Rock 'N Soul

“Rock ‘n Soul” by Solomon Burke (1964) This guy has a great voice. Excellent control and timbre across his considerable range. Better rock than Elvis; better soul than James Brown. As an album, however, it lacks variety and has a rather monotonous arrangement of backing vocals and instrumentals. A good album, for its historical value if nothing else. 3/5

From purely a listening standpoint this album is a real joy. Burke's voice is clear, articulate, and soulful. If you're a fan of R&B or soul this album is probably already at the top of your list. Adding in the historical context, that Burke was one of the founding fathers of soul, makes this album even more impressive as you realize that he was forging a new sound.

Wow what a voice, smooth and silky one minute, rough and ready the next. I loved the punchy mono sound (would love to listen to this on vinyl). The songs are simple and the backing is fairly sparse yet full sounding; the typical 'dry' Atlantic sound, which I love. Back in their copycat days the Rolling Stones covered two tracks from this album (Cry to Me and If You Need Me) so you can see how influential it was. It's a bit old fashioned sounding, but who gives a damn when it sounds this good. Not much to fault, so it's easily a 5 star for me.

Hooray! Some soul! I didn't think I knew this guy but once it started I recognized Cry to Me from that one scene in Dirty Dancing. You know the one. I also know He'll Have to Go but I'm thinking that maybe I really just know the first line, "Put your sweet lips a little closer to the phone," from a TV ad for one of those compilation records in the 70s. (And maybe not this version. Maybe Elvis?) I really like this! Sexy, bluesy, lots of yearning. So glad to be introduced to it.

Proper good. An unexpected treat. Will be listening again. We like the part where the songs happen.

I’ve got a bit of a soft spot for Solomon Burke because of his cover of Van Morrison’s “Fast Train” that was used in the season 3 finale of The Wire. It’s a wonderful song and, dare I say, better than the original. The rest of his catalog, I’m not super familiar with. Rock ‘N Soul was enjoyable, but as I’ve said in other reviews, early 1960’s music doesn’t really connect with me. It’s often like taking a trip to a forgotten era, one that’s kind of familiar, but also completely foreign. Having been released in 1964, this record is closer to the familiar than to completely foreign, but, it feels…old. Like if you could listen to music in black and white. …and there’s some to charm to that. One of my favorite movies of all time is Dr. Strangelove: Or, How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb, but there aren’t many other black and white films I truly love. So when it comes to music, it’s not something I can go back to over and over. This is reflection on me, not the music. Solomon Burke is a great singer, the songs are well written and performed. There’s no good reason for me not to like this. …there’s just something in my brain that isn’t receptive to the late 50’s/early 60’s sound. I can’t explain it otherwise.

Solomon seamlessly intertwines gritty and luxury on this record. He gives it his all, yet it feels effortless.

Rock’n’Soul Easily one of the greatest soul voices, emotionally powerful with such lovely timbre, excellent control and superb range, from mellow and tender to rough and gritty. However this album suffers from the way albums were regarded in the early to mid sixties as a vehicle for singles plus any other stuff lying around. Consequently this is a bit all over the shop and doesn’t really feel like an album, although I can understand why it’s on the list, from a historical perspective and to acknowledge his skill as a singer. I’m not really that au fait with his full discography but it doesn’t feel like there is a definitive Solomon Burke album or period, in the way Otis Redding and Aretha Franklin had, but I know he did some great covers in the late 60s, and that Don’t Give Up On Me album from a few years back is well worth a listen if you don’t already know it. Not all of it, but much of the album does feel very rooted in its early 60s time period with songs dating back to 1961. You can hear the legacy of big band R’n’B in the arrangements and overall sound, particularly the slightly flat drum sound, the guitar and the saxophone heavy horns. Goodbye Baby (Baby Goodbye) is a good example of this, his voice is obviously great, but it really lacks punch. As a fan of Dirty Dancing I’ve always loved Cry to Me though, and it is a great song - it definitely stands out. For 1962 the piano motif feels ahead of its time, really giving the whole song a sense of dramatic tension. Won’t You Give Him One More Chance has slight Hawaiian vibes to me, and feels like a song from an Elvis movie or something. Great vocal of course but the song is pretty flimsy. If You Need Me’s bluesiness is a better vehicle for his voice, but it suffers from the production, overall sound and slightly anaemic sounding band. I like country vibes of Hard, Ain’t it Hard, which make sense as it's a Woody Guthrie song, and his vocal really is very lovely, but the backing vocals feel overly intrusive and the acoustic guitar in the left channel seems way too loud and high in the mix. Can’t Nobody Love You is good, another superb vocal, particularly when he lets loose from around 1.40 onwards. But again the production vaguely lets it down, although the horns are nicely restrained. He goes enjoyably full crooner on Just Out of my Reach (Of my Two Empty Arms), showing how versatile he is, and what a supercharged Dean Martin might sound like. You’re Good For Me follows a similar pattern, great great vocal but a largely uninspiring production and arrangement, although the guitar is pretty nice. The wonkiness of the recording of You Can’t Love Em All does jump out and the song itself is another of those slightly Elvis movie sounding songs, with mariachi horns this time. Someone to Love Me is great though, the guitar is very good and backing vocals, for the most part, are very sympathetic to his voice and sit nicely within the arrangement. The soulful in a bar at 3am sound is great, one of the few times on the album where the song and recording come up to meet the quality of his voice. Beautiful Brown Eyes continues that feel, although perhaps slightly less successfully than Someone to Love Me, the slightly flatulent sax being a bit distracting. I like He’ll Have To Go, the strings giving it a sense of harmonic range not that evident on the rest of the album, although the farty sax continues to make some more unwelcome contributions. I suppose it’s not really fair to judge this as a soul album against the classic soul sound of the mid 60s onwards, as that hadn’t been invented yet, and it’s tricky to judge it as an album in general, as these are all disparate recordings from a period of 3 or so years, never meant to be an album. Despite that you can’t help but yearn for a bit of the joyous playing of the Funk Brothers at Motown or the gritty southern soul sound of Booker T et al at Stax and for it to be a more considered collection of songs. I had a cursory listen to the two late 60s albums that are on Tidal and they do have more of that classic soul sound, which really suits his voice, but I think his popularity had waned a bit by then and it looks like he decided to go back to Gospel and God. Ultimately his voice is superb, and I don’t really mind what he sings as he sounds great, but musically this is way below someone of his quality - not because it’s poor, it’s just a reflection of the time it was recorded. I think a 3 is fair, musically and as an album it’s not re-listenable enough to be a 4, but he’s too good a singer for it to be a 2. 🪨🪨🪨 Playlist submission: Cry to Me

