Bob's Chat

Today's Best Of Jazz Volume 126 brings you the third volume in "All About The Chicks" with 20 fine tracks running from 1933 through to 2024. A few well-known and several not-so-well-known artists are in this collection: Clifford Brown, Stephane Grappelli, Ray Charles, Larry Coryell, Stanley Jordan, Carl Perkins, Ravi Coltrane, Henry Red Allen, Calvin Keys, plus a few others, all performing great tracks dedicated to the fairer sex.

Blues, R&B, Soul & Gospel Records continues with Volume 291. Here for your listening pleasure are 21 selected tracks starting in 1938 with Sonny Boy Williamson I and "Whiskey Head Blues" to Nathaniel 'Snoopy' Dean's "Travelin' Man" recorded in 1996, just two years before his death in 1998. Other fine artists included here are: Melvin Sparks, Esther Phillips, Wynonie Harris, Tiny Bradshaw, Walter Brown, Sugar Boy Crawford, Marylyn Scott, and several other great people.

The other day I was listening to Lonnie Mack's superb 1963 album "The Wham Of That Memphis Man!". I bought the 1969 Elektra Records LP "For Collectors Only" sometime in the early 1970s and it instantly became one of my most favorite albums. However, it had been a long time since I last heard this great album so I really enjoyed having another listen. Every track is a gem, the obvious standouts being "Wham!" and "Memphis" but the track that totally blew me away was "Down And Out". Of course I've heard it many times in the past but probably not for two or three decades, so I'd forgotten just how good it is. If you haven't heard this before, or haven't heard it for a long time, then give yourselves a treat and listen to this ballsy guitar classic. Lonnie Mack's "The Wham Of That Memphis Man!" most definitely deserves another listen.