Lovejoy

Albert King | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (October 17, 1990)
• Number of Discs: 1
• Label: Stax
• ASIN: B000000ZID
• Also Available in: Audio CD  |  Audio Cassette  |  Vinyl  |  MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 4.9 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (8 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #150,996 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Editorial Reviews

From Grove Press Guide to Blues on CD

Finding himself in early-1970s Hollywood and Muscle Shoals studios with good studio players, King lends his rugged baritone voice and ever-ready guitar to material from the Rolling Stones, Taj Mahal, producer Don Nix, and his own funky self. The highlight is King's uplifting slow blues "Everybody Wants to Go to Heaven -- © Frank John Hadley 1993

Product Description

Remastered reissue of 1971 album on the Stax label featuring nine studio recordings cut between December 1970 & January 1971. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars One of Albert's very best!, May 5, 2004

By 

Ernie Wild "Eddie" (Traverse City, MI) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Lovejoy (Audio CD)

I bought this album when it was first released and it remains one of my favorites! Albert at his best! The best word I can use to describe it is even! As well balanced an album as Albert ever put out! You can't go wrong with this one!

3 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Albert's Alabama Album For Stax, January 6, 2009

By 

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

This review is from: Lovejoy (Audio CD)

This LP was a turning point for Stax and Albert King. It was released just as Stax was about to begin its demise and it used a combination of Stax session players such as "Duck" Dunn and Atlantic "White Boy" soul players who had backed the likes of Aretha Franklin. It also has guitarist Jesse Edwin Davis, who played with King on the famous Fillmore recordings. It was produced by Don Nix of "I'm Goin Down" fame and who had played sax with the Mar-keys and others. Albert pulls off a polished LP with a slick early 1970s sound. More of a combined sound than pure blues and it was recorded in Hollywood CA and Muscle Shoals, Alabama, not Memphis. This, I feel, was Albert's first commercial market album.

However, it is an LP from Albert's "Golden Period" and the tunes do come off as very well produced, although a few are over-produced (this was Albert's problem with Tomato Records later on). First of all, we start with a cover of the Stone's then recent hit "Honky Tonk Woman", but a completely different groove. It is more polished and Albert has backing singers for the first time since he recorded in Cincinnati in the early 60s. The lyrics are also changed to remove the brothel inferences. Stax, who didn't mind songs such as "Who's Making Love" and "I'll Be The Other Woman" didn't like brothels I guess.

"Bay Area Blues" is one of King's neglected classics. It is a different sounding tune with a great groove and is a ode to King's famous Fillmore sessions. "Corna Corina' is a tune that goes back to Blind Lemon Jefferson and was done by Big Joe Tuner and many more. This tune jumps and has a great feel to it. Albert's economic solo is outstanding. "She Caught The Katy" of Taj Mahal and Blues Brothers fame is a tune to me that has an "Alabama" folk feel to it. It's part blues, part soul and part funk. "For the Love of A Woman" is a standard LP piece that wouldn't be too exciting if Albert King wasn't doing it, again it reminds us of some of his later Tomato Records work in the mid-1970s.

"Lovejoy" Ill. is an outstanding talking blues instrumental that heralds the change in Albert had would be reflected in his next three releases. He starts to define blues-funk which as the time was a new thing in the 1970s with Sly Stone, Allen Troussaint (who produced a later King LP) and others. I really love this track, another King highlight which goes unnoticed in most compilation reissues. The highlight of the set is "Everybody Wants To Go To Heaven", written by Nix, which is one of King's best ever slow blues. It has a "modern progression" for the time, it's not a straight 12-bar blues, great lyrics "everybody wants to go to heaven, but nobody wants to die" and a fantastic redefinition of King's standard guitar licks.

"Going Back To Iuka" is the only King track ever to have a slide guitar on it, King played no slide at all. It is effective in this tune. The final cut is a gem. "Like A Road Leading Home" was Stax's response to "Let It Be', "Bridge Over Troubled Water" and other gospel influenced tunes at the time. King had sung in a Gospel Group, the "Harmony Kings", as one point. This tune is one of the most soulful ever done by Albert, another unsung "classic" never released as a single (too long at the time). His fantastic soulful solo ends the record. This is truly one of Albert King's lost Stax classic records. It marks the change in music from the 60s to the 70s and Albert's style from "Live Wire" and "Years Gone By" to "I'll Play The Blues For You" and beyond.

3 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars sweatpea from fla/ny/ca, November 20, 2000

By 

ljlilly (from fla/ny/ca) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Lovejoy (Audio CD)

Robert was right! A classic blues cd/classic Albert. His usual outstanding guitar licks, and muscular vocals. But there's more. If there has been a flaw in King's body of work, it may be that some of the cuts on occasion "run together". This release has extra energy, a delicious flow, and each selection stands on it's own merits as Albert runs the gamut of emotions. Evocative, sweet, powerful, and...catchy? From first to last a buffet of very tasty blues.(Remember when you used to have a limited budget and you scoped out the albums where every/almost every tune was a fave? Bingo!