Rock 'n Soul (Solomon Burke album)

Last updated
Rock 'N Soul
Rocknsoul.jpg
Studio album by
ReleasedJuly 1964 (1964-Jul)
Genre Soul
Length34:06
Label Atlantic
Producer Bert Berns
Solomon Burke chronology
Solomon Burke
(1962)
Rock 'N Soul
(1964)
The Best of Solomon Burke
(1965)
Professional ratings
Review scores
SourceRating
AllMusic Star full.svgStar full.svgStar full.svgStar half.svgStar empty.svg [1]

Rock 'N Soul is a 1964 studio album by Grammy Award winning musician Solomon Burke. The album contained seven top 100 hits. Originally released on LP on Atlantic Records, #8096, in July 1964, it was subsequently reissued in March, 1997, on the Sequel Records imprint, #RSACD 861. [2] The album was also reissued in 1998 on the Collectables Records label in conjunction with a June, 1963, Burke album as If You Need Me/Rock 'n' Soul. [2] [3]

Contents

The album was included in Robert Dimery's 1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die . [4]

Title

The album's title refers to Burke's rank as the "King of Rock 'n' Soul", [5] a label Burke embraced because of the interconnectedness of the musical forms of rock and roll and soul music, telling Jet in 1963 that "without soul, there'd be no rock, and without rock, there'd be no soul." [6] He was also uncomfortable being associated with rhythm and blues, which he believed had "a stigma of profanity", because of his clean lifestyle and strong spiritual beliefs. [7] Burke's coronation as the "King of Rock 'n' Soul" at the Royal Theatre in Baltimore was reported in Jet in January, 1964. [8]

Songs

The album contained seven top 100 Billboard hits, including "Just Out of Reach (Of My Two Empty Arms)", "Cry to Me", "Can't Nobody Love You", "If You Need Me", "You're Good For Me", "Goodbye Baby (Baby Goodbye)", and "He'll Have to Go". [9] The New Rolling Stones Album Guide singles out Burke's version of the 1959 hit "He'll Have to Go" here as "a heartbreaking interpretation" and his version of Woody Guthrie's "Hard, Ain't It Hard" as a "lively stab". [10] Allmusic notes that Burke's version of "Cry to Me" is "vaguely Caribbean in rhythmic feel", contributing to an "upbeat tempo" that stands "at odds" from the "solemn" lyrics. [11]

Charting songCharting year Black Singles Pop Singles Adult Contemporary
"Just Out of Reach (Of My Two Empty Arms)"1961#7#24#6
"Cry to Me"1962#5#44
"Can't Nobody Love You"1963#66
"If You Need Me"1963#2#37
"You're Good for Me"1963#8#49
"Goodbye Baby (Baby Goodbye)"1964#33#33
"He'll Have to Go"1964#51#51

Track listing

  1. "Goodbye Baby (Baby Goodbye)" (Wes Farrell, Bert Russell) – 3:16
  2. "Cry to Me" (Bert Russell) – 2:27
  3. "Won't You Give Him (One More Chance)" (Joseph Martin, Winfield Scott) – 2:31
  4. "If You Need Me" (Robert Bateman, Wilson Pickett, Sonny Sanders) – 2:29
  5. "Hard, Ain't It Hard" (Woody Guthrie) [10] [12] – 2:45
  6. "Can't Nobody Love You" (James Mitchell) – 2:30
  7. "Just Out of Reach" (Virgil Stewart) – 2:46
  8. "You're Good for Me" (Don Covay, Horace Ott) – 2:45
  9. "You Can't Love Them All" (Bert Berns, Jerry Leiber, Mike Stoller, Nugetre) – 2:40
  10. "Someone to Love Me" (Sonny Burke) – 2:59
  11. "Beautiful Brown Eyes" (Sonny Burke, Bert Russell) – 3:42
  12. "He'll Have to Go" (Audrey Allison, Joe Allison) – 3:16

Personnel

Related Research Articles

This is a list of notable events in music that took place in the year 1962.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Solomon Burke</span> American preacher and singer (1936–2010)

Solomon Vincent McDonald Burke was an American singer who shaped the sound of rhythm and blues as one of the founding fathers of soul music in the 1960s. He has been called "a key transitional figure bridging R&B and soul", and was known for his "prodigious output".

Bertrand Russell Berns, also known as Bert Russell and (occasionally) Russell Byrd, was an American songwriter and record producer of the 1960s. His songwriting credits include "Twist and Shout", "Piece of My Heart", "Here Comes the Night", "Hang on Sloopy", "Cry to Me" and "Everybody Needs Somebody to Love", and his productions include "Baby, Please Don't Go", "Brown Eyed Girl" and "Under the Boardwalk".

