Door to Door [Import]

Otis Rush, Albert King, ?????????,?????????? | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (February 24, 2003)
• Original Release Date: September 11, 1990
• Number of Discs: 1
• Format: Import
• Label: Universal UK
• ASIN: B000002OBE
• Also Available in: Audio CD  |  Audio Cassette  |  Vinyl  |  MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (11 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #61,928 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)
  • #73 in Music > Imports > Blues

Track Listings

1. Searchin' For A Woman

2. Bad Luck

3. So Close

4. Howlin' For My Darling

5. I Can't Stop

6. Won't Be Hangin' Around

7. I'm Satisfied

8. All Your Love

9. You Know My Love

10. Merry Way

11. Wild Women

12. Murder

13. So Many Roads

14. California

Editorial Reviews

From Grove Press Guide to Blues on CD

Esquires King and Rush pushed themselves further toward interpretative wisdom and individuality with the 196~61 recordings found in this blue-ribbon collection. The tone in King's low-down voice shifts between sternness and leniency while his rhythmically staggering guitar distills drama. (Three 1953 Parrot singles, his earliest work, have been included, and they're notable for his up-high singing.) Rush, with "So Many Roads," "All Your Love," and four more gems, is also in fine form, his singing agonizingly pitched, his choking of the guitar neck beseeching and peremptory. -- © Frank John Hadley 1993

Product Description

Limited Edition Japanese pressing of this album comes housed in a miniature LP sleeve. 2007. --This text refers to an alternate Audio CD edition.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

12 of 12 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Fine collection, though the title is slightly misleading, July 29, 2003

By 

Docendo Discimus (Vita scholae) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Door to Door (Audio CD)

If you didn't know any better, you would think that an album credited to "Albert King & Otis Rush" is some sort of collaboration between the two left-handed blues guitarists.

It's not, though. "Door To Door" is merely a collection of the few singles that King and Rush recorded during their short tenure with the Chess brothers in Chicago.
It's still a good album, however, and I suppose this way of re-issuing King's eight and Rush's six singles is better than putting out two seperate CDs.

Albert King, the older of the two men, does a great T-Bone Walker on "Bad Luck" (excellent piano playing on that one, courtesy of "Little" Johnny Jones), and "Won't Be Hangin' Around" is one of his greatest slow blues.
King also shines on the soulful, saxophone-driven "Searchin' For A Woman", and he does a very credible "Howlin' For My Darling" (originally written for Howlin' Wolf).

You should note that three of the six Otis Rush numbers are remakes of songs that he cut just a couple of years earlier with Cobra Records (not that they're not great), but this 1960 session also produced the original version of one of his best songs, the smouldering "So Many Roads, So Many Trains", which features what must be one of the greatest slow blues guitar solo of all time, as well as soulful blues piano playing by Lafayette Leake.
("Oddie" Payne is credited as Rush's drummer. It's "Odie". Like the dog!)

This is not an essential purchase perhaps (all the best songs can be found on other albums), but it is a very enjoyable collection of the few songs that these two excellent guitar players cut for the biggest blues label in town, and the quality of the material is high all the way through.

8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The Once Lost Chess Sides of Albert King and Otis Rush., July 5, 2005

By 

Perry Celestino (Tahmoor, NSW Australia) - See all my reviews
(VINE VOICE)    (REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Door to Door (Audio CD)

Most of us who lived in the Blues revival of the 1960s remember this landmark recording. The Blues was coming back and Chess Records, the original home of Chicago Blues, wanted their fair share of it! These recordings were in the Chess vault for ten years are would not have been released had it not been for the success of Albert King at Stax Records in Memphis.

King had recorded his set for this LP in East St. Louis and used them as a demo for Chess. They weren't really interested. Otis Rush, who has had the worst luck of any Bluesman with record deals, had come out of favour with no follow up to his massive hit "I Can't Quit You Baby" on Cobra Records. The label had gone under due the the underworld dealings of its owner. So he was looking around too.

The result was this landmark record. Two left-handed guitarists on one record! Albert King sounds as raw and basic as you will ever hear him. His tunes (maybe due to Jimmy Reed's influence) don't match the titles. I think that's cool. For example "Wild Woman", a template for "Crosscut Saw" never mentions the title; "Looking For A Woman" never explains what it is about- but its a Blind Lemon Jefferson takeoff on "Matchbox Blues" that King did right up until his death and the most famous tune on this CD; "Won't Be Hangin Round" ,is the first recorded version of his most famous lick: The stop-break bends in the first four bars of the progression-yeah! It also never articulates the song title! This is top blues!

The Otis Rush set is more diverse with remakes of several of his Cobra tunes. Most memorable would have to be "All Your Love", made famous as a cover version on John Mayall's Bluesbreakers LP. I always liked his slow tune "So Close", almost as pop, do-wop blues and the remake of the Cobra tune "I'm Satisfied" with its Gospel overtones. Fantastic!

This record has an interesting history. It was released as CD from Europe, first France in 1986 and then the Charly Label in 1987. They were withdrawn and Chess issued this remaster in 1990.It is now getting harder to locate so do yourself a favour and get a copy now!

Update: 2007 - There is now a new remaster of this classic album just released from Japan. There is also a new German version as well.
It's great that this classic material will still be available for some time to come.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Same as domestic version?, March 18, 2001

By 

"bluesjunkie" (Osaka, Japan) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Door to Door (Audio CD)

Imported CD's available at amazon.com are often Japanese versions featuring bonus tracks available only in Japan. The album info at this site doesn't specify which country the version they're selling has been imported from. I have the Japanese one, though, and in this case there are no bonus tracks. So unless you need the liner notes in Japanese, go with the domestic version.

Door To Door is a great album, but I took off one star because if you're an Otis Rush fan, chances are you already have all these tracks on one of the several versions of his 50's Cobra sessions. This is a must for Albert King fans though. In addition to 5 tracks from '61, it has his first sessions as a leader - 3 tracks recorded in '53. You can hear the beginnings of his distinct style, but the overall sound is much more raw than the slick, funky Memphis soul sound of his Stax era recordings.