Curtis Mayfield - Curtis

Styles: Soul, Funk
Year: 1970
File: MP3@320K/s
Time: 40:43
Size: 95,6 MB
Art: Front

(7:52)  1. (Don't Worry) If There's Hell Below We're All Gonna Go
(4:03)  2. The Other Side of Town
(3:44)  3. The Making of You
(6:05)  4. We The People Who Are Darker Than Blue
(8:55)  5. Move on Up
(3:00)  6. Miss Black America
(3:18)  7. Wild and Free
(3:43)  8. Give It Up

The first solo album by the former leader of the Impressions, Curtis represented a musical apotheosis for Curtis Mayfield  indeed, it was practically the "Sgt. Pepper's" album of '70s soul, helping with its content and its success to open the whole genre to much bigger, richer musical canvases than artists had previously worked with. All of Mayfield's years of experience of life, music, and people were pulled together into a rich, powerful, topical musical statement that reflected not only the most up-to-date soul sounds of its period, finely produced by Mayfield himself, and the immediacy of the times and their political and social concerns, but also embraced the most elegant R&B sounds of the past. As a producer, Mayfield embraced the most progressive soul sounds of the era, stretching them out compellingly on numbers like "Move on Up," but he also drew on orchestral sounds (especially harps), to achieve some striking musical timbres (check out "Wild and Free"), and wove all of these influences, plus the topical nature of the songs, into a neat, amazingly lean whole. There was only one hit single off of this record, "(Don't Worry) If There's a Hell Down Below We're All Going to Go," which made number three, but the album as a whole was a single entity and really had to be heard that way. ~ Bruce Eder https://www.allmusic.com/album/curtis-mw0000112083
 

Personnel:  Musicians - Leonard Druss, John Howell, Harold Lepp, Loren Binford, Clifford Davis, Patrick Ferreri, Richard Single, Rudolph Stauber, Donald Simmons, Robert Lewis, Harold Dessent, Ronald Kolber, Harold Klatz, John Ross, Sol Bobrob, Sam Heiman, Elliot Golub, Henry Gibson, Robert Sims, Gary Slabo, Philip Upchurch

Curtis

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Curtis Mayfield - Love Is The Place

Styles: Vocal And Guitar Jazz
Year: 1981
File: MP3@320K/s
Time: 36:17
Size: 84,4 MB
Art: Front

(4:16)  1. She Don't Let Nobody (But Me)
(4:09)  2. Toot An'toot An'toot
(5:32)  3. Babydoll
(5:04)  4. Love Is The Place
(4:28)  5. Just Ease My Mind
(4:50)  6. You Mean Everything To Me
(3:38)  7. You Get All My Love
(4:16)  8. Come Free Your People

A CD reissue of an old Mayfield platter that didn't garner as much interest as some of his other solo releases, and for good reason: Mayfield was experimenting with his sound. After the first three songs nothing else really works until the last cut: "Come Free Your People," one of Mayfield's best albeit little-known message songs. The most engaging of the eight tunes are the reggae-influenced "She Don't Love Nobody Else," "Toot an' Toot an' Toot," and the lilting "Baby Doll."~ Andrew Hamilton https://www.allmusic.com/album/love-is-the-place-mw0000608697

Personnel:  Curtis Mayfield - vocals, guitar;  Fred Tackett, Michael Sembello - guitar;  Dennis Belfield - bass;  David Loeb - keyboards;  Paulinho Da Costa - percussion;  Carlos Vega - drums;  Efrain Toro - marimba, vibraphone;  Sam Small - Theremin;  Julia Tillman Waters, Luther Waters, Maxine Willard Waters, Oren Waters, Dino Fekaris - backing vocals;  Gene Page - string and horn arrangements

Love Is The Place

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Curtis Mayfield - Give, Get, Take And Have

Styles: Vocal, Soul, Funk
Year: 1976
File: MP3@320K/s
Time: 36:42
Size: 86,3 MB
Art: Front

(4:27)  1. In Your Arms Again (Shake It)
(3:11)  2. This Love Is Sweet
(3:59)  3. P.S. I Love You
(3:52)  4. Party Night
(3:36)  5. Get A Little Bit (Give, Get, Take And Have)
(4:01)  6. Soul Music
(4:22)  7. Only You Babe
(5:36)  8. Mr. Welfare Man
(3:34)  9. Only You Babe (Single Edit)

Less sociopolitical than previous efforts, Give Get Take Have offers "Mr. Welfare Man" as its sole attempt to enlighten and enhance. Mayfield was obviously experiencing the joys of new love when he cut "Only You Babe" and "This Love Is Sweet," and the tear-jerking numbers "In Your Arms Again" and "Party Night." His aching falsetto coos and purrs, but sounds weakened on this LP. Overall, the album falls short of Mayfield's former releases, but even great artists don't always achieve their usual high standards. This was originally released on Curtom Records in the mid-'70s.~ Andrew Hamilton https://www.allmusic.com/album/give-get-take-and-have-mw0000110128

Give, Get, Take And Have

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The Impressions - The Greatest Hits

Bitrate: MP3@320K/s
Time: 41:46
Size: 95.6 MB
Styles: Soul, R&B
Year: 1998
Art: Front

[2:18] 1. Gypsy Woman
[2:46] 2. It's All Right
[2:30] 3. Talking About My Baby
[2:46] 4. I'm So Proud
[2:30] 5. Keep On Pushing
[2:31] 6. You Must Believe Me
[3:24] 7. Amen
[2:37] 8. People Get Ready
[2:15] 9. Woman's Got Soul
[2:18] 10. Meeting Over Yonder
[2:47] 11. I Need You
[2:32] 12. You've Been Cheatin'
[2:35] 13. Can't Satisfy
[2:21] 14. We're A Winner
[3:13] 15. I Loved And I Lost
[2:16] 16. We're Rolling On (Part One)

The quintessential Chicago soul group, the Impressions' place in R&B history would be secure if they'd done nothing but launch the careers of soul legends Jerry Butler and Curtis Mayfield. But far more than that, the Impressions recorded some of the most distinctive vocal-group R&B of the '60s under Mayfield's guidance. Their style was marked by airy, feather-light harmonies and Mayfield's influentially sparse guitar work, plus, at times, understated Latin rhythms. If their sound was sweet and lilting, it remained richly soulful thanks to the group's firm grounding in gospel tradition; they popularized the three-part vocal trade-offs common in gospel but rare in R&B at the time, and recorded their fair share of songs with spiritual themes, both subtle and overt. Furthermore, Mayfield's interest in the civil rights movement led to some of the first socially conscious R&B songs ever recorded, and his messages grew more explicit as the '60s wore on, culminating in the streak of brilliance that was his early-'70s solo work. The Impressions carried on without Mayfield, but only matched their earlier achievements in isolated instances, and finally disbanded in the early '80s. ~Steve Huey

The Greatest Hits

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