Solomon Bourke - 1968 - Detroit City FLAC

Detroit City/It's Been A Change/Take Me (Just As I Am)/I Stayed Away Too Long



 
Soul-R&B pioneer Solomon Burke never gained the level of fame afforded to contemporaries James Brown, Al Green, Wilson Pickett, Otis Redding, or Sam Cooke. Rather, artists such as the Rolling Stones, Otis Redding, and the Blues Brothers introduced him to a wider audience through their cover versions.

The Stones’ early versions of “Cry to Me” and “Everybody Needs Somebody to Love” especially stand out. In fact, the former appeared over 20 years later in the 1987 blockbuster Dirty Dancing, garnering renewed interest in the singer.

Born above Philadelphia’s Solomon’s Temple church, Burke was an ordained minister throughout his life as well as a mortician. He certainly led a very colorful life, as evidenced by a revealing Rolling Stone profile. Always full of life, the singer never actually slowed down even in the face of obvious weight gain and immobility, recording, touring, and often preaching from the pulpit of his Los Angeles church, the House of Prayer for All People and World Wide Center for Life and Truth (the church must have a wide sign). He passed away suddenly on Oct. 10, 2010, of natural causes after arriving in Switzerland by jet for a live performance with Dutch rock band De Dijk. Hold on Tight, a final, collaborative studio album featuring the decidedly odd couple, was ultimately released one year later.

 

In his 70 years on Earth, Burke wrote many songs and had his fair share of hits, albeit unfairly relegated to the R&B charts. Critics and soul aficionados have regularly called Burke one of the greatest singers of his generation, dubbing him “The King of Rock & Soul.” Burke’s vocals always possessed a ‘You’ve got to be born with ‘em’ gospel undertone. Even on soul numbers like “I Feel a Sin Coming On” and “Meet Me in Church,” the listener feels as if they’re hearing a gospel song straight from the Lord’s altar.

Burke wasn’t strictly pigeon-holed as a soul music interpreter. During his early Atlantic years, the singer was usually backed by a full orchestra with a decidedly pop sound, vocally resembling Sam Cooke on his first Atlantic single in 1961, the non-charting, yet very charming “Keep the Magic Working.” Burke was a masterful interpreter of pop standards, including one of his most neglected performances, a 1969 rendition of “That Lucky Old Sun,” which idiosyncratic Beach Boys founder Brian Wilson revived almost 40 years later.

Though not well-known as a social protest singer, Burke still left his mark with versions of “I Wish I Knew (How It Would Feel to Be Free)” and Elvis Presley’s “In the Ghetto.” And as soon as he began recording, Burke set himself apart from his peers by tackling country standards, including “I Really Don’t Want to Know,” “He’ll Have to Go,” “Detroit City,” and “We’re Gonna Hold On,” the latter taken from the appropriately titled Nashville released late in the artist’s career. Burke’s early forays into country triumphantly bridged the gap between segregated audiences months before Ray Charles’ much more successful versions of “I Can’t Stop Loving You” and “You Don’t Know Me.”

 By the early ’70s, Burke was having few and far in-between hits, bouncing from one record label to the next. As the mid-‘80s rolled around, King Solomon found himself attached to Rounder Records, releasing the critically-acclaimed A Change Is Gonna Come. Subsequent years found the singer devoting much of his time to constant touring to make ends meet. By 2002, a sustaining comeback finally occurred, as Don’t Give Up on Me won a Grammy for Best Contemporary Blues Album. The long-running CBS television procedural Cold Case showcased one track from that great album in a 2008 episode, the sparse social commentary “None of Us Are Free.”

Artists such as Eric Clapton, Bob Dylan, Bruce Springsteen, to producers ranging from Don Was and Willie Mitchell, all contributed songs to Burke’s 21st century discography. Burke’s penultimate album, Nothing’s Impossible, was the epitaph for producer Willie Mitchell, and it also serves as a fitting almost-finale for Burke. Listen to the opening song, “Oh What a Feeling,” cut in Memphis at Royal Studios with Mitchell’s trademark strings, organ, and rich rhythm section anchoring Burke’s longing vocals.

Sixty-eight years old when that performance was tracked, Burke’s singing had lost nothing with the passage of time. When he moans, almost preaching the lines “One night’s sleep is never enough, it feels so good, I don’t wanna wake up, oh what a feeling, I can’t help myself, I’ve just got, what a feeling I have inside for you,” you know he’s singing from plenty of hard-earned experience.