Customer Reviews

Uptight

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

A remake of the film, "The Informer," the imposed demands of soundtrack music combined with the funky discipline of the band make this an unusual & excellent collection. Besides a couple of versions of "Time is Tight," & turns at the mic by Booker T & Judy Clay, this is perhaps the most musically diverse album BT & the MGs made (McLemore Avenue excepted, but a few other guys wrote those songs). Straight blues, tricky turns of time signature, angular rhythms, even a carousel waltz. The band really stretches. & the late Al Jackson is absolute perfection, bless him.

Bob Rixon, WFMU-FM

The catch here is that Booker T. & The MG's are famous for their rump shakin' instrumentals, but the first three instrumentals here are much closer to film scoring than juke joint jams. That is to say that they were written for the purpose of ambient visual support, rather than catchy R&B hits. Truth be told, the two selections with vocals are right in there with the best instrumental material on this disc. Personally, I find "Deadwood Dick" to be a catchy but rather strange Arabic Circus tune (were they trying to re-invent "People Are Strange"?!), and "Cleveland Now" a pastoral organ and bongo creep, "Tank's Lament" a smartly devised piano and organ solo, while "Run Tank Run" is an ambient bongo and guitar workout. This leaves only "We've Got Johnny Wells", "Down At Ralph's Joint" and "Time Is Tight" for a BEST OF set (plus I'd include the two vocals and the spiritual "Blues In The Gutter"). I think it's quite nice coupled with MELTING POT. One bonus is that all the tunes are self-penned, rather than featuring any cover tunes; which they were as famous as The Ventures for doing.

Exactly what I meant - "some" amazing stuff. Half of these songs side with the best stuff the band ever did. Some of it might be a bit more fluffy, but don't let the two-star "music fan from Richmond" review steer you wrong: I mean, come on, s/he says that the album pales next to songs like "time is tight," and that song is actually ON the freaking album. So get off the pipe, friend. "Tank's Lament" is one of the more beautiful and poignant tunes ever; "Down at Ralph's Joint" swings like hell, "Run Tank Run" might be Al Jackson Jr.'s finest hour, and yeah, "Time is Tight" just can't be stopped. So at least listen to the samples.

I am not particularly happy with the audio quality of this CD. There is a lot of noise that should not be there. The original recording was done in 1969 and it should have a lot less noise than there is.

The stereo separation is extreme, which was often done in those days but could probably have been fixed in the remastering process; the organ and drums are hard right, the guitar and bass hard left. This varies a bit between tracks but is most prominent on Time is Tight; some tracks have instruments center but the bass and drums are always hard panned. Combined with the noise this makes it hard to listen to with headphones.