Etta James Music:

Description of Etta James: Her Best (The Chess 50th Anniversary Collection):
Whether she sings string-laden pop ballads, lively soul, or gritty electric blues, James's high-powered, enormously expressive voice displays a knack for passionate blues inflections. Emotionally charged ballads including "At Last" and "All I Could Do is Cry" find James blasting through the orchestra with unearthly wails and moans. "If I Can't Have You," a duet with Harvey Fuqua, drops the orchestra in favor of horn-driven R&B and "Something's Got a Hold On Me" is a gospel-flavored romp reminiscent of Ray Charles. A live version of Jimmy Reed's "Baby, What You Want Me to Do" shows her raunchiest Chicago-blues style, and "In the Basement," with Sugar Pie DeSanto, is a funky workout. Also here are three classics from her soul-drenched 1967 Muscle Shoals sessions. --Marc Greilsamer

Etta James: Her Best (The Chess 50th Anniversary Collection) Reviews:
Sensational!
2009-10-11 - I'd never heard Etta James before till a friend played this album. She, and it, are fantastic! A lotta blues, a little rock, and a wonderful voice!

Distinctive sixties R+B music
2009-06-09 - Born Jamesetta Hawkins of mixed parentage, Etta James began her career at the dawn of rock'n'roll but her career only really took off when she joined the Chess label in 1960 and it is from her period with Chess that this collection was compiled. Etta could rock and she could sing the blues, but her biggest successes came with her re-interpretations of old classics from the swing era, most particularly her cover of At lat, although she also had hits with other types of song.

Etta's peak years, at least as far as the singles charts were concerned, were the early sixties, when she was a regular in the American charts with All I could do was cry, At last, Trust in me, Don't cry baby, Something's got a hold on me, Stop the wedding and Pushover. Personal problems took their toll for a while, but Etta returned to top form in 1967 with Tell Mama, Security and I'd rather go blind. A cover of the last-named song, which Etta wrote, became a British top twenty hit for Chicken Shack, a group that featured Christine Perfect (who later became Christine McVie of Fleetwood Mac) as lead singer.

All those hits, together with many other great songs, can be found on this excellent collection of music by one of the most distinctive R+B singers you're ever likely to hear.

Not Her Best, But GOOD
2009-05-31 - I enjoyed several of the songs very much. A few seemed out of place...a disconcerting mix of up tempo and ballads. Well worth the price to hear the classics once again.

Just what I wanted!
2009-05-03 - Such a great price, for a piece of music history on Etta James. I have to admit, after watching Cadillac Records (the recent movie), I was inspired and wanted to hear more. I have a great love for MUSIC - hence, the history.

Miss Peaches Stands Apart From The Crowd
2007-08-25 - When songwriters Harry Warren and Mack Gordon had their composition At Last become the B-side to the 1942 Glenn Miller # 1 hit (I've Got A Gal In) Kalamazoo, they probably thought they had died and gone to Heaven. Especially when it too charted at a respectable # 14 with Ray Eberle doing the vocals. A decade later they struck paydirt again when the song was resurrected in the movie Orchestra Wives and then taken to # 2 by Ray Anthony & his orchestra, with Tommy Mercer doing the vocal.

But in my humble opinion the best was yet to come, and when a 23-year-old from Los Angeles by the name of Jamesetta Hawkins decided to record it in 1961 under her stage name Etta James, from that point on it became HER song. It may not have done as well on the Billboard pop charts as the earlier versions [# 47 Hot 100] but it did become a # 2 R&B and is, by any standard, the best version of that enduring love song.

Her career had actually commenced in 1955 when, at age 17, she recorded an "answer" song to the 1954 # 1 R&B hit Work With Me Annie by The Midnighters [Hank Ballard and crew]. Also known as Roll With Me Henry, and with Richard Berry providing the bass male vocal, it too reached # 1 R&B early in 1955 as The Wallflower, billed to Etta James and "The Peaches" [hence the later nickname]. That same year Georgia Gibbs would have a # 1 Billboard Pop Top 100 with it as Dance With Me Henry.

Later that year she would have her second hit single when Good Rockin' Daddy climbed to # 8 R&B with the backing of The Dreamers, a group that included the great Jesse Belvin, and Maxwell Davis & His Orchestra.

Personal problems then set in, and Etta would be off the charts until early 1960 when she returned with the stirring ballad All I Could Do Was Cry, which scored on both the R&B [# 2] and Billboard Pop Hot 100 [# 33] charts. And from there right through to 1976 she would seldom be off the charts, racking up another 27 R&B hits and putting 26 more on the Hot 100 and one - Two Sides (To Every Story) - to # 16 on the Adult Contemporary charts. which weren't introduced until 1961. That great song, which is at track 11, also made it to # 63 Hot 100 in late 1963 and, except for the fact that the R&B charts had been suspended from late 1963 and for all of 1964, it would have been a major hit there.

This CD gives you the best of her many hits along with nine pages of liner notes by Peter Grendysa of Words On Music Ltd., a partial discography of the contents [no chart information], and two more nice photographs of Etta, who was inducted into the R&R Hall of Fame in 1993, and to the Blues Hall Of Fame in 2001.

Now just 69 years old, Etta is still wowing them in personal appearances. This is a must-have compilation for any true R&B fan.