Cream
Review by Charlie Gillett, Cream, May 1971
THEY ALL AGREED, the people who went to see her on stage, that Janis had something special. The effect of her personality didn’t come over ...
Wilson Pickett: In Philadelphia (Atlantic) and If You Need Me (Joy)
Review by Charlie Gillett, Cream, May 1971
IT SEEMS AS if Wilson Pickett's been the number two soul singer ever since the term was coined. Ray Charles, James Brown, Otis Redding, and ...
Lee Dorsey: Yes We Can (Polydor)
Review by Charlie Gillett, Cream, May 1971
LEE DORSEY's one of the easiest singers to underestimate: he seems to be completely unassuming, apparently equally prepared to sing good blues like 'Get Out ...
Captain Beefheart: Lick My Decals Off, Baby (Bizarre)
Review by Charlie Gillett, Cream, May 1971
INSIDE CAPTAIN Beefheart is a corny old ballad-singing crooner, aching to sing those same old songs of sorrow and devotion. But the knows that kind ...
Carl Perkins: Boss Blues Bopper: Carl Perkins
Retrospective by Bill Millar, Cream, July 1971
Kilburn High Street. November 2nd 1964. 10.15 p.m. Half a dozen youths are jigging about and clapping their hands. Not just to keep them warm ...
Harold Battiste: All for One – A Study in Frustration and Black Organisation
Interview by Charlie Gillett, Cream, September 1971
HAROLD BATTISTE has worked on a lot of very big hits, but although you probably have some of them, it's unlikely you'll be able to ...
Aretha Franklin: Greatest Hits – on Atlantic and Columbia
Review by Pete Wingfield, Cream, December 1971
ON ATLANTIC: Greatest Hits illustrates the power that fourteen condensed, concise, definitive musical statements can exert – particularly in the soul/R&B field, totally geared until ...
Review by Pete Wingfield, Cream, December 1971
THIS DOUBLE ALBUM set of Etta James' hits from Chess seems uncharacteristically enlightened, despite a commercially suicidal price-tag (£3.99, enough to make even ardent soul ...
Junior Parker: Junior's Last Stand
Obituary by Charlie Gillett, Cream, January 1972
WHILE I WAS in New York for a short time last April, I noticed some billposters up near Columbia University on the upper West Side, ...
B.B. King: Will Success Spoil B.B. King?
Comment by Tony Russell, Cream, January 1972
ANY ARTIST who becomes noticeably successful soon has the more inquisitive, the harder-to-satisfy, of his followers asking ‘What’s he going to do now?’. Some sit ...
Frank Zappa: Portrait Of The Artist As A Businessman
Interview by Paul Phillips, Rob Partridge, Cream, January 1972
"IF you’re making £10 a night, you’ll be screwed. When you’re making £1,000 a night, you’ll still get screwed... only you’re being screwed for more." ...
Interview by uncredited writer, Cream, January 1972
THESE days, everyone’s got Fanny on their minds. "What little yummies!" drooled Frendz. "Although the bass and drums are together if a little lightweight, the ...
Jimi Hendrix: Experience – Original Soundtrack/Isle Of Wight/Rainbow Bridge – Original Soundtrack
Review by Charles Shaar Murray, Cream, January 1972
A CONSIDERABLE amount of Hendrix material has surfaced over the last six months. In addition to these three albums, there’s a side each on Woodstock ...
Sly & The Family Stone, Van Morrison, Al Green: Soul Brothers: Al Green, Sly Stone, Van Morrison
Review by Charlie Gillett, Cream, January 1972
IS THE REVIEWER supposed to come to each record as an objective analyst? Or, if he isn’t one, must he pretend he is? Impossible for ...
Review by Tony Russell, Cream, March 1972
EACH OF THESE bluesmen began to make his name soon after World War II, most of them profiting from the new urban audiences of blacks ...
Ray Charles: 25 Years In Show Business (Atlantic)
Review by Charlie Gillett, Cream, March 1972
FOR MOST OF US, Ray Charles is a singer. Asked if he does anything else, we'll probably be able to rattle off a few other ...
Chuck Berry: Big Red Cars, Little White Chicks And The Chuck Berry Lick
Live Review by Charles Shaar Murray, Cream, March 1972
It was singalong night at the Coventry Locarno. Difference was that it was Chuck Berry we were singing along with. The Brown Eyed Handsome Man ...
MC5: Teenage Outrage in Croydon: the MC5
Review and Interview by Charles Shaar Murray, Cream, March 1972
THE Fox in Crydon, Surrey, is a very long way indeed from the Grande Ballroom in Dee-troit, Michigan, and the MC5 were a very long ...
Emerson Lake And Palmer: Emerson, Lake and Palmer: Pictures at an Exhibition
Film/DVD Review by Charles Shaar Murray, Cream, June 1972
ONCE again, rockanroll culture heroes hit the big screen, and, predictably enough, this week’s lucky winners are Emerson, Lake and Palmer. Like all other rock ...
Argent: First Get Yourself On The Telly!
Interview by Steve Turner, Cream, June 1972
WHATEVER GETS SAID about hit singles and Top Of The Pops, there's no denying that they still form the most powerful tonic that a British ...
