The Complete James Ray: 27 Tracks; If You Gotta Make A Fool of Somebody (in Itty Bitty Pieces), then Put Me in Your Diary--and Welcome to the Floor. While you're at it, Do the Monkey! (finalized 6/18)
Seeing that the various Otis Blackwell and "5" Royales posts, here, have proved popular, here's some more R&B, albeit of a more eccentric species.
Contained HEREIN(Box.com download) are 21 tracks that I once thought comprised the recorded output of James Ray, elfin soul singer, between 1962 and 1964. He died in '64, as this skeletal Wikipedia article relates. After this post first went live in December 2013, some kind folks stepped forward and let me know that I was shy several tracks. Just imagine! It took a few years to track these tracks down in good sound quality, and as summer 2018 rears its ugly head, I have the pleasure of sealing the deal on James Ray.
HERE is a smaller mp3 file of all 27 songs (the top link is for FLAC versions--see below.) The formerly missing tracks: JR's version of the standard "(I'm Afraid) The Masquerade is Over," which shared a single with the far superior "One By One," escaped my notice 'til now.
How could I forget the '63 dance floor filler "Do the Monkey," a songwriting collaboration of Bobby Darin and Rudy Clark? Well, I did.
As well, I was unaware of his first single, from 1959, as "Little Jimmy Ray," which consists of the moody minor-keyed "You Need to Fall in Love," coupled with the more traditionally soulful "Make Her Mine." These two tracks were released on the spell-check-maddening Galliant Records and are rare as all heck.
And there's more... a 1962 single that couples the non-LP track "Always" (the Irving Berlin standard done up in gospel style, complete with an unusually tasteful and restrained choir) and George Harrison's fave, "Got My Mind Set on You." I believe that this is a wholly different take of the song from the album track. The banjos get a little more, shall we say, aggressiveon this 45 version.
I truly believe this represents everything James Ray recorded, barring unissued material that may have been destroyed or abandoned once the record label perished. The UK reissue label Charly Records issued a compilation LP, Itty Bitty Pieces, in 1983, which contains most of the singles, selected Caprice LP tracks, and three unissued pieces which are superb and more "normal" soul/R&B performances.
Ray had a great voice--smoky, expressive, and more than a little indebted to another Ray (Charles). His performances are commanding and unusual.
Producer Hutch Davies fashioned some zany arrangements to couch Ray's unique voice, abetted by several original tunes composed by cult soul figure Rudy Clark. There's something sinister-sounding about many of these recordings. Perhaps it was substandard studio technology. And the oddball arrangements of Hutch Davies contribute mightily to the strange effect. I give him credit for building an atypical soundscape for a rhythm and blues singer. The instrumentation and mood harks back to pre-rock pop, but with an indescribable edge.
Some R&B/soul purists can't stand the weird backdrops on several tunes, but I love them, and think that their off-ness is an asset. From the tuba-harmonica duet on the waltz-time "If You Gotta Make A Fool of Somebody" to the cartoon-Dixieland of "St. James Infirmary," you never know what's gonna end up in the musical stewpot.
Ray did his share of good, solid straight-ahead soul numbers towards the end of his too-brief career. Tunes such as "One By One," "We Got a Thing Goin' On," "On That Day" and "I'm Not Guilty" are top-drawer R'n'B-soul. The sub-par sax solo on "Not Guilty" is yet another unexpected sonic delight in the Ray-ology.
Ray's songs were much-covered by the rock bands that came exploding out of England in the early 1960s. "If You Gotta Make A Fool of Somebody" and "Itty Bitty Pieces" have many renditions in the UK British Beat catalog. (The Rockin' Berries' rendition of the latter song is among the most cringe-inducing, unbearable discs of the British beat era, BTW.) Maxine Brown, US soul-stress, did a nice version of "Fool" in 1967.
Nothing much is known about Ray, but the oft-weird intensity of the recordings speak for themselves. I love his languid, Charles-inspired take on Hoagy Carmichael's "Lazy Bones," and the Rudy Clark-penned modern morality tale "The Old Man and The Mule." Those two tracks show Ray at his vocal peak.
This first download link leads to a large file... I opted to save the 21 original songs as FLAC files. Please don't give me any flack about this. If you're using iTunes, just convert the files to AACs or MP3s, and you'll get a smaller (but probably lossy) version handy for your iPod, smart phone, or dumb camel.
Five years later, I think I've finally closed the book on James Ray. His voice, songs and the weirdness of his discography still fascinates me. I hope it do you, too.
PS: To make the best sense of these recordings, here's...
