1. Goodbye Baby (Baby Goodbye)
2. Cry to Me
3. Won't You Give Him (One More Chance)
4. If You Need Me
5. Hard, Ain't It Hard
6. Can't Nobody Love You
7. Just Out of Reach
8. You're Good for Me
9. You Can't Love 'Em All
10. Someone to Love Me
11. Beautiful Brown Eyes
12. He'll Have to Go
The march of soul continues, with a lesser known singer this time. Solomon Burke never quite got the crossover success that Sam Cooke or Otis Redding had, though he did come by the title of 'King of Rock 'n' Soul' somehow. Recognition was largely limited to black listeners and other musicians like the Rolling Stones, who covered his songs a few times in their earlier days. And although there are great songs on this album, I didn't really find myself feeling too strongly about most of it. It looks like I've been sent back to the cruel world of 2 hits and 10 afterthoughts once again. It's like purgatory.
I will say that this album is diverse in its own way, though. Some songs have a pronounced Latin beat that you wouldn't really expect from that period. Burke also takes a page out of Ray Charles' book and covers a country ballad, as well as a Woody Guthrie song, of all things! There's even a fiddle!
This album is surprisingly stripped down for early '60s soul. I mean, the live albums are too, but since obviously you can't afford to pay a 40 piece orchestra to tour across the country with you, so they don't really count. But generally you had to have brass and strings all over the place, and this doesn't!
Having said that, this album is still nothing to rave about. Perhaps it's because the last 2 soul albums I reviewed were such fiery and energetic pieces of work that this seems sort of tame by comparison. Also, the backing vocalists needed to cool it sometimes. Just because you can sing doesn't mean you should. 7/10
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