Sarah Vaughan - "Feelin' Good" (1972, Mainstream)

22.3.09 - Hello to all the New York Times readers who read the story about the man searching for "Just a Little Lovin" ... a friend sent me the article today. My conjecture is that the guy who finally sent him the song a few weeks ago got it from here ... timing seems right ... anyway welcome, enjoy, say hi in the comments ...

Sarah Vaughan's third studio album for Mainstream Records sits somewhere between the lush orchestrations of the Michel Legrand "Sarah Vaughan" album and the pop-jazz stylings of "Send In The Clowns" and "A Time In My Life".

"Feelin' Good" includes both contemporary pop songs and classics with rich orchestrations coming from three groups of arrangers.

This is not my usual jazz - the album arrived in a throwaway box from a retiring DJ. I dismissed it on a quick listen, but revisited it when I noticed that it was missing from the Shad Shack, and several tracks have grown on me since.

At this stage of her career Vaughan is something of a vocal dramatist, and here refines the dynamic range that Legrand's orchestrations had afforded her on the previous album. To my mind, she hits the mark in spectacular fashion on about half of this album ... and sounds like a drag queen channelling Shirley Bassey on the other half.

Michel Legrand's only contribution here is "Deep in the Night", an extraordinary track that builds from a cocktail bar blues into a full scale drama that leaves you breathless, with vocal and instrumental arrangements that trump anything on their previous collaboration - it ended up being tacked on to the CD re-release of the other album.

"Easy Evil" is a great restrained soulful piece, previously covered on this blog on Marcia Hines' album "Marcia Shines". Some nice wah-wah guitar, building brass and evil strings. "Promise Me" is a good ballad, with a nice reverbed second vocal playing call-and-answer with Vaughan's main vocal.

"Take a Love Song" sounds here like a lost Burt Bacharach number that deserves to be found, and is written by Donny Hathaway - just another example of his lost genius, covered from his second studio album.

"Just a Little Lovin' " is the established sample dig here (though I never quite understand why people want to dig holes that have already been dug, isn't that more canine than hip hop, behaviourly speaking? ) Anyway ... a guy named Irfane had a notable, catchy underground success about four years ago when he chopped it over a compressed house pulse, first running into sample clearance problems and then later releasing it on an album under the moniker "Outlines". Here's that track.

Hope you enjoy this album, just watch out for "Alone Again (Naturally)" and a cover of the Bee Gee's "Run To Me", along with a few of the others they're just a little bit scary. This album is guaranteed 50 % killer!

TRACKLIST
01. And The Feeling's Good (4:20)
(N.Gimbel - C.Fox)
02. Just A Little Lovin' Early In The Mornin' (3:07)
(Mann-Weil)
03. Alone Again (Naturally) (4:25)
(R. O'Sullivan)
04. Rainy Days And Mondays (3:42)
(Nichols-Williams)
05. Deep In The Night (3:17)
(Miller-Miriam)
06. Run To Me (3:00)
(Bee Gees - R.Stigwood)
07. Easy Evil (3:04)
(Alan O'Day)
08. Promise Me (4:00)
(Peter Matz - Carol Hall)
09. Take A Love Song (3:25)
(D.Hathaway - N.McKinnon)
10. Greatest Show On Earth (3:00)
(J.Marcellino - M.Larson)
11. When You Think Of It (4:00)
(R. Allen - A.Kent)

PRODUCTION DETAILS
Mainstream Records MRL 379
Producer - Bobby Shad
Conductor, Arranged By:
Allyn Ferguson (tracks 2, 6, 10)
Jack Elliott (tracks 2, 6, 10)
Michel Legrand (tracks 5)
Peter Matz (tracks 1, 3, 4, 7, 8, 9)

POST CREDITS
Vinyl rip by Simon666
Links in this post go to the Shad Shack and Daytime Lovers.
Thank them for their work if you go there!

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Please say hi in the comments. 

Sarah Vaughan - "Send In the Clowns" (1974, Mainstream)

Art Director : "Don't worry Sarah, you'll look great!"

A post for the Shad Shack, cheeba's temple to all-things-Mainstream Records.