A JAMES RAY DISCOGRAPHY
1959:
(as Little Jimmy Ray)
You Need to Fall in Love/Make Her Mine (Galliant 1001, 9/59)
1961:
If You Gotta Make a Fool of Somebody/It's Been a Drag (Caprice 110, 10/61)
1962:
Itty Bitty Pieces/You Remember the Face (Caprice 114, 3/62)
A Miracle/Things Are Gonna Be Different (Caprice 117, 6/62)
Always/I've Got My Mind Set on You* (Dynamic Sound 503, 12/62)
1963:
Marie/The Old Man and the Mule (Congress 109, 2/63)
Do the Monkey/Put Me in Your Diary (Congress CG-201, 9/63)
(I'm Afraid) The Masquerade is Over/One By One (Congress CG-203, 11/63)
1964:
We Got a Thing Goin' On/On That Day (Congress CG 218, 7/64)
Extended Play 45:
The Old Man and the Mule/Lazy Bones/Come Rain or Come Shine/St. James Infirmary
(Caprice EP 1002, 7/62; promotional tool to exploit the full length LP)
12" LP Album:
James Ray (Caprice LP 1002, 7/62)
The Old Man and the Mule; Lazy Bones; I've Got My Mind Set on You, Pts. 1 & 2; St. James' Infirmary; Come Rain or Come Shine; If You Gotta Make a Fool of Somebody
Without a Song; Teach Me Tonight; A Miracle; It's Been a Drag; Welcome to the Floor; Itty Bitty Pieces
(tracks in italics were previously issued on 45)
Itty Bitty Pieces (Charly R&B CRB 1065, 1983)
contains the unissued tracks:
(I'm Not) Guilty; One By One; I'm Gonna Keep on Trying plus various singles and LP tracks from 1961-1964
* this is a different and shorter take than the one found on the Caprice LP; apparently there was a plan to issue "Got My Mind Set On You" as a two-sided disc that was shelved
http://www.rockabilly.nl/references/messages/james_ray.htm
JAMES RAY Born James Ray Raymond, 1941, Washington, D.C.
Died circa 1963
Life was grim for James Ray until his life was turned around by a dynamic musical entrepreneur and a talented new songwriter.
Gerry Granahan, who had scored a Top 30 hit with "No Chemise Please" in 1958, formed his own label, Caprice Records, in late 1960, in New York City. He had almost immediate chart success with his discoveries the Angels ("'Til", # 14) and Janie Grant ("Triangle", # 29).
Delivering demos to the Caprice office on a regular basis was Rudy Clark who, in addition to being the local mail carrier, was an enthusiastic songwriter in his spare time. Granahan liked his songs, but not his voice and advised Clark to bring in someone who could really sing. Clark took Granahan at his word and brought in James Ray whom he had discovered performing in a club. The singer was destitute at the time and living rough on the rooftop of an apartment block. Granahan saw great potential in the 20-year old Ray and immediately signed him to Caprice, bought him a new wardrobe of clothes and found him somewhere to live.
Ray's first record was Clark's composition "If You Gotta Make A Fool Of Somebody" (Caprice 110), released in October 1961. The production was taken care of by Granahan himself, while Hutch Davie supplied the arrangement and accompaniment. Davie had played piano on Jim Lowe's million-selling "The Green Door" in 1956 and had released a few honky tonk piano singles on Atco, including "Woodchopper's Ball", which went to # 51 in 1958. "If You Gotta Make A Fool Of Somebody" was/is an excellent record, now a minor classic, and peaked at # 22 on the pop charts and # 10 R&B. In the UK it was released on Pye International, but the song did not chart there until 1963, when it was revived (butchered is perhaps a better word) by Freddie and the Dreamers from Manchester, as part of the Merseybeat phenomenon that was taking the UK by storm. Maxine Brown charted with the song in 1966 (# 63).
Granahan and Davie then recorded an entire LP with James Ray. The album, simply titled "James Ray", included "Itty Bitty Pieces", which was issued as the follow-up single and peaked at # 41 (pop) in the spring of 1962, and "I've Got My Mind Set On You", both written by Rudy Clark. The latter also came out as a single in 1962, on Dynamic Sound 503, but this is probably a re-recording of the Caprice track. (Can anyone confirm this?) George Harrison had picked up a copy of Ray's Caprice LP (now a collector's item) in New York in 1963 and always wanted to record "Got My Mind Set On You" himself. He finally did it in 1988, scoring a # 1 US hit in the process. Rudy Clark went on to sign with Bobby Darin's T.M. Music publishing company and write such hits as "It's In His Kiss (The Shoop Shoop Song)" and "Good Lovin'".
James Ray Raymond died in the 1960s from an overdose of drugs. Some sources say he already died in 1962, Joel Whitburn writes "He died soon after his success as a singer" and others date his death towards the end of the sixties. The Social Security Death Index has no entry for him, not under Raymond nor under Ray.
Ray's Caprice LP was reissued on CD by Collectables (COL-5199) in 1994, but is now probably out of print.
Acknowledgements: Mick Patrick (Spectropop message).
Dik
These pages were saved from "This Is My Story" for reference usage only. Please note that these pages were not originally published or written by BlackCat Rockabilly Europe. For comments or information please contact Dik de Heer at dik.de.heer@ziggo.nl
No hay comentarios:
Publicar un comentario