Search - Elmore James :: Last Sessions

****1/2. Great latter-day Elmore

Docendo Discimus | Vita scholae | 09/25/2004

(4 out of 5 stars)

"These are not rare recordings...all of them can be found on the tremendous box set "King Of The Slide Guitar". And this disc doesn't really work as a career retrospective.

But there is certainly nothing wrong with the music. These 21 tracks include a brief bit of conversation between James and Herb Abrahamson, three instrumentals (two good and one great), and a handful of genuine grade-A electric blues classics: One of several versions of "Dust My Broom", a tough alternative rendition of "Look On Yonder Wall", a fiery, piano-driven re-recording of the excellent "Talk To Me Baby (I Can't Hold Out)", the smouldering slow blues "It Hurts Me Too", the powerful (and humorous) "The Twelve Year Old Boy", and a great take on Memphis Slim's omnipresent "Nobody Loves Me" AKA "Everyday I Have The Blues".



The first three may be particularly interesting to "mid-level" Elmore-fans, since both are quite different from the ones usually included on various Elmore James-compilations, and there are several other relatively rare but often excellent songs here, songs which are generally omitted from most labels' career-spanning Elmore James-retrospectives: the gritty mid-tempo numbers "Find My Kind Of Woman" and "Can't Stop Lovin' My Baby", the funky slow grind of "Got To Move", and a sizzling "Hand In Hand".

Newcomers should pick up Rhino's "The Sky Is Crying: The History Of Elmore James" for starters, and diehards will want the two Elmore James-box sets which chronicle his powerful early waxings and his latter-day Fire, Fury and Enjoy-recordings respectively, as well as the MCA/Chess disc "Whose Muddy Shoes". But those who aren't quite diehards, but have progressed beyond newcomer status, should find a lot to love on this fine disc."