Rhythm & Western Vol.1: When Two Worlds Collide (CD)

28 great tracks from an eare when black Blues artists were pursuaded by their record labels to record Country and Western classics

This album opens with a fantastic doo-wop version of the first number 1 Hillbilly- Honky Tonk hit ever "Pistol Packing Mama" by the Hurricanes, followed by Long John Hunter's rendition of Grandpa Jones classic Old Rattler before moving to "A Knockin' At My Baby's Door" - a song that I believe would have been regarded as C&W if only a white singer instead of Titus Turner would have recorded it. Same thing for tunes like "Ida Red" and "Rosa Lee" and many more. I really dig Koko Taylor's take on Webb Pierce's Honky Tonk Song and Gene Autry's classic Take Me Back To My Boots And Saddle by the Ray-O-Vacs. I always thought Fats Domino had a strong C&W thing to most of his songs and it's really plain to see just listening to his version of Hank Williams Your Cheating Heart featured here. The King Curtis version of the classic Home on The Range sounds to me just like the records made in Nashville around that time by white C&W sax player Boots Randolph (that actually tried hard to sound like Curtis) and also the classic Country tune "When Two Worlds Collide" by Damita Jo sounds 100% like something straight out the top of the C&W charts of that era. Too bad she was the wrong color. Esther Phillips's take on "Release Me" had the same fate in the C&W charts but scored a nice number 1 on the R&B charts - despite sounding just like a white Nashville C&W production. Guitar Jr. gives us a gritty version of Pick Me Up On Your Way Down another chestnut recorded by Charlie Walker, Buck Owens, Patsy Cline, Jerry Lee Lewis, and a lot more. The great Scatman Crothers takes Ghost Riders In The Sky straight to Harlem. I included many other "Rhythm & Western" gems here by Smokey Hogg, Wade Flemons, The Coasters, Mercy Dee, Solomon Burke, and The Crowns. The best known is probably "Maybellene" by Chuck Berry - the epitome of a C&W song done by an African-American artist. The closing track is the first recording of the classic Western track "Corinne Corrina" by Charlie McCoy & Bo Chatman.