The Impressions
Swayze
14,705 Posts
Ok this is a bit of a "little guy" post...I'm a really big Curtis Mayfield fan. I have 9 of his LPs and like all of them a hell of a lot.BUT[/b] I don't own anything by The Impressions at all, only heard the famous tunes like Choice Of Colors, Mighty Mighty, We're a Winner, etc. So was hopin you guys could get me started diggin their stuff...Thanks
Comments
edited: go back a bit further than the songs you listed.
Impressions songs you mentioned, I would recommend
starting out with the later LP's w/Curtis, especially
"Check Out Your Mind" and maybe "This Is My Country"
or "Young Mod's Forgotten Story" ... definitely go for
"Check Out Your Mind" ... you can work your way backwards
into their classic earlier albums with a less "funky" sound.
My favorite Impressions song is I Wonder.
You should not stop at the Impressions. Curtis did a ton of production work. Most can be found on 45. Major Lance is an early artist who Curtis wrote for and produced. His Okeh hits are easy to find, and worthwhile. He had a series of labels that he did production work for with a slew of 45s.
http://www.zshare.net/download/11983284eb948113/
"Isle of Sirens" ... crazy mythological soul ...
"You're Really Something Sadie" ... ill midtempo funk w/conga ...
"Emotions" ... nice Fred Cash vocal ...
"Too Slow" ... great northern soul sound ...
Thanks very much for this, downloading now. And no cats to spot on zSHARE either!
I'm definitely gonna pick up "Check Out Your Mind" thanks for the recommendation SoulOnIce.
And thanks for the info on Major Lance LaserWolf, only Curtis production I have is Baby Huey at the moment, will definitely be checking more out.
that entire "people get ready" LP is just golden...
Yes, they do - We're A Winner has filler as sure as night is dark!
Some of the ABC albums can be really inconsistent, but I can recommend Keep On Pushing and The Fabulous Impressions.
Oh, come on - We're A Winner has no more filler than any of them.
The smoother pop album The Versatile Impressions may be the weakest,
but even that has fine moments. The only thing weak about We're A Winner is
the cover art - next you'll be saying that "Romancing to the Folk Song" is bad!
That's exactly what I was going to say! (Or have I said it before?)
There's a lot of skipovers on the albums mentioned above, but then again, they were in the process of leaving ABC at the time and were probably saving their best things for later. Winner was the last ABC album; Versatile was scraped together after they left for Curtom.
My least favourite - never feel like listening to it.
Huge co-sign on Emotions.
We're Rollin' On
"You Must Believe Me"
I could listen to this song all day.
Also, "I Loved and I Lost" and every damn song on The Young Mods' Forgotten Story.
"You've Been Cheatin'"
"If it's in you to do wrong" on Curtom. The intro to this destroys my head every time.
Seriously. We're a Winner is a solid lp.
There is an earlier one that is mostly standards type stuff that is less than amazing... probably the afore mentioned "Versatile Impressions"... can't remember. It's still decent though.
Well, as long as we're talking about Impressions tracks made after Curtis left, try "Finally Got Myself Together"...a massive hit in 1974, but never heard as an oldie today...
This was me a little under a year ago. I have since bought all Impressions lp's from "keep on pushing" up to "the young mod's forgotten story" and they have probably been the best music i bought in the last twelve months.
In other words: DO IT.[/b]
a little incentive:
ripped from my own copy @256kb:
http://www.divshare.com/download/3392695-c7f
Also I want to take this time to big up "Check Out Your Mind" from 1969. Such a good album and one that definitely doesn't get held up next to the other more well known LPs from them.
But yes, whatever you do, JUST DO IT.