Features Houston Person on tenor sax. CD

... LP, Vinyl record album

Two albums from Peggy Lee on one CD. First up is I Like Men! – an obscure album of "guy" songs from the end of the 50s! There's a playful feel to the music that fits Lee's vocals very well – as do the bouncy arrangements from Jack Marshall, who turns out to be one of the best musical partners that Peggy could ever hope for! The set's got that nice jazzy groove that really makes Lee's return to Capitol Records so great – and titles include "Good For Nothing Joe", "Charley My Boy", "Jim", "Bill", and "It's So Nice To Have A Man Around the House". On Sugar 'N' Spice Peggy's sweet as sugar, but working here with a heck of a lot of spice – thanks to arranger Benny Carter, who brings in a wonderfully jazzy feel to the set! The album's one of Peggy's best from her comeback years at Capitol – and a prime example of the syncopated, slinking mode of arrangement that was the best 60s discovery for the Peggy Lee voice – and which allowed her to create a unique space for her own maturing sexuality in pop music. The whole thing's great, and avoids the cliches of some of the other Peggy Lee albums from the time. Titles include "I Believe In You", "Ain't That Love", "The Best Is Yet To Come", "The Sweetest Sounds", "Teach Me Tonight", "Tell All The World About You", and "Big Bad Bill". CD

Peggy's sweet as sugar, but working here with a heck of a lot of spice – thanks to arranger Benny Carter, who brings in a wonderfully jazzy feel to the set! The album's one of Peggy's best from her comeback years at Capitol – and a prime example of the syncopated, slinking mode of arrangement that was the best 60s discovery for the Peggy Lee voice – and which allowed her to create a unique space for her own maturing sexuality in pop music. The whole thing's great, and avoids the cliches of some of the other Peggy Lee albums from the time. Titles include "I Believe In You", "Ain't That Love", "The Best Is Yet To Come", "The Sweetest Sounds", "Teach Me Tonight", "Tell All The World About You", and "Big Bad Bill". Plus, CD features 3 bonus cuts – including "Amazing", "Loads Of Love", and "I'll Be Around". CD

Peggy's sweet as sugar, but working here with a heck of a lot of spice – thanks to arranger Benny Carter, who brings in a wonderfully jazzy feel to the set! The album's one of Peggy's best from her comeback years at Capitol – and a prime example of the syncopated, slinking mode of arrangement that was the best 60s discovery for the Peggy Lee voice – and which allowed her to create a unique space for her own maturing sexuality in pop music. The whole thing's great, and avoids the cliches of some of the other Peggy Lee albums from the time. Titles include "I Believe In You", "Ain't That Love", "The Best Is Yet To Come", "The Sweetest Sounds", "Teach Me Tonight", "Tell All The World About You", and "Big Bad Bill". Plus, CD features 3 bonus cuts – including "Amazing", "Loads Of Love", and "I'll Be Around". LP, Vinyl record album

A wonderful set by Carmen McRae – captured at San Francisco's Sugar Hill in 1962 – backed by a tight trio! Carmen is in sweet form here, very loose and and wise, and the group knows just how to fill out the sound. She scats loosely on the opening "Sunday", nearly hits a weep on "What Kind Of Fool I Am", and actually manages to breathe some life into "I Left My Heart In San Francisco" – no mean feat! The players include Norman Simmons on piano, Victor Sproles on bass, and Stu Martin on the kit. Other tracks include a playful "A Foggy Day", "Let There Be Love", "This Is All I Ask", "Thou Swell", "It Never Entered My My Mind" and "Make Someone Happy". LP, Vinyl record album

A wonderful set by Carmen McCrae – captured at San Francisco's Sugar Hill in 1962 – backed by a tight trio! Carmen is in sweet form here, very loose and and wise, and the group knows just how to fill out the sound. She scats loosely on the opening "Sunday", nearly hits a weep on "What Kind Of Fool I Am", and actually manages to breathe some life into "I Left My Heart In San Francisco" – no mean feat! The players include Norman Simmons on piano, Victor Sproles on bass, and Stu Martin on the kit. Other tracks include a playful "A Foggy Day", "Let There Be Love", "This Is All I Ask", "Thou Swell", "It Never Entered My My Mind" and "Make Someone Happy". LP, Vinyl record album

