Jan 062010
Legendary Al Green producer/arranger Willie Mitchell died today at 81. Although I haven’t heard many Mitchell productions on par with the dozens of excellent recordings he made with Green, his style was so money that he even made solo Keith Richards sound pretty good.
Pretty good. It’s still burnt-out Keef on lead vocals, but those gently thumping drums, the warm guitar, and the chunky-but-never-overbearing horn punctuations were money in the bank. Feel free to lecture me on the wonders of Ann Peebles and other artists Mitchell helped, a large piece of the magic that is Al Green has left us.
NEXT: Rock Town Hall’s Official Eulogy…
C’mon, Mod. Keith’s solo albums are swell!
I don’t know, 2K, to my ears they sound like sketches for the next Stones album.
For those kindly resisting a Pince Nez on me, I learned this evening that Mitchell actually died yesterday, the yesterday that was Tuesday. What do I know?
That ‘SoulSchool’ video of Al Green is so awesome. It proves that the record Tired of Being Alone was not just three minutes of magic that Mitchell miraculously managed to capture in the studio. That’s just the way they played. Whenever they wanted to. Unbelievable.
And btw Mod, I would never lecture you or anyone, because it’s not my nature to be pedantic, but I certainly would generously recommend an Ann Peebles best-of to you and/or anyone. She’s really good.
I’ll check her out again, BigSteve. I don’t dislike the few songs I know by her, but they don’t get me anywhere near the way Al Green’s greatest songs get me.
I don’t want to oversell Peebles. You won’t get transcendence from her like you do from Reverend Al, but the band still sounds great, and the woman’s point of view thing is interesting. The pleasures from her records are much more meat and potatoes.
The Keith solo albums are fair to middlin’. Talk Is Cheap especially was extravagantly (over) praised at the time, mainly because compared to the most recent Stones product (Dirty Work) and Mick’s She’s the Boss and Primitive Cool (which is by no means as awful as its reputation, which is not to say that I am likely to ever listen to it again) it sounded absolutely brilliant. It isn’t. It’s fair to middlin’. It is at this point, though, I think, that the Mick As Worthless Sell-Out and Keith As Irreproachable Torch Carrier for Authenticity schism officially becomes dogma.
Primitive Cool sucks even more than Jamming With Edward. It’s the only Stones related album I’ve ever taken back.
Keith’s solo albums are swell, though. Talk Is Cheap is a terrific recording, to boot. I think they’re both the best thing that happened to the Stones after Undercover. I don’t mean that as a backhanded compliment, either. Keith’s solo albums are just a band, no guest stars and no constant overdubbing to get every note perfect. Steve Jordan turned out to be a really good collaborator for Keith.
2000 Man, no power on earth can make me speak well of Mick’s solo records. And even though it has been a good 15 years since the thought “yeah, it would be great to hear those Keef records” has passed through my brain, that doesn’t mean I think they’re bad. They were just overpraised by people who felt they needed to take sides in the tedious Stones Wars.