Etta James: Tell Mama (Chess 75 series) [HIP-O RECORDS / UME]

Why you'll love it

This Chess 75 series edition is mono, on 180g vinyl, mastered from the original analog tapes and housed in a gatefold jacket. The title track became her highest Hot 100 hit at No. 23, and her cover of Otis Redding's "Security" reached the R&B Top 20.

This edition

• Chess 75 series
• Mono
• 180g vinyl
• Mastered from the original analog tapes
• Gatefold jacket
• Remastered

About the album

Leonard Chess knew Etta James could sing anything; the trick was finding a room that could keep up with her. He sent her south to Rick Hall's FAME Studios in Muscle Shoals, Alabama, and the sessions that came back gave Cadet Records her first album to reach the Billboard 200 since 1964.

Hall's crew mixed her voice so the high notes came through at full strength, and AllMusic's Bill Dahl called the sessions skin-tight. "Tell Mama," written by Clarence Carter, drives relentlessly, while its B-side, "I'd Rather Go Blind," grew from a flip side into one of her signature ballads. Don Covay supplied "Watch Dog" and "I'm Gonna Take What He's Got," and she makes Jimmy Hughes's "Don't Lose Your Good Thing" and "Steal Away" sound like her own.

Dahl ranked it among her best and most soul-searing Cadet albums, and Colin Larkin's All Time Top 1000 Albums included it in 2000. Dahl also noted that the producers did themselves proud behind Miss Peaches, which is about as warm a thank-you note as a studio band ever gets.

Also at Kops: more Etta James on vinyl · browse Classic Soul

Tracklist

Listen

On Chess / Cadet (cat# LPS 802), a reissue of the 1968 album.