Willie Hutch - Concert In Blues (1976)

Mid 70s magic from the great Willie Hutch -- two classic albums back to back! Concert In Blues offers up no blues at all -- just some great funky soul from the mighty Willie Hutch! The vibe's kind of an extension of Willie's great blacksploitation soundtrack material from a few years before -- lots of bad-strutting rhythms, peppered with some larger horn arrangements -- but a bit more vocals from Willie himself, and lots of sweet guitar too! There's a few great mellow moments that remind us that Hutch can be as super-dope in a laidback mode as in a funky one -- and the whole thing was arranged and produced by Willie himself. Includes the single "Party Down", plus "Baby Come Home", "I Finally Made The Headlines", "Stormy Weather", "Precious Pearl", and "Don't Let A Little Money Keep You acting Funny". Color Her Sunshine is solid superdope soul from Willie Hutch -- a self-produced, self-arranged, self-composed masterpiece that proves that he was one of the greatest things Motown had going in the mid 70s! The album's got a bit less of the wicked edges of Willie's blacksploitation work, but in its place is a really well-developed sense of mature soul -- stretching out through the vocals, guitar work, and overall orchestrations -- and pushing Willie into territory that was also being explored at the time by Marvin Gaye and Leon Ware. Great stuff all around, and the kind of a record that gets better each time we hear it! Titles include "Come On Girl Let's Get It On", "I Like Everything About You", "Shake It Shake It", "We Can Make It Baby", and "I'm Gonna Be Around".

The second of the two Willie Hutch album digital reissues from 1976 is "Concert In Blues". This album spawned just one single, the opening track "Party Down" which included the highly regarded "Just Another Day" on the flip which appeared on his previous album "Ode To The Lady".

The highlights for us from the album are two self-written songs "Baby, Come Home" and "Come On Let's Do The Thing", and his version of a couple of standards, "Stormy Weather" and "I Wish You Love".

A couple of other covers didn't quite cut the mustard for us i.e. "Shake, Rattle And Roll". Yes 'that one' originally recorded by Big Joe Turner in 1954, but a completely different take on the song, and T-Bone Walker's "Stormy Monday".