Mainstream repackaging of a wonderful set by Carmen McCrae – captured at San Francisco's Sugar Hill in 1962 – backed by a tight trio! Carmen is in sweet form here, very loose and and wise, and the group knows just how to fill out the sound. She scats loosely on the opening "Sunday", nearly hits a weep on "What Kind Of Fool I Am", and actually manages to breathe some life into "I Left My Heart In San Francisco" – no mean feat! The players include Norman Simmons on piano, Victor Sproles on bass, and Stu Martin on the kit. Other tracks include a playful "A Foggy Day", "Let There Be Love", "This Is All I Ask", "Thou Swell", "It Never Entered My My Mind" and "Make Someone Happy". LP, Vinyl record album

Though one of her groovy Hazlewood produced albums, she only does two Hazlewood-penned tunes on this one: "Coastin", and "Sugar Town". The rest of the songs are the old-timey standards like "Sweet Georgia Brown", "Vagabond Shoes", "Let's Fall In Love", "Oh! You Beautiful Doll" and "Hard Hearted Hannah", though you might not guess that from the hot front cover featuring Nancy posing in a mod pink bikini. LP, Vinyl record album

Rare unrelased recordings by the legendary Nat King Cole Trio! Forget all the soppy pop stuff you've heard a million times – this is the real deal, the kind of stuff that got Nat noticed in the first place, and the type of material that he was playing for LA audiences in the immediate postwar years. The trio features the great Oscar Moore on guitar, plus Johnny Miller on bass and Nat on piano and vocals. Tracks include "Everyone Is Saying Hello Again", "I Found A New Baby", "My Sugar Is So Refined", "I'm Through With Love", "Oh, But I Do", and "I You Can't Smile & Say Yes". CD

Bill Evans is reunited with singer Monica Zetterlund – in a live date done more than a decade after their classic Waltz For Debby album! The first side of the record features Evans in a trio mode – working instrumentally, without Monica, in a group that features the great Eddie Gomez on bass and Eliot Zigmund on drums – easily some of the better-recorded European live material by Bill from the 70s, caught in a way that really shows his new sensitivity in the later decade. Evans' piano is breathtaking here – a subtle symphony of shades and tones that delights the ears at each new twist and turn – recorded in some slightly longish takes on tunes that include "Sugar Plum", "Sareen Jurer", "Very Early", and "Gloria's Step". Bill continues the feeling of the first side wonderfully on the flip – as Zetterlund joins the group, and shows how much she's matured as well since here last meeting with Evans. Most of the tunes are standards, but they've got a sensitivity that goes way beyond familiar readings – carried off wonderfully by Monica in some beautifully dark-toned vocals. Titles include "Come Rain Or Come Shine", "The Second Time Around", "Once Upon A Summertime", "What's New", and the lovely "Samba". (Jazz, Vocalists) CD

Maceo Pinkard wrote plenty of classic tunes in the pre-War years – and here, they're performed by drummer Sticks Evans & The Broadway Recording Orchestra and featuring such vocalists as Delores Andrews (who we learn on the back cover "likes big men and tiny dogs"), Daisy Banks, Vic Carlo, and The Edgar Battle Singers! Titles include plenty of classics – including "Sugar", "Them There Eyes", "Gimme A Little Kiss Will Ya Huh", "Why Do You Torture Me?", "Mammy O Mine", and "Let's Have A Show Down". LP, Vinyl record album

One of the last great records ever cut by Jon Hendricks – one of our favorite singers of all time! The album's a bit of a "tour de force" – with Hendricks singing alongside a host of famous jazz musicians and vocalists, working in an all star setting that's sometimes too good for its own good, but at other times works magically! The best moments are those when Jon actually takes the lead himself, singing in that warm, raspy, honest style that's always made him the kind of a singer that brings meaning to lyrics that always leave us cold from other vocalists. The album's got a wonderful re-reading of the Italian classic "Estate", redone here with English lyrics as "In Summer" – and one of Hendricks finest moments on record! Other tracks include "Listen To Monk", "Sugar", "Freddie Freeloader", "High As A Mountain", "Trinkle Tinkle", and "The Finer Things In Life" – and players include Tommy Flanagan, George Benson, Wynton Marsalis, Stanley Turrentine, and Al Jarreau. CD

Collects Brunswick and Vocalion recordings with Teddy Wilson, Benny Carter, Lester Young, and others. Titles include "April In My Heart", "Everybody's Laughing", "What Shall I Say", "Sugar", "Dream Of Life", and "Under A Blue Jungle Moon" – 23 tracks total. CD

