Louis & The Good Book: Vme [Extra tracks, Original recording remastered]

Louis Armstrong | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (June 19, 2001)
• Original Release Date: 1949
• Number of Discs: 1
• Format: Extra tracks, Original recording remastered
• Label: Umvd Labels
• ASIN: B00005CDME
• In-Print Editions: MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (12 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #165,190 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

16 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A great Armstrong pop album..., July 3, 2001

By 

Rob Damm - See all my reviews

This review is from: Louis & The Good Book: Vme (Audio CD)

I've always admired Louis's pop records from the late Fifties. Verve has done a great job reissuing some of the best of them: this album, "Louis and Angels", the great two-disc set "Louis under the stars/I've got the world on a string"... Yes, I know Louis's 20's-30's work is the most important music ever recorded, but my personal preference is for these lushly produced artifacts. I call them artifacts because the production techniques definitely tie them to a time and place in history. This is a great example of The Golden Age of Stereo... there is so much detail and ambience, you feel as if you are in the studio. Chairs squeak, Louis smacks his lips, pages turns. Listen alone in a dark room, and it's an awesome experience. I've been told by those in the know that these 24/96 remasters sound *almost* as good as the original LPs...

The music is great... an all-gospel programme, with Louis singing and (thank heavens) playing trumpet on all but one of the album tracks! Louis's interaction with the Sy Oliver Choir is something to behold... call and response, spoken interplay... again, it's so well-rendered in stereo, you get an amazing sense of the recording space, the spatial sense that Louis is standing in front of the choir, where the instruments are etc. The trumpet solos are just show-stopping. Sonically, they just jump out, and a good stereo will resolve the bell-like undertones of the instrument. Musically, I'll say this: I'm not one of those Jazz-heads that can listen to a mystery record and name, by ear every soloist. There are a few instrumentalists I can pick out, and Louis is definitely the foremost. I can recognize his brilliant, ringing, trumpet tone anywhere!

Verve fleshes out the re-release with bonus tracks, which I consider a mixed blessing. I like to sit and listen to an album as a coherent whole, and the bonus tracks distract me. That's a silly gripe really, as they are at the end, and can be simply programmed out. The repacakaging is very nice, duplicating the album sleeve, plus providing lots of critical and scholarly notes. I couldn't imagine a jazz or pop fan who wouldn't love this album!

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Satch Classic-You Can't Go Wrong Here, July 17, 2001

By 

Andre M. "brnn64" (Mt. Pleasant, SC United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Louis & The Good Book: Vme (Audio CD)

This is some more classic Satch. The album istelf is a relief from the tired reissues of Satch playing the same old songs over and over. Good concept album from 1958, which I agree is a neglected period in Satch history. The version of "Down By The Riverside" is quite joyful in particular. The bonus trax are an added blessing. I remember "Sit Down You're Rocking the Boat" and "That's What The Man Said" from my Dad's copy of Decca/Vocalion Records' "Here's Louis Armstrong" (will somebody PLEASE reissue this on CD!?) from my childhood. The former of these songs, a vivid tale of Satch's journey to hades after drinking and shooting dice, scared the HELL out of me as a child. The "Elder Eatmore" comedy sermons are 1938 versions of routines originated by Bert Williams, the father of Black comedy, in the 1910s (compare these to Williams' original versions). A nice addition to this would have been 1931's "The Lonesome Road," another comic sermon featuring Satch as "Reverend Satchelmouth Armstrong." But this minor complaint aside, this is great stuff for Satch fans, no matter what you personally beleive.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Music from heaven, June 19, 2001

By 

Jason Koffman (MINNEAPOLIS, MN USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Louis & The Good Book: Vme (Audio CD)

"Louis And The Good Book" (1958) reads much sweeter, with his All-Stars there to back him up, Trummy Young, Billy Kyle, Barrett Deams and others. Again the Sy Oliver Choir makes their appearance known as well. These sessions have a much heavier feel with meaningful tunes such as "Nobody Knows The Trouble I've Seen" and "Sometimes I Feel Like A Motherless Child", two subjects that Louis has dealt with his whole life. On the former, Louis' spoken introduction even makes an attempt to explain his choice to do this type of album. He tells of how there are times when you feel the need to look up. Funny, because as I listen I'm looking up at Louis right now and thanking him for yet another treasure. Another fine Verve release. Be sure and check on the companion reissue, "Louis And The Angels".