the singer was taking in the 60s – delivering sophisticated vocals that didn't care much for the charts, but which really stand the test of time as the years go by! As on some of Tony's best from the period, arrangements are by Torrie Zito – whose careful orchestrations always let Bennett's vocals soar out in the lead, while also hitting some occasional flourishes that bring just the slight touch of drama to the music – but never in the over the top styles of some of his contemporary! Space is the key here – lots of space between the words and the notes – which makes even simpler songs sound pretty darn amazing. Titles include "Sweet Georgie Fame", "Fool Of Fools", "Only The Young", "I Only Have Eyes For You", "Yesterday I Heard The Rain", and a surprisingly great version of "Hushabye Mountain". CD

There's few singers we like better than Blossom Dearie – and this great little record captures Blossom at her unfettered best, working live before an intimate crowd at London's Ronnie Scott's nightclub in the 60s! The performance is in the same small combo mode as some of Dearie's Verve albums from the 50s – but there's a looser swing here that's really great – an even hipper approach to the even hipper tunes that pushes the Blossom aesthetic very nicely into the 60s. Blossom herself is on piano, supported by the bass of Freddie Logan and drums of Alan Ganley – and overall, the album's a few notches up from the better-known Blossom Time At Ronnie Scotts, thanks to a more fluid groove and very strong choice of material. Titles include "Big City", "One Note Samba", "On A Clear Day", "You Turn Me On Baby", "Let's Go Where The Grass Is Greener", "You're Gonna Hear From Me", "Peel Me A Grape", "Sweet Lover No More", and an early reading of "Sweet Georgie Fame". CD

A great sampling of work from Monica Zetterlund – the icy-voiced singer who's one of Scandinavia's greatest jazz vocalists ever! Monica first came to light at the end of the 50s, singing songs in both English and Swedish, in a style that rivalled some of the best American and English vocalists of the same time – often working in a small combo jazz mode, but also sounding equally nice with larger swinging arrangements. The set offers 18 tracks in all – mostly from the 60s, with a few numbers from the 70s thrown in for good measure – and titles include Swedish versions of "Dat Dere", "Sweet Georgie Fame", "Alfie", "Walking My Baby Back Home", "Take Five", "Waltz For Debby", and "Un Homme Et Une Femme". CD

Classic work from one of the hippest jazz singers of all time – and a hell of a pianist too! Mose Allison began his recording career laying down piano on jazz sessions for Stan Getz and a few others – but here, he emerges as a fully-formed talent of his own – steeped in modes from the New Orleans scene, but also able to spin out his own uniquely hip approach – at a level that went onto have a huge influence on later generations of singers – from Dr John to Georgie Fame to Paul Weller – as well as the UK mod scene of the 60s! This album's one of a few that Allison cut for Epic Records, which are among some of our favorites – and titles include "Baby Please Don't Talk About Me When I'm Gone", "Back On The Corner", "Mad With You", "Life Is Suicide", "I Love The Life I Live", and "Ask Me Nice". LP, Vinyl record album

A mighty nice pairing of talents – the great Van Morrison, working here in a soul jazz setting with plenty of work on Hammond from the equally great Joey DeFrancesco! The album's a lot like the one that Van cut with Georgie Fame years back – and with all that organ, the sound is a bit like Fame's work of the 60s – much more in a soul jazz mode than any of Morrison's work from his early years, and a great setting for his mature vocals – which still have all the charm of before, but have maybe changed in a way that suits a jazz setting more than the albums of his early solo years. The group's also got some strong tenor from Troy Roberts, and Joey plays some trumpet too – on titles that include "Celtic Swing", "Sticks & Stones", "Close Enough For Jazz", "Goldfish Bowl", "Have I Told You Lately", "All Saint's Day", "Hold It Right There", "Miss Otis Regrets", and "Magic Time". (Rock, Vocalists) CD

A great set by one of the most unique voices in early 70s British pop – the enigmatic Norman "Hurricane" Smith, a strange singer whose work fits into a spectrum that lies somewhere between Georgie Fame, Gilbert O'Sullivan, and Ray Davies! Like all 3 of those artists, Hurricane's got an ear for days gone by – a slight touch of nostalgia that comes through in the subjects of his tunes and the instrumentation that accompanies his voice. And if we were to link his style with anyone, it would probably most directly be Gilbert O'Sullivan – who shares a similarly quirky style of songwriting and arranging, and who gave Smith a hit in the tune "Who Was It?" The rest of the numbers off this album are originals, with titles that include "Aunti Vi's", "Getting To Know You", "Theme From An Unmade Silent Movie", "Many Happy Returns", "Take Suki Home", "Back In The Country", and "Don't Let It Die". LP, Vinyl record album