A selection of tunes from the film Pete Kelly's Blues – a 20s tale of jazz and gangsters that starred and was directed by Jack "Dragnet" Webb! Given the setting of the film, the tunes often have a more traditional jazz bent to them – with backing from the orchestra of Harold Mooney that features a fair bit of Kansas City-styled jazz. Peggy and Ella's vocals are pure 50s Decca, though – and if anything, the album's a great chance to hear them singing in a slightly different setting, but with all the strength of their best work of the time. Peggy sings on about 2/3 of the album – on tracks that include "Sugar", "I Never Knew", "Somebody Loves Me", and "I'm Gonna Meet My Sweetie Now". Ella sings on the last third – on tracks that include "Ella Hums The Blues", "Pete Kelly's Blues", and "Hard Hearted Hannah". LP, Vinyl record album

A wild little record from this little-known American singer – a set recorded in Germany at the end of the 60s, with a compelling mix of jazz, bossa, psychedelic, and funky touches! Don's got this weird sort of raspy vocal approach a times – a rumbling style of putting over a lyric that's a nice contrast to the sweeter blend of jazz and Latin instrumentation used in the backdrop! The set features some wonderful work from key talents on the German groove scene at the time – including guitar from Sigi Schwab, and arrangements from Ingfried Hoffmann – both of whom contributed a number of original tunes to the set! Titles include "Danza", "Titicaca", "Ananas", "Inca Uyu", "Blue Bossa", "Duerme Negrito", "Sugar Cane", and "Charangito". Also features 2 bonus cuts – "On The Road Again" and "In My Fantasy". CD

A dreamy set of vocal work from Queen Latifah – a set that not only draws on her recent recasting as a jazz-based singer, but which also shows a bit more of a straighter soul approach as well! The style here is a bit less traditionally torchy than other Latifah efforts of this sort – which is a good thing, as it shows the Queen not just content to copy classic modes – and trying a bit harder to find her own musical voice away from hip hop. Arrangements are by John Clayton and Jerry Hey, and titles include "Poetry Man", "Quiet Nights Of Quiet Stars", "Don't Cry Baby", "I Love Being Here With You", "I'm Gonna Live Till I Die", "I Want A Little Sugar In My Bowl", "I'm Not In Love", "Gone Away", and "How Long". CD

The last Capitol album from vocalist Sue Raney – and easily the most compelling of the bunch! Sue's in really great form here – shaking off some of the cooler west coast modes of earlier records, and going for a more lively, more fluid style that's sometimes touched with the R&B influences that were creeping into jazz vocals at the time. Backings are by Ralph Carmichael – tightly jazzy, but often with plenty of room for Sue to take over – and there's a really great sense of balance, poise, and power here that far surpasses most of Raney's other albums from the time. Titles include "How About Me", "Burnt Sugar", "Some Of These Days", "Trouble Is A Man", "Don't Let The Sun Catch You Crying", and "Here's That Rainy Day". CD

The last Capitol album from vocalist Sue Raney – and easily the most compelling of the bunch! Sue's in really great form here – shaking off some of the cooler west coast modes of earlier records, and going for a more lively, more fluid style that's sometimes touched with the R&B influences that were creeping into jazz vocals at the time. Backings are by Ralph Carmichael – tightly jazzy, but often with plenty of room for Sue to take over – and there's a really great sense of balance, poise, and power here that far surpasses most of Raney's other albums from the time. Titles include "How About Me", "Burnt Sugar", "Some Of These Days", "Trouble Is A Man", "Don't Let The Sun Catch You Crying", and "Here's That Rainy Day". CD

A decade's worth of wonderful work from singer Sue Raney – a vocalist who was a real west coast gem at the time, and rarely got the fame she deserved! Sue's got a style that follows nicely in the mode of Chris Connor or June Christy, but which is also a bit warmer and personal, especially in a setting such as this. The sides are all studio sessions, but rare ones done for the US Navy Swings radio show at the time – recorded with backing from Shelly Manne & His Men, The Page Cavenaugh group, or the Buddy DeFranco Tommy Gumina Quartet. Instrumentation is all tightly jazzy, and sometimes filled with some freshly different phrasings – and the set features a nicely varied selection of 20 tunes that include "Umbrellas Of Cherbourg", "Breezin Along With The Breeze", "Goodbye Charlie", "Bluesette", "Five Definitions Of Love", "No Place To Go", "Burnt Sugar", "I Ain't Go No Worry", and "My Love Is A Wanderer". CD

A way hipper record than you'd guess from a group with a name like "Rare Silk" – and some of the best group jazz vocalese recorded in the 80s! The group is a quartet of voices – 3 female, 1 male – and they come together in a style that's far less hokey than most of the other practictioners of this mode at the time – a timeless sort of hipster approach that's really got a lot of the same sort of energy as Mark Murphy on Muse! Backing is small combo jazz on all numbers, with some really sweet keyboards on a few of the best tracks – and titles include versions of Flip Nunez's "Happying", Freddie Hubbard's "Red Clay", Richie Cole's "New York Afternoon", Chick Corea's "Spain", Stanley Turrentine's "Sugar", and Eddie Harris' "You Know It's Wrong". CD