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Freddie Scott</span> Musical artist

Freddie Scott was an American soul singer and songwriter. His biggest hits were "Hey, Girl", a top ten US pop hit in 1963, and "Are You Lonely for Me", a No. 1 hit on the R&B chart in early 1967.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">The Andantes</span> American female session group

The Andantes were an American female session group for the Motown record label during the 1960s. Composed of Jackie Hicks, Marlene Barrow, and Louvain Demps, the group sang background vocals on numerous Motown recordings, including songs by Martha Reeves & the Vandellas, the Temptations, Stevie Wonder, the Four Tops, Jimmy Ruffin, Edwin Starr, the Supremes, the Marvelettes, Marvin Gaye and the Isley Brothers, among others. It is estimated they appeared on 20,000 recordings.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Junior Parker</span> American blues singer (1932–1971)

Herman "Junior" Parker was an American blues singer and harmonica player. He is best remembered for his voice which has been described as "honeyed" and "velvet-smooth". One music journalist noted, "For years, Junior Parker deserted down home harmonica blues for uptown blues-soul music". In 2001, he was inducted into the Blues Hall of Fame. Parker is also inducted into the Mississippi Musicians Hall of Fame.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">The Honeycombs</span> English beat/pop group

The Honeycombs were an English beat group, founded in 1963 in North London, best known for their chart-topping, million-selling 1964 hit, "Have I the Right?" The band featured Honey Lantree on drums, one of the few high-profile female drummers at that time. They were unable to replicate the success of their first single and disbanded by 1967.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Dean Parks</span> American guitarist and record producer

Weldon Dean Parks is an American session guitarist and record producer from Fort Worth, Texas. Parks has one Grammy nomination.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Buddy Johnson</span> Musical artist

Woodrow Wilson "Buddy" Johnson was an American jump blues pianist and bandleader active from the 1930s through the 1960s. His songs were often performed by his sister Ella Johnson, most notably "Since I Fell for You", which became a jazz standard.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">James Intveld</span> American singer-songwriter

James Intveld is an American rockabilly musician, singer, songwriter, performer, actor, and film director from Los Angeles, California, United States.

The first season of the Theme Time Radio Hour, hosted by Bob Dylan, ran from May 3, 2006, to April 18, 2007 on XM Satellite Radio for a total of 50 shows.

"Everybody Needs Somebody to Love" is a song written by Bert Berns, Solomon Burke, and Jerry Wexler, and originally recorded by Burke under the production of Berns at Atlantic Records in 1964. Burke's version charted in 1964, but missed the US top 40, peaking at number 58.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Betty Harris</span> American soul singer (born 1939)

Betty Harris is an American soul singer. Her recording career in the 1960s produced three hit singles that made the U.S. Billboard R&B and Billboard Hot 100 charts: "Cry to Me" (1963), "His Kiss" (1964) and "Nearer to You" (1967). However, her reputation among soul music connoisseurs far exceeds her commercial success of the 1960s, and her recordings for the Jubilee and Sansu record labels are highly sought after in the 2000s by fans of Southern Soul, Northern soul and deep soul.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Cry to Me</span> 1962 single by Solomon Burke

"Cry to Me" is a song written by Bert Berns and first recorded by American soul singer Solomon Burke in 1961. Released in 1962, it was Burke's second single to appear in both Billboard magazine's Hot R&B Sides and Hot 100 singles charts. On March 20, 1962, Burke performed "Cry to Me" on American Bandstand.

The third season of the Theme Time Radio Hour premiered on Wednesday, October 8, 2008, the same week that saw the release of a new edition of the Bootleg Series, Tell Tale Signs. Somewhat eerily, given that it aired during the week of a worldwide financial crisis caused by the collapse of the credit markets, the first show's theme was "Money: Part 1".

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Jimmy Radcliffe</span> American singer

James Radcliffe was an American soul singer, composer, arranger, conductor and record producer.

Classic Rock was a 31-volume series issued by Time Life during the late 1980s and early 1990s. The series spotlighted popular music played on Top 40 radio stations of the mid-to-late-1960s.

The following list is the discography of the American soul musician Solomon Burke.

"If You Need Me" is a 1963 song co-written and originally recorded by Wilson Pickett. It was made into a bigger hit by Solomon Burke, who sent the song to #2 on the R&B charts that year.

References

  1. AllMusic review
  2. 1 2 Strong, Martin C. (2004). The Great Rock Discography: Complete Discographies Listing Every Track Recorded by More Than 1,200 Artists. Canongate U.S. p. 213. ISBN   1-84195-615-5.
  3. If You Need Me/ Rock 'n' Soul at AllMusic
  4. ^ Robert Dimery; Michael Lydon (23 March 2010). 1001 Albums You Must Hear Before You Die: Revised and Updated Edition. Universe. ISBN   978-0-7893-2074-2.
  5. Cossar, Neil; Pete Hawkins (2005). This Day in Music: An Everyday Record of 10,000 Musical Facts. Sterling Publishing Company, Inc. ISBN   1-84340-298-X.
  6. Company, Johnson Publishing (Nov 28, 1963). "People are talking about". Jet . 25 (6): 42. Retrieved 2008-12-09.
  7. Ward, Brian (1998). Just My Soul Responding: Rhythm and Blues, Black Consciousness, and Race Relations . University of California Press. p.  199. ISBN   0-520-21298-3. Solomon Burke Rock 'n' soul.
  8. Company, Johnson Publishing (Jan 23, 1964). "Rock 'n' royalty". Jet. 25 (14): 37. Retrieved 2008-12-09.
  9. Solomon Burke Billboard Singles at AllMusic
  10. 1 2 D.M. (2004). "Solomon Burke". In Nathan Brackett, Christian Hoard (ed.). The New Rolling Stone Album Guide: Completely Revised and Updated (4th ed.). Simon and Schuster. p.  121. ISBN   0-7432-0169-8 . Retrieved 2008-12-09.
  11. Cry to Me at AllMusic
  12. label – Hard, Ain't It Hard at AllMusic