Search - Duffy Power :: Leapers & Sleepers

Superb portrait of British blues singer's early development

Randall E. Adams | Los Angeles, CA United States | 11/01/2002

(5 out of 5 stars)

"This excellent set starts at the beginning of Duffy Power's "freedom" from the Larry Parnes pop merry-go-round (in 1962). Included are a string of great performances with the early Graham Bond band circa 1963. That means with Jack Bruce, Ginger Baker and John McLaughlin, folks. You should hear what he and the band do with "I Saw Her Standing There." His vocal style was still relatively callow at that point but by the end of the first disc (1964), the full Duffy Power vocal sound had evolved. The second disc reprises a good deal of material found on "Just Say Blue" but includes worthwhile additions and ends with a singularly inappropriate single from 1967--Duffy's desperate bid to get a hit.This set is a fine companion-piece to the deleted Edsel anthology "Little Boy Blue" which consists of nothing but Power's fantastic self-produced recordings from 1964 to 1967. Indeed, if you own both that set and this one, you will have everything Power did from 1962 through 1967--arguably his most inspired years.As is so typical of RPM sets, the sound is first rate. Power contributes to the annotations."