Sad Street

Sad Street
Studio album by Bobby "Blue" Bland
Released	1995
Studio	Muscle Shoals Sound
Genre	Blues
Label	Malaco [1]
Producer	Wolf Stephenson, Tommy Couch
Bobby "Blue" Bland chronology
Turn on Your Love Light: The Duke Recordings Vol. 2 (1994) Sad Street (1995) That Did It!: The Duke Recordings Vol. 3 (1996)

Sad Street is an album by the American musician Bobby "Blue" Bland. ^[2] It was released in 1995. ^[3]

The album was nominated for a Grammy Award for "Best Contemporary Blues Album". ^[4] It peaked at No. 11 on the Billboard Blues Albums chart. ^[5]

Production

Sad Street was produced by Wolf Stephenson and Tommy Couch. ^[6] It was recorded with the Muscle Shoals house band; string arrangements were done in Miami, Florida. ^{[7] [8]} The title song was written by George Jackson, with many others provided by the songwriting partnership of Sam Mosley and Robert Johnson. ^[9]

Critical reception

Professional ratings

Review scores
Source	Rating
AllMusic	[10]
The Commercial Appeal	[11]
The Encyclopedia of Popular Music	[12]
MusicHound R&B: The Essential Album Guide	[6]
(The New) Rolling Stone Album Guide	[13]

The Commercial Appeal opined that "Bland gets deep into the blues," writing that "'Double Trouble' deals with the age-old blues dilemma of dealing with a troublesome wife and girlfriend." ^[11] The Tampa Tribune thought that the album "perfectly captures his wistful romanticism and raspy-smooth vocals." ^[14]

Texas Monthly concluded that Malaco's "synthesizer-and-strings approach has kept him contemporary without making him sound foolish." ^[3] The San Antonio Express-News noted that "Sad Street find Bland still working a smooth, sophisticated, but unmistakably blues-driven, groove." ^[15]

AllMusic wrote that "Malaco's well-oiled, violin-enriched studio sound fit Bland's laid-back contemporary approach just fine (even if his voice admittedly wasn't what it used to be)." ^[10] MusicHound R&B: The Essential Album Guide agreed that Bland's voice was "a ravaged hulk by this point." ^[6] The Sunday Times deemed Sad Street a "gritty" album that proved Bland's "Southern blues credentials." ^[16]

Track listing

No.	Title	Length
1.	"Double Trouble"
2.	"Sad Street"
3.	"God Bless the Child That's Got His Own"
4.	"Tonight's the Night (It's Gonna Be Alright)"
5.	"My Heart's Been Broken Again"
6.	"I've Got a Twenty Room House"
7.	"Mind Your Own Business"
8.	"I Wanna Tell You About the Blues"
9.	"I Had a Dream Last Night"
10.	"Let's Have Some Fun"

References

1. "Sounding Off". Ebony. Vol. 51, no. 4. February 1996. p. 23.
2. D'Addono, Beth (May 3, 1996). "Smooth blues from Bobby Bland". News. Delaware County Daily Times.
3. Morthland, John (August 1997). "Royal blue". Texas Monthly. Vol. 25, no. 8. p. 58.
4. "Bobby "Blue" Bland". Grammy Awards. November 19, 2019.
5. "Bobby "Blue" Bland". Billboard.
6. MusicHound R&B: The Essential Album Guide. Visible Ink Press. 1998. p. 56.
7. Farley, Charles (February 7, 2011). Soul of the Man: Bobby "Blue" Bland. Univ. Press of Mississippi.
8. Reilly, Terry (February 9, 1996). "(Red, Hot & Blue)". The Sunday Age. p. 8.
9. Kelley, Michael (April 9, 1996). "Long Time Coming, Beale Note to Go to Bland". The Commercial Appeal. p. C1.
10. "Sad Street". AllMusic.
11. Nager, Larry (November 11, 1995). "Recordings". The Commercial Appeal. p. C2.
12. Larkin, Colin (2006). The Encyclopedia of Popular Music. Vol. 1. MUZE. p. 666.
13. (The New) Rolling Stone Album Guide. Simon & Schuster. 2004. p. 82.
14. Dunn, Michael (January 14, 1996). "From Beale Street to 'Sad Street'". Florida/Metro. The Tampa Tribune. p. 6.
15. Beal Jr., Jim (January 31, 1997). "Blues we can still use – Bobby Bland shows no signs of slowing down". San Antonio Express-News. p. 12H.
16. Sexton, Paul (March 6, 2011). "Squalling the blues". Culture. The Sunday Times. p. 30.