Album Reviews

Originally issued by Elektra in 1969 as EKS-74053 in November, of 1969, this record shows Butterfield feeling the cultural and political heat of the times, beginning with Gene Dinwiddie's anti-war opener, "Love March."

With soul producer/writer Jerry Ragovoy in charge (he co-wrote "Piece of My Heart" made famous by Janis Joplin, among hundreds of hits), this late '60s edition of The Butterfield Blues Band ditches the southside Chigago for James Brown's soul kitchen.

Butterfield sings and screams like Brown, the horn arrangements sting and Buzzy Feitens guitar is on fire. Everyone, even the tambourine player, turns up the heat.

If you like your soul/blues picante, with horns blazing and bongos popping, you will absolutely love this record. It is hot from the first note to the fade out at the end of the next to last track on side two. The closer, a Butterfield ballad, "Keep on Moving," give you a chance to catch your breath while Butterfield gives one of his most heartfelt performances on record.

The Hit Factory recording is clean, orderly, dynamic as hell and somewhat antiseptic in that you can sense everyone's playing in an acoustic bottle so the mixer could have greater latitude later. A real "headphone" recording. Fortunately the separate parts add up really well!

Unfortunately, while the sonics engraved into the vinyl are excellent, my slab of vinyl was pretty noisy. Fortunately, so is the music and most of the time the noise was buried. I love this record.