Search - Roy Brown :: Mighty Mighty Man!

Roy Brown wrestling with r&r

Bomojaz | South Central PA, USA | 04/28/2006

(4 out of 5 stars)

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This CD collects many of the later King recordings Roy Brown cut between 1953 and 1959. In a sense it's kind of a sad album: these are the years Roy should've been raking in the dough and fame, since he'd laid the foundation for this kind of music years earlier, but it just never happened. Roy's jumpin' blues style with the wailing horns in the background and his own vibrant, exciting vocals screamed ROCK AND ROLL before there even was such a thing. But though some of his r&b hits such as GOOD ROCKIN' TONIGHT were covered by r&r singers like Presley, Roy himself never could make the transition. The problem, I think, was that Roy continued to jump and jive when he should've concentrated on angst and sex appeal; he had a sexy voice when he chose to apply it, but that was rarely. AIN'T IT A SHAME, AIN'T NO ROCKIN' NO MORE, WORRIED LIFE BLUES, and MR. HOUND DOG'S IN TOWN are all excellent tracks, but the ultimate gut-wrenching, major highlight of the disc is QUEEN OF DIAMONDS, a snap-your-head-back killer, thanks to Roy's emotional vocal and the brilliant sax work of Philip Scott. Although Roy's greatest recordings predate these, these feature Roy's more deliberate attempts at cracking the r&r market, the key to which continued to allude him."