Customer Reviews

You Got My Mind Messed Up

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The complete 1966 album plus 12(!) bonus tracks, many previously unreleased. Carr was one of the greats of Memphis soul music, even if he did not get the recognition of Otis Redding, Percy Sledge, or the others on bigger labels. The performances are great, the sound quality is excellent, and the liner notes (a complete biography with photos) are outstanding.

James Carr's 1967 LP has been augumented by a whopping twelve bonus tracks on this remixed stereo edition, and several of them are previously unreleased.
Very generous...and several of these twelve songs are really good. The only thing I don't like about these deluxe editions with a million bonus tracks is that they often tend to detract a little from the overall impression of the album.
The original "You Got My Mind Messed Up" was such a terrific album, with barely a single weak song, and it's not that there are too many of them among the bonus material, but they generally aren't up to the level of the original cuts, and that dulls the impact of the CD a little bit.

But hey, you can program the CD player or something. Whatever you do, don't let my griping deter you from getting this otherwise wonderful CD.
James Carr is not one of the best known U.S. soul singers, but this his debut album is simply filled with genuine soul classics, and Carr delivers them with power and pathos to rival Otis Redding. "Pouring Water On A Drowning Man" is probably my favourite soul tune, and songs like the emotional "These Ain't Raindrops", the muscular groove of "Better Than You" and the wonderfully melodic, soulful title track are right up there as well. And while it's true that there are very few bad versions of Dan Penn's and Lincoln "Chips" Moman's wonderful "The Dark End Of The Street", James Carr's rendition still stands as the ultimate rendition of that song.

Backed by a stellar band which includes the great Steve Cropper, Carr lays down two dozen impeccable vocal performances, emotional but never over the top. This one of the finest soul records of the 60s - of any era, actually - and no soul fan should be without it.
One of the greatest soul singers of all time, James Carr succumbed to lung cancer on January 7th, 2001, just 58 years old. This magnificent album is his lasting legacy.

This cd is extremely intense. There was no singer as raw and passionate as James Carr and this cd is just one example. It is very ironic that this cd is called "You Got My Mind Messed Up" because he really did have mental problems. It's almost like you can hear it in his voice without even knowing that he really did. I say that because it is almost scary the way he sings these songs. From "Pouring Water On a Drowning Man" to the very end James is singing for himself and him alone. He is held as the man who has the definitive version of "Dark end of the Street," but like co-writter of the song Dan Penn has stated compared to his version there is no other version, period. It's pretty hard to describe his vocal interpretive capability. He puts forth so much passion into these songs its mind blowing. If you have only just heard of James Carr I highly recommend purchasing this cd and then the rest of his 60's work. It has been remastered extrodinarily well, job very very well done and it has also been mixed to stereo(excluding "I Don't Want To Be Hurt Anymore" "Coming Back To Me Baby" and "She's Better Than You")A lot of people don't realize that a lot of material that was orginally in mono has the instruments at the correct level. And sometimes the remastering prouducers, when mixing to stereo dont keep certain things at the correct level(guitars are usually such the case)fortunately that is not the case here (except for possibly the title track. The guitar is slightly lower than the orginal mono is). But hey, I'm nitpicking so don't worry about that :o) For some soul singers cd's don't do them enough justice, so if you have a turntable get the LP so you can truly experience this.

This is simply a classic.The original album (first 12 tracks on the CD) is one of the greatest Soul albums ever released. It's a real shame that James Carr had a lot of things in his life which prevented him from ever attaining the recognition and respect that he deserved , he has both of those of course but at a much smaller level than he should have . Otis Redding is a world famous household name (rightly so !) but James was as good a singer , some feel he was better . But he recorded for a smaller label at a time when STAX/VOLT clearly felt they had enough talent on their books and didn't need anymore , i would say their loss but it wasn't really was it , it was ours . Then again , who can really say for sure , if James had become a bigger star then maybe those demons would have emerged sooner and greater than they eventually did . We'll never know .
What we do know is that James Carr was one of the finest singer's who ever entered a studio and that this is his best album.......you really should try and get it into your life .

Once you're a convert to the glory of James Carr you could also seek out the work of some other great Southern Soul singers like :
O.V. Wright
Candi Staton
Clarence Carter
Oscar Toney Jr
That should keep you going for a while !

Carr is one of the absolute best. If you like blue, or R & B, you will love this CD

James Carr is one of the most passionate vocalists to ever grace Soul music. His raw and gritty style should have made him as huge as Otis Redding, but unfortunately that never happened. And while I'm not going to debate which one of the two is the better vocalist, Redding never had an album as terrific from beginning to end as "You Got My Mind Messed Up". He can waver from being theatrical and over-the-top (in a good way) on tracks such as "You're Pouring Water on a Drowning Man" to being more subtle and introspective on "The Dark End of the Street" (the definitive version of the standard). After a while, the less renowned tracks such as "These Ain't Raindrops" or "Forgetting You" prove to be just as classic. For me, no other soul singer of the era sang with such conviction. If James Carr sounds extremely fragile on the record, its because he was a very unstable individual in real life. Despite being a highly erratic talent, when James Carr was at his finest, none were better.

Loved this CD.Brought back a lot of memories dancing close to the guy you thought you would be with forever.And the heartache of knowing he wasn't the one.Love it I play it everyday.I don't leave my house without it.I listen to it in my car.And sing along.Those were the days.

I loved this CD. James Carr can be counted among the greats. Thanks Amazon for having this fantastic CD.