In The Midnight Hour & The Exciting Wilson Pickett

Awesome

The British Edsel label have a deal with the Atlantic and Stax soul labels, reissuing albums by top artists on both labels. This one comprises the first two Atlantic albums by Soul singer Wilson Pickett, one of the greatest singers of all times. His distinctive rough voice is evident throughout. These albums are from 1966, containing all his hits from 1965-1966 up to Land Of 1000 Dances. The first album is puzzly, as the two duets on it, here claim to be with Tammi Lynn, but other sources allege they were with Cissy Houston. But as both had undistinctive voices, it is a job to tell which is correct. This first album also contained three of his early sixties tracks as lead singer of The Falcons, before he went solo, including their 1961 US hit I Found A Love. But how Atlantic got the rights to these tracks, I don't know, as they were recorded for the small US Lupine label. His second album here contains a few covers, such as his vastly superior version of Robert Parker's Barefootin' (I did not like that boring original version at all, but with Wilson's magic, it sounded really good), Ray Charles' Danger Zone, You're So Fine, a late fifties US hit for Wilson's former group The Falcons, but with Joe Stubbs (brother of The Four Tops lead singer Levi Stubbs) on lead before Wilson replaced him in the group, and Wilson's version of Mercy Mercy, co-written and originally recorded two years earlier by his label-mate Soul singer Don Covay, but already covered famously by The Rolling Stones in a more commercial pop rock style of that era. Wilson;s version of the latter is obviously more faithful to the original, but he still put his own stamp in to it, like with all his covers here. The sound quality is excellent, although one track Land of 1000 Dances sounds as though it comes out of one channel more than the other, but this may only be noticeable if you listen through headphones. This and the next track Something You Got were in fact both written and originally recorded by Chris Kenner who had mild US hits with them during the early sixties. But Wilson did them much better. At the end of the CD, we get two bonus tracks which were much later live versions of songs Wilson already recorded studio-wise, plus a non-bonus track, the shorter single version of Don't Fight It, which was the album version slightly edited. But although this CD contains his first two Atlantic albums, they were in fact his second and third albums in total, as he already had an album in the States on the small Double L label.called If You Need Me, named after his first single for that label. The best CD reissue of this, if you can still find it, is on the RCA Victor label, before that label was acquired by Sony, although I do not know how they obtained the rights to it. It has also appeared on a series of unofficial labels like Acrobat, but usually with thinner stereo separation, and poorer sound quality. But if you want more pre-Atlantic Wilson Pickett, there is a 4CD set by The Falcons which I bought through Amazon called The Definitive Falcons, which is an official release, containing the complete Falcons' recordings from the late fifties to early sixties, many of them with either Wilson or group-mate and another future Soul soloist Eddie Floyd on lead, while the rest of the tracks feature lesser known members on lead. But these tracks, even the ones with either Wilson or Eddie on lead, were not really up to the standard of their later solo material. A lot of the tracks on this set are previously unreleased, including demos that were obviously not intended for release at the time, and both Wilson and Eddie sounded then as though they were learning their craft. But Wilson developed his craft surprisingly quick, as his first solo recordings for that Double L label were surprisingly good, and every bit as god as anything he later recorded for Atlantic. But he had to wait until he moved to Atlantic, by then a major label, before he had his breakthrough. All three of his earlier Falcons' recordings on his first Atlantic album here, are also on that 4CD set.

Great albums. If you are a Pickett fan then this is the one to get.

Amazing music. Eternal classic stuff.