Solomon Burke is a perfectly fine soul singer, but on Rock 'n Soul, he's sabotaged by one of the sickening cliches of early 60s arranging, the "Ray Conniff Singers" style vocal arrangements. Another problem, which affects roughly a third of the songs, is the then fashionable tendency to fuse soul and country music. Ray Charles has a lot to answer for in this regard. In general, I'm no purist, but fusing soul and country isn't like peanut butter and chocolate, it's more like mustard and chocolate. Poor Solomon does his best, but he never had a chance.

Who knew? Solid songwriting for the era. Hidden gem lost in the shadow of other Atlantic Stax superstars. He should have been bigger.

I'm really digging a lot of the stuff on this list from the 50's. I could play this stuff all day in the house. Soothing, classic sounds can permeate these walls anytime.

This is the kind of album you can take off the shelf and sit and listen to all by yourself. Today's music ain't got the same soul. I like that old time... something something.

Chef's kiss of '6os soul.

Song: Cry To Me Burke has a great voice, rich and passionate, and I liked it on this song. Also, I found the lyrics really sweet and touching, and the song had a really raw vibe that I liked as well. However, the rest of the song was nothing terribly special—I liked it well enough, but nothing stood out. The instrumental felt quintessentially 60s, and I wasn't a huge fan of the background choir. Still, it made me feel nostalgic, and I did enjoy the song—just not as much as others I've listened to.

I can forget that this style made it deeply into the 60s, and heavily influenced what followed in pop. Always down for this kind of thing.

great sound although upon first listening you may not guess it is a 60's album but a 50's. alt least that was my impression.

Wikipedia says this had seven top-100 hits. I had never heard of the artist and was unfamiliar with the songs as well. But I thought it was perfectly pleasant. “if you need me” and “you’re good for me” were two favorites.

Es gibt hier so einen Sender, Bayern 1, da werden den ganzen Tag alte Lieder gespielt. Da kann ich mir das gut vorstellen als ein Album was sich perfekt in den langweiligen Hintergrund einfügt.

das ist schlager für amis

lovely soulful voice , but bit lacking in variety across a whole album .

Surprised to see this was a mid 60s record. In terms of interesting sound, this was pretty far behind. Solomon has a cool and talented singing voice, but these songs are boring. The album drags almost from the very beginning. Disappointing.

This is basically an Elvis album. I can see how this is a bridge into R&B but I'm just bored

Everything you want from a rock and roll album.

Soul power is the cleanest energy source and may just save the human race

13 januari

Fantastic album.

Badass early soul

classic!!!

Great Soul Album, 5/5

beautiful

Buen álbum, artista que no conocía

Amazing. Sounds like Otis Redding with the intensity turned down 15%.

pure, undiluted soul. solomon has such an incredible voice.