A way hipper record than you'd guess from a group with a name like "Rare Silk" – and some of the best group jazz vocalese recorded in the 80s! The group is a quartet of voices – 3 female, 1 male – and they come together in a style that's far less hokey than most of the other practictioners of this mode at the time – a timeless sort of hipster approach that's really got a lot of the same sort of energy as Mark Murphy on Muse! Backing is small combo jazz on all numbers, with some really sweet keyboards on a few of the best tracks – and titles include versions of Flip Nunez's "Happying", Freddie Hubbard's "Red Clay", Richie Cole's "New York Afternoon", Chick Corea's "Spain", Stanley Turrentine's "Sugar", and Eddie Harris' "You Know It's Wrong". LP, Vinyl record album

Wonderful work from Dorothy Shay – a very unusual singer for her time, and in a backwards way, almost a force in mainstreaming country music in later years! As the title implies, Dorothy's a bit of a "Park Avenue Hillbilly" – in that she sings country themes, but in a style that's less hillbilly and more in the mode of some of the straighter female vocalists of the time. She's working here with backings from Russ Black, and the sound's almost in the mode of some of the country sides cut by Bing Crosby – but perhaps a bit more whimsical overall. Titles include "A Little Western Town Called Beverly Hills", "Why Shore", "Television's Tough On Love", "Sugar Plum Kisses & Vinegar Tears", and "Don't You Think You Should've Mentioned It Before". LP, Vinyl record album

3 great Nina records collected together in one package! Emergency Ward is a great little album cut by Nina Simone during the time she was working with Weldon Irvine. The record features 4 long tracks, all cut live in concert, and with large arrangements done by Weldon, and lots of improvising on lyrics by Nina Simone. Includes a haunting version of "My Sweet Lord", the classic "Poppies", and a great poem/song called "Today Is A Killer". It Is Finished was the kind of record that once made purists turn up their noses, but which is now being rediscovered as a unique jazz/soul crossover album, filled with loads of nice moments! The instrumentation's pretty darn interesting – and includes sitar, harp, Spanish guitar, and other odd percussion instruments. Includes Nina's nice version of "Funkier Than a Mosquito's Tweeter", plus "I Want A Little Sugar In My Bowl", "Dambala", "Obeah Woman", and "The Pusher". Black Gold was one of the excellent LPs she cut with the Stroud Productions imprint during the early 70s. The style here is even hipper than her late 60s work on Philips – with a mixture of open-ended jazz and soul that's best summed up in the album's extended reading of "Black is the Color of My True Love's Hair", and a great version of "To Be Young Gifted & Black", which was written by Weldon Irvine, who's probably playing piano here with Nina. 18 tracks on 2 CDs! CD

A cool 80s set from Nina Simone – recorded live in spare trio formation, with a sound that's a lot more old school than you might guess from the date! Nina's piano has this nicely broken-down quality – almost a raspy edge that complements her unique vocals nicely, and quite different than some of the keyboards that might have been used on such a set at the time. The rhythms are often a bit laidback too – played by Arthur Adams on guitar and electric bass, and Cornell McFadden on drums – usually in ways that let Simone's piano take the lead strongly. Nina really seems to find a new sort of life in the setting – getting past some of the more comfortable styles she'd found by this point, and rediscovering the edge that first made her so great back in the 60s. Titles include "Just Like A Woman", "Be My Husband", "Balm In Gilead", "Stars", "Baltimore", "If You Knew/Let It Be Me", "Fodder On My Wings", and "Sugar In My Bowl". CD

