Album Reviews

A generation has grown up without Reference Recordings, which due to a series of business mishaps, had gone silent and not due to a lack of demand for its consistently spectacular recordings and often adventurous titles.

A “country” album from The Byrds? Back in 1968 when this album was released, “Country” was the enemy, the home of beer-swilling, drug-warrior, war in Vietnam supporting, long hair-hating rednecks.

Larry “Ratso” Sloman’s annotation brings into sharp, entertaining focus this collection of vital Dylan outtakes, alternative takes, unreleased tracks and live performances from 1989’s Oh Mercy sessions through his most recent 2006 release Modern Times.

So great were Aretha’s hit making abilities during the peak of her Atlantic era that a blockbuster like “Think,” which leads off this set, did not make it to 1971’s Aretha’s Greatest Hits (SD8295). The track from this set making to the hits album was “I Say A Little Prayer,” given a less introspective, more energetic reading than the Dionne Warwick original.

There’s a fine new acoustic blues album by an artist some of you may not have heard of: Duwayne Burnside. Acoustic Burnside was made in the style of classic field recordings from a half-century or so ago using a vintage microphone and a monaural analog reel-to-reel tape machine. Burnside, who has an established electric blues career, also happens to be the son of the late, great R. L. Burnside. Read on to discover why this sweet field-recording LP bridges the generations. . .

Analogue Productions’ third series of limited edition 45rpm 180 gram “twofers” will surely be as popular as the first two sets, with key titles selling out and fetching big bucks on the used market. The musically well-balanced offerings from the Riverside, Pablo and Prestige catalogs controlled by Fantasy Records include The Tony Bennett Bill Evans Album, Bill Evans’ How My Heart Sings and Interplay, Miles Davis’s Workin’ and many other long sought after jazz and blues titles.