Dragnet for Jesus

Wynona Carr

Product Details

• Audio CD (January 4, 1995)
• Original Release Date: 1992
• Number of Discs: 1
• Label: Specialty
• ASIN: B000000QMP
• In-Print Editions: MP3 Download
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #130,802 in Music (See Bestsellers in Music)

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com
Cleveland's Wynona Carr was a sadly underrated master of metaphor in gospel songwriting. Her best-known release during her 1949-54 heyday was "The Ball Game," an extended metaphor with Satan as the pitcher, Solomon as the umpire, and so on. She had several other similarly clever songs, including "Dragnet for Jesus" (inspired by the TV show) and "15 Rounds for Jesus," that were never released at the time. It's thought that Specialty Records felt the songs were a little too clever and not straightforwardly devotional enough. There may also have been concern about the effect a jump-blues feel would have on a conservative record-buying public, although contemporary records by Sister Rosetta Tharpe and songs by Mahalia Jackson scarcely a decade later were equally jazzy. This 26-song collection covers a lot of stylistic ground: on "I'm a Pilgrim Traveler" (modeled on the blues song "St. James Infirmary") and an "Our Father" recorded at the Rev. C.L. Franklin's Bethel Baptist Church, she shows off a full-voiced sanctified style with impressive power and expression. Turning the tables on R&B artists who were not above rewriting gospel numbers with secular lyrics, she borrows back Wynonie Harris's "Good Rockin' Tonight" and rewrites it as "I Heard the News (Jesus Is Coming Again)." --Bob Bannister

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars greatest gospel cd on the market today, May 15, 1999

By A Customer

if you dont dig wynonna, you must have grown up on pluto. this is her greatest album, and although her secular work is fine, these are the tunes that symbolize the Golden Age of Gospel.

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Outstanding, November 9, 2002

By	"thebigj" (Ilford, Essex United Kingdom) - See all my reviews

is the only word for this Cd of this sadly neglected "great".
The voice is out of this world and this really is gospel at its very best.
If you are already a gospel fan or just want reat music in your collection then this is one that you must get.
"Sister" Carr stand up to any of the gospel greats from this era as this album proves.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars spirit, soul, and sass..., June 15, 1999

By A Customer

great recordings from a great singer just look me in the eye and tell me that 'dragnet for jesus' or 'fifteen rounds' aren't immortal tracks that cross over all boundaries of genre and time.