Search - Jimmy Reed :: Found Love

Another fine Jimmy Reed reissue

Docendo Discimus | Vita scholae | 06/03/2004

(4 out of 5 stars)

"First issued by VeeJay in 1960, this Charly reissue of Jimmy Reed's "Found Love" features four bonus tracks, and some of Reed's best and most popular songs. It opens with a true classic, the inexplicably titled "Baby What You Want Me To Do", one of the very few 50s and 60s blues singles which managed to crack the pop charts.
Inexplicably titled? Well, yeah, Jimmy Reed actually never once utters the line "Baby what you want me to do", and on one available recording he and his wife can be heard bickering with the studio engineer about the title.
He actually sings:

You got me runnin', got me hidin',
Got me run, hide, hide, run
Anyway you wanna let it roll
Yeah, yeah, yeah
You got me doin' what you want me
Baby why you wanna let go? Anyway, "Big Boss Man" is also here, with backing vocals from Mary Lee ("Mama") Reed, and so is the primitive but groovy "Hush Hush", which features the great Eddie Taylor on lead guitar.
Jimmy Reed does a fine rendition of soul singer Clarence Carter's "I Ain't Got You", and manages to sound genuinely menacing on "I'm Gonna Ruin You", and other highlights include the lively "The Sun Is Shining" (not the Elmore James-song), the title track, and the slightly spiritual-flavoured "Going To The River".Sixteen times Jimmy Reed's sparse, laconic boogie shuffle and (very!) basic harmonica solos may be a little too much for casual listeners...they should probably start with one of the many career-spanning Reed compilations...but if you're a fan and want something more than just Rhino's "Blues Masters - The Best Of Jimmy Reed" or Recall Records' 2-disc "Big Boss Man", all of Charly/Collectable's Jimmy Reed reissues can certainly be recommended."

Good to have

Laurence Upton | Wilts, UK | 01/20/2005

(4 out of 5 stars)

"Having acquired a couple of Jimmy Reed compilations, the next inevitable stage is to want a complete original album by the "Bossman" and one could do a lot worse than begin with the 1960 Vee-Jay set, Found Love. The title song was a contemporary hit (the single version had an overdubbed bass) and the album featured the first appearance of lasting favourites like Baby What You Want Me To Do, as covered by everyone on the planet, Hush Hush and Big Boss Man (even Elvis recorded that one), songs that crossed over from the R&B charts and became national hits. I Ain't Got You, recorded in 1955, is also featured, as later covered by the Yardbirds with Eric Clapton, though most of the tracks were recorded in 1959 and 1960. Remarkably for a blues album, Found Love hit the US album charts at the time of its release.

This digitally-remastered edition on Charly has four bonus tracks: the original B-side version of I'm Gonna Ruin You (1955), The Sun Is Shining (1957) and I'm Gonna Get My Baby (1958), both hit singles, and Please Don't, an outtake from the Found Love sessions of December 1959. I don't know if the first three have any special relationship to this album but it is certainly good to have them"