Backbeats: SOUL TIME and JAZZY VIBES

The site’s intro­duc­tory Backbeats review takes a look at two sets aimed at dif­fer­ent audi­ences: Soul Time is designed for the old-school soul music fan while Jazzy Vibes aims at the groove-conscious lis­tener who appre­ci­ates the crossover, soul-flavored jazz of the 1970’s.  That said, either set gives the lis­tener a good feel for the series’ approach to curat­ing and struc­tur­ing compilations.

Soul Time man­ages to be sim­ple and expan­sive all at once.  Nominally, it’s a vin­tage soul set that draws its brew of sounds from mul­ti­ple record labels (Brunswick, Hi, Carla, Crazy Cajun are just a few of the cat­a­logs raided here).  However, it man­ages to encom­pass mul­ti­ple fla­vors of soul under its roof, weav­ing a decent amount of famil­iar songs into the mix to give the lis­tener an anchor as it cuts across sub­gen­res with style.

The disc begins effec­tively with Bob & Earl’s clas­sic “Harlem Shuffle,” lead­ing into a lengthy string of tracks that cap­ture that bright, ener­getic style of 1960’s  R&B beloved to Northern Soul enthu­si­asts.  Familiar tracks include the late-period doo-wop of “Cool Jerk” by the Capitols and the light proto-jazz-funk instru­men­tal clas­sic “Soulful Strut” by Young-Holt Unlimited.  There are also some choice tunes that allowed the artists to become crossover one-hit won­ders on the pop charts, like Barbara Acklin’s swing­ing soul fave “Love Makes A Woman” and Jackie Lee’s taut excur­sion into dance-craze nov­elty music, “The Duck.”

However, much more of this set is devoted to lesser-known mate­r­ial.  Highlights include Billy Watkins’ “The Ice Man,” a saucy uptempo num­ber with a great sing-along hook at cho­rus time, and The Lost Generation’s “You’re So Young But You’re So True,” an umtempo love song that off­sets bright, Motown-ish orches­tra­tions and vocal har­monies over a rock-solid funk bassline.  Another killer you aren’t likely to hear on your local clas­sic oldies sta­tion is Willie Mitchell’s “That Driving Beat,” a tough sax-driven dance track that gives Jr. Walker And The All Stars a run for the money.

A few 1970’s-era tracks are snuck into the lat­ter part of the set as well: Al Green’s intense bal­lad “Take Me To The River” is the most famil­iar but Your Humble Reviewer grav­i­tated towards “Put It Where You Want It” by the Average White Band, which finds this Scottish out­fit doing a damned effec­tive approx­i­ma­tion of a Southern Soul groove.  All in all, Soul Time is like lis­ten­ing to an R&B oldies sta­tion where the dee­jay has thrown out the hits playlist in favor of play­ing what he likes.

Jazzy Vibes is a whole dif­fer­ent ket­tle of grooves — but a pleas­ing one.  This set was curated by Dean Rudland, an old-school vet­eran at the com­pi­la­tion game, and con­sists of a series of jazz records with a crossover bent that aimed for soul music fans.  It draws its tunes from a quar­tet of labels: Philadelphia-International, Brunswick, Groove Merchant and Fantasy.  The results are a savvy mix of jazzed-up instru­men­tal cov­ers and orig­i­nals that mix soul­ful hooks into exploratory jazz arrangements.

On the cov­ers tip, big high­lights include a slinky take on War’s “Cisco Kid” by Reuben Wilson that rebuilds the tune as a call-and-response duet between organ and brass and Lionel Hampton’s ver­sion of “Them Changes,” which allows Hampton to high­light his nim­ble skills on the vibes against a stomp­ing, wah-wah-accented funk back­ing.  In terms of orig­i­nals, the biggest grab­ber is “Killing Time,” a vocals-oriented tune by Natural Essence, a group formed by Nat Adderly Jr.  It sets a social con­scious­ness lyric that takes aim at street hus­tlers who fleece their own com­mu­ni­ties against a mel­low but insis­tent back­ing high­lighted by stately horn work.

However, the stuff your hum­ble reviewer responded to the most on this set are sev­eral ele­gant num­bers drawn from the Philadelphia-International library.  Norman Harris’s “In Good Faith” off­sets its orches­trated groove with some ghostly-sounding slide gui­tar work and label co-founder Leon Huff’s “Latin Spirit,”  which lay­ers exploratory jazz piano work over a taut, per­colating rhythm track that includes plenty of Latin-ized per­cus­sion.  Dexter Wansel gets two solo cuts on the disc and they are both jazz-funk gems: “Latin Love” pairs effects-heavy elec­tric gui­tar work à la Ernie Isley with spacey, ethe­real synth work while “What The World Is Coming To” starts with a del­i­cate, prog­gish tapes­try of key­boards before flow­er­ing into an ele­gantly orches­trated mellow-jazz track.

In short, both sets offer a ton of great music (each clocks in at over 70 min­utes) and include a lot of inter­est­ing rar­i­ties cho­sen with the love of a true music fan.   If you dig vin­tage soul or jazz, Soul Time and Jazzy Vibes offer a guar­an­teed good time for their respec­tive audi­ences and each is a steal at the cheap retail price.