After an uncharacteristic four year break from recording, Sarah Vaughan began an association in 1971 with Bob Shad's new label, Mainstream Records - he'd worked with her during her time at Mercury Records.

First cab off the rank was the album "A Time In My Life", produced and arranged by Count Basie veteran Ernie Wilkins, and featuring a fantastic version of Marvin Gaye's "Inner City Blues" - also check a preview here. Generally, that album's a nice mix of classic pop-jazz orchestration with some "band" elements thrown in, including the occasional rhodes. The Wilkins version of "On Thinking It Over" from there, written by Brian Auger, also re-appears on today's album.

She followed that in 1972 with "Sarah Vaughan", a collaboration with Michel Legrand and his orchestra. It's a more traditional ballad collection with some superb string arangements from Legrand. 1973 saw the release of "Feelin' Good", which I've finally ripped and will throw at you when I get the cover scans fixed up - it has several different arrangers and is overall a better album than this one.

Sarah imitates a famous Millie Jackson record cover

After a few live albums for Mainstream, her final studio release for the label was this one, 1974's "Send In The Clowns". Possible confusion : she released another album under the same title for Pablo Records in 1981, and later also used the title for a greatest hits collection - but this is the 1974 Mainstream release.

Primary arranger here is Gene Page, whose work with Barry White and Love Unlimited was exploding into the charts at the time. You can echoes of that work in the simple, unison-based string arrangements and backing vocals, though the disco beat is absent - there's more elements of a blues-based southern soul.

AMG's Scott Yanow calls this album ...

... which Google's "Yanow Interpreter" translates as "contains pop/soul elements and some electric instrumentation - and there's that damned rhodes again!". Essentially this is an early 70s pop/soul album with some jazz stylings - you've just got to look at it from a different perspective to her earlier work.

Anyway - not an all-killer-no-filler, there are a few absolute stinkers, but enough good moments to recommend checking it out. "That'll Be Johnny" and "On Thinking It Over" are the standouts for me. "I Need You More" has a Fifth Dimension flavour that I like, and arranger Michel Legrand returns with an arrangement of Jobim's "Wave".

Later in 1974, Vaughan's then-lover/manager (I need one of those!) Marshall Fisher apparently had a fight with Mainstream Records over a record cover (this one??) and/or unpaid royalties, and Vaughan remained without a record contract for a further three years, until she signed with Pablo Records in 1977 and dumped Fisher.

This is a rip from a deleted CD re-release with a much nastier cover even than the one above, and it's remarkably short of information, but I've gathered what I can below.

WAV / MP3 in COMMENTS

TRACKLIST1. 'Send in the Clowns'
(Stephen Sondheim)
2. 'Love Don't Live Here Anymore'
(Rose Marie McCoy / Reddington)
3. 'That'll Be Johnny'
(H.Miller / Rose Marie McCoy)
4. 'Right in the Next Room'
(H.Miller / Rose Marie McCoy)
5. 'I Need You More (Than Ever Now)
(H.Miller / Rose Marie McCoy /Holley)
6. 'On Thinking It Over'
(Brian Auger / J.Mullen)
7. 'Do Away With April'
(H.Miller / H.Greenfield)
8. 'Wave'
(A.C. Jobim)
9. 'Got to Go See If I Can't Get Daddy to Come Back Home'
(H.Miller / Rose Marie McCoy)
10. 'Frasier (The Sensuous Lion)'
(Johnny Mercer / Jimmy Rowles)

PRODUCTION INFORMATIONReleased in 1974, Mainstream Records MRL 412
Produced by Bob Shad
Arranger on 2-5, 7, 9 - Gene Page
Arranger on 1 - P.Griffin
Arranger on 6 : Ernie Wilkins
Arranger on 8 : Michel Legrand
Arranger on 10 : Wade Marcus

POST CREDITS

Rip by Simon666
Other links in this post go to : The Shad Shack, Daytime Lovers, Crap jazz Covers and Blaxploitation Jive.
Please thank these fine folks for their music if you go there.
Some info sourced from Michael Minn's Sarah Vaughan biography.

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