Review by Tony Russell, Cream, June 1972
THESE THREE double albums (with a fourth by Eddy Arnold) open a reissue series presumably intended to uncover the roots of today’s country music. Each ...
Country Joe & The Fish: Country Joe McDonald: Incredible! Live! Country Joe! (Vanguard)
Review by Charles Shaar Murray, Cream, June 1972
I like the coffee and I like tea,I like the sweetness that you give to me, Hey woman set your mind at rest,Home cookin' still ...
Elton John: Step Right Up And Feel The Man’s Muscles: Honky Chateau
Review by Charles Shaar Murray, Cream, June 1972
THESE DAYS you have to get fashionable before you get successful or else you get resented, and, if you get too successful without first being ...
Grateful Dead: Vintage Dead; Historic Dead
Review by Simon Frith, Cream, June 1972
I THINK I liked it better when rock didn’t have a history. These days record companies seem to be the victims of some Tutankhamen-like curse, ...
Edgar Winter's White Trash: Roadwork
Review by Charles Shaar Murray, Cream, July 1972
EDGAR WINTER’S White Trash are advanced cases of the Live Album Syndrome. Their line-up allows them to tackle soul, gospel, blues and rock, depending on ...
Stone The Crows: Ontinuous Performance
Review by Charles Shaar Murray, Cream, November 1972
I STILL CAN'T BELIEVE that this album hasn't sold 87 million copies. The Crows are one of that select handful of red-hot live bands who ...
Michael Nesmith: Tantamount To Treason, Volume One
Review by Charles Shaar Murray, Cream, November 1972
IN THE DAYS when he was the young generation with somethin' to say (though he was too busy singin' to put anybody down), Mike Nesmith ...
Review by Simon Frith, Cream, November 1972
WHY BOTHER? Chicago are rightly contemptuous of critics. They've never had a good review and their records sell by the million. Chicago V has been ...
Review by Simon Frith, Cream, November 1972
Jefferson Airplane: Long John Silver (Grunt)Pamela Polland: Pamela Polland (CBS) ...
Various Artists: The Gospel Sound
Review by Tony Russell, Cream, November 1972
YOU READ it here, you read it there: gospel is close to the heart of blues and rock. But where do you hear what that ...
Tim Buckley, Domenic Troiano: Tim Buckley: Greetings from LA/ Domenic Troiano: Dom
Review by Simon Frith, Cream, November 1972
DOMENIC TROIANO has just been signed up as lead guitarist for the James Gang (transfer fees?) but I don't know where he came from nor ...
Isaac Hayes: Live At The Sahara Tahoe
Review by Bob Fisher, Cream, 1973
IGNORING the Shaft soundtrack, Isaac Hayes blew it with the Black Moses double set. This followed three good and original albums, although you could still ...
Eric Clapton: Rainbow Theatre, London
Live Review by Charles Shaar Murray, Cream, February 1973
SO THERE'S THIS cat in the white suit smiling diffidently through his beard at the cheering hordes on the other side of the lights. He's ...
Jerry Butler: The Iceman Talking: The Life And Times Of Jerry Butler
Interview by Norman Jopling, Cream, June 1973
BUTLER'S MUSIC Workshop is upstairs in a tatty warehouse building in Chicago's South Side, very near Chinatown and uncomfortably near Lake Michigan so it gets ...
Aretha Franklin: Hey Now Hey (Atlantic)
Review by Bob Fisher, Cream, September 1973
IT'S BEEN HIP for mainstream rock critics to knock Miss Franklin for some time now, in much the same way the current vogue is to ...
Bo Diddley: The London Sessions (Chess)
Review by Bob Fisher, Cream, September 1973
AFTER THE release of Golden Decade and Got Another Bag Of Tricks, which really put Bo in perspective, Chess undo all their sterling work by ...
Review by Bob Fisher, Cream, September 1973
THERE MUST be some crap music coming out of the States, or is it me? Can't I discern between the good, the bad and the ...
Dale Hawkins: Oh Suzie: The Best Of Dale Hawkins
Review by Bob Fisher, Cream, September 1973
YET ANOTHER priceless bargain from Phonogram. The way in which the rock and roll collectors are being catered for this year is excellent, Polydor have ...
The Platters, Johnny Otis, Jackie Wilson: Johnny Otis, Platters, Jackie Wilson Reissue Albums
Review by Bob Fisher, Cream, February 1975
Johnny Otis: Pioneers of Rock: Vol. 2The Platters: The Best of the PlattersJackie Wilson: Greatest Hits ...
Martin Mull: Martin Mull (Capricorn)
Review by Bob Fisher, Cream, June 1975
SINGER/SONGWRITERS are thirteen to the dozen this year. Of the newcomers of the last eighteen months only a couple have managed completely successful albums, like ...
Big Joe Turner, T-Bone Walker and Otis Spann: Super Black Blues
Review by Bob Fisher, Cream, June 1975
IT'S TAKEN Phillips a long time to get around to issuing this superb album, probably the only genuine spontaneous blues jam ever commited to wax. ...
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