5 classic albums from Nina Simone – packaged together in one sweet little set! First up is Nuff Said – a great little album from Nina – mostly recorded live at the Westbury Music Fair, with a hip mix of jazz, soul, and folk that's stretched out in a slightly informal setting that always brings out the best of Nina's vocals! Tracks include "The Backlash Blues", "Please Read Me", "Sunday In Savannah", "Why? (The King Of Love Is Dead)", and the nice jazzer "In The Morning". Plus, the album also includes one straight soul number – "Do What You Gotta Do", with some great arrangements by Horace Ott. Next is To Love Somebody – one of Nina's greatest records – recorded with her cool combo that included Weldon Irvine! Weldon's on organ on the set, and he co-wrote the two-part track "Revolution" with Simone, one of the album's strongest numbers! That track is set amidst covers of other hip 60s material, including "Turn Turn Turn", "To Love Somebody", "I Can't See Nobody", and "Just Like Tom Thumb's Blues" – all done with a freely righteous style that has Nina cutting loose at the end of the 60s! Black Gold is a real classic from Nina, one of the excellent sets she cut with the Stroud Productions imprint during the early 70s! The style here is even hipper than her late 60s work on Philips – with a mixture of open-ended jazz and soul that's best summed up in the album's extended reading of "Black is the Color of My True Love's Hair", and a great version of "To Be Young Gifted & Black", which was written by Weldon Irvine, who's probably playing piano here with Nina. It Is Finished is the kind of record that once made purists turn up their noses, but which is now being rediscovered as a unique jazz/soul crossover album, filled with loads of nice moments! The instrumentation's pretty darn interesting – and includes sitar, harp, Spanish guitar, and other odd percussion instruments. Includes Nina's nice version of "Funkier Than a Mosquito's Tweeter", plus "I Want A Little Sugar In My Bowl", "Dambala", "Obeah Woman", and "The Pusher". Nina Simone & Piano is a strong back to basics session for Nina, one that featured her piano and vocals only, a very spare approach that was markedly different from her work a few years previously for other labels. Nina's tone on the piano is incredible – and she's working with some striking modern jazz changes that offset the folksiness of her vocals in a fantastic way, creating a sound that's a lot fuller than you'd expect! Titles include "Seems I'm Never Tired Lovin You", "Compensation", "Everyone's Gone To The Moon", "Nobody's Fault But Mine", "I Think It's Going To Rain Today", "The Desperate Ones", "The Human Touch", and "Another Spring". CD

Nina's not just singing the blues here – she's completely reinventing the sound of the format – by drawing on a long tradition of vocal expression, and infusing it with the hipper, more personally exploratory mode she forged in the 60s! The album's got a subtle brilliance that means that it's sometimes overlooked next to her more forceful work of the time – but it's every bit essential Simone as some of her other key sides of the decade. The group is a small combo featuring Eric Gale, Bernard Purdie, Buddy Lucas, and Ernest Hayes – and titles include "I Want A Little Sugar In My Bowl", "Do I Move You?", "In The Dark", "Real Real", and "Backlash Blues". LP, Vinyl record album

Nina pays tribute to an assortment of modern poets – Bob Dylan and George Harrison, as well as herself! The album collects tunes from some of Nina's other RCA albums – and features arrangements by Nina, Harold Wheeler, and Weldon Irvine – of tracks that include "I Shall Be Released", "Just Like A Woman", "To Be Young Gifted and Black", "Here Comes the Sun", and "I Want a Little Sugar in my Bowl". LP, Vinyl record album

The coolest collection of work we've ever seen from Nancy Sinatra – a package that goes way past her 60s hits to include a host of lesser-known gems, non-LP singles, rarities, and even a few unissued tracks as well – all presented in a lavish setting that's as vivid as the image on the cover! As you can guess, much of the magic here also comes from Lee Hazlewood, whose studio talents really allows Sinatra to find that special sort of sexy quality that she never seemed to have at the start of her recording career. The whole thing is a great addition to the too few Nancy Sinatra albums of top shelf quality – and titles include a previously unreleased duet with Lee Hazlewood on "I Just Can't Help Believing", the unissued tracks "Something Pretty" and "Do I Hear A Waltz" – and the cuts "Drummer Man", "Shades", "Easy Evil", "Ain't No Sunshine", "Kinky Love", "Sugar Me", "Dolly & Hawkeye", "This Town", "Tony Rome", "100 Yars", "See The Little Children", "Zodiac Blues", "Flowers In The Rain", "Are You Growing Tired Of My Love", "The Last Of The Secret Agents", and "The City Never Sleeps At Night". CD

The songwriting of Jimmy Webb meets the studio genius of producer/arranger George Martin – for this one-off Atlantic album from 1977, a strange little set that almost has Jimmy sounding far older than his young years at the time! Martin's working in a style that follows nicely from Webb's earlier Land's End album – using full backings to color in the tunes with just the right shades and sounds to flesh them past Jimmy's vocals. But the unusual thing is the raspy, almost faltering quality of Jimmy's vocals – sung in a style that moves into his own words tentatively, as if he's rediscovering the lyrics after many years, or making them up on the spot. The mix of Webb's roughness and Martin's warmth makes the album more compelling than it might be otherwise – and titles include a version of Jimmy's classic "The Moon Is A Harsh Mistress", plus "The Highwayman", "Christiaan No", "Moment In A Shadow", "Sugarbird", "Where The Universes Are", and "Mixed-Up Guy". (Rock, Vocalists) LP, Vinyl record album