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Nina Simone is my favourite singer, and Sings the Blues (1967) is an outstanding album - full of emotion but also catchy. I'll pick out a few of my favourite bits.
The overdubbed vocal harmonies are so good. I just want to listen to them all day. It's also groovy and has a cool twangy sound. The only thing I would change is the fade-out. I don't like fade-outs.
This is the peak of emotional vocals, the impact is almost physical. The power of her voice is amplified by the restrained accompaniment and varied dynamics. Here's the producer's not for this track:
My Man's Gone Now was the last selection taped at the recording session. Miss Simone was physically and emotionally exhausted from previous recording, but she sat down at the piano and began to play and sing this moving "Porgy and Bess" tune. The bass picked it up. From somewhere she called up the stamina to deliver with even more intensity and spirit a rare, perfect performance in one take, which could not possibly be improved.
Short but great. The inflections on the words give it an extra push and the solo vocal parts where the accompaniment drops out are perfect.
This really does crackle, as the liner notes put it. The repetitive, driven drum and organ parts particularly.
This is just a great 12 bar blues. Reminds me of How Blue Can You Get, famously recorded by B. B. King.
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Callum Brown, 2021-02-23
Licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0