If you want that album that stokes that fire of romantic angst, the kind that endears you to the lady who chose you but took her sweet time doing so, then this album is for you. If you want that album that provokes that romantic angst whilst in pursuit of the lady you love, but things haven't developed as you hoped they would, and you don't know why but are insistent they should, then this album is for you, but you might also want to think about moving on. If you want that album that reminds you of how decisive and successful you were in landing the woman of your dreams, then this is the album for you. If you are at a 50s and 60s diner and there's a jukebox, then this album is for you. If you want to relive the late night informercials of those classic love songs of the 60s, then this album is for you. Solomon Burke has the incredible voice of a crooner, with gospel fervor. The album is aptly titled 'Rock 'n Soul' as the vocals and lyrics are very much what we would expect from soul, but the music while not quite less 'soul' seemed more inclusive of 'rock'. This listener knows a lot of little things from this era of music, mostly from movies and pop culture, and the experience with 'Rock 'N Soul' is an educational one. Solomon Burke is just too good at this music, and after further research, it becomes clear why. He's part of, if not the baseline for this genre. We could with valid criticism call everyone else imitators, and lament that Solomon Burke wasn't more popular as some of his contemporaries. "Rock 'N Soul" by Solomon Burke gets a 5/5 for this very reason. We can listen to Elvis, The Righteous Brothers, even James Brown, but this album is a ground zero for those talents. Where this album might lack in experimentalism and variety that appeals to the 21st century listener, this album does something even more valuable --- it defines where our music can go from here.

Sjukt bra!! Dette overgår Sam Cooke. Elsker sounden og melodiene. En herlig albumopplevelse som blir med meg videre. Paolo Nutini må være kraftig inspirert avvente her, både mht arrangementer og stemmebruk. Formidling og rop er helt like.

They don't make them like they used to.

that album was amazing 10/10 I like Fats Domino more but this album is still great

Superb collection of music.

This was my introduction to Solomon Burke, and holy crap, I wish it'd come much sooner. This was fantastic.

Perfect vibes

Light rock for some songs, soul vibes for others. Late night listen for sure.

Amazing voice. The music is so alive. I haven't listened to Burke before but he's going on the list with Aretha and Sam and Otis. I look forward to digging deeper into his catalog.

Baller

Just a lil something for your soul

You're Good For Me -- Excellent song!

More of this please

The early 60’s was an interesting time in rock music. It was the ending of music driven by the Silent Generation throughout the ’50s and the beginning of music driven by the Baby Boomers. The release of the album is the capstone of the previous era just as the Beatles, The Beach Boys, The Rolling Stones, and others were forging the sounds of the next generation. As the capstone, this represents the best of the soul sounds from the’50s. While soul would continue on. It would also be forged by new artists. I’m deviating from my scale. This isn’t an absolute favorite, but due to the quality and significance, it earns a 5. Scale: 5 - My absolute favorites. 4 - Albums I like. 3 - It was ok to listen to it but wouldn't seek it out. 2 - Didn't like. 1 - Absolute shit.

Great Rock n' Soul Album!

Soulful and awesome.

Fantastic

powerhouse album

Loved it - knew the first song as a classic and the rest were just as good. Had a grin on my face the whole time I was on the bus and i could just imagine it as background music or singing & dancing to it

mmmm very rock and soul passed by quick, there wasnt any one song i felt i wanted to skip. it was all very stimulating to my ears 5/5 maybe??

Stunning

Where has this guy been my whole life! Great record.

What a fantastic album. Loved it

A really great soul album. BARELY above a 9/10. Nothing else to say. 5 stars.

Damn how did I miss this one!

Ik geeft het toe, ik ben een liefhebber van soul (en dan vooral de Motown sound) maar had nog nooit van Solomon Burke gehoord. Hij is dus van hetzelfde label als bekende artiesten als The Drifters, Percy Sledge en Aretha Franklin. Voor mij springt dit album er niet echt uit. Er zijn geen nummers die me echt heel erg raken. De composities swingen gewoon niet genoeg of zo? Je hoort soms wel nog wat invloeden uit de jaren '50 wat het wel weer bijzonder maakt. Neemt niet weg dat het gewoon een steengoed album is verder. Solomon is een artiest waar je wel zeker meer van moet luisteren, zoals het album dat samen met de band De Dijk is gemaakt (bedankt Roel voor de tip). Van het album "Rock 'n Soul" is het nummer "Hard, Ain't It Hard" een van de lekkerste nummers, maar "If You Need Me" gaat er na een tijdje ook wel bovenuit steken. Voor mij zijn er echter betere nummers op andere albums, zoals "I Wish I Knew (How It Would Feel To Be Free)" #kippenvel en "What A Woman" dat dus gewoon een verbeterde versie van het Nederlandstalige nummer is.

I love 60s vocal harmonies. His voice is incredible

60s soul is not my wheelhouse. It tends to be too soft. No backbone, you know? But that couldn't be further from the truth here. Solomon brings the fire on "Rock 'N Soul" like nobody before or after. There's an undeniable energy here that's lacking from most soul music. There's a heavy dose of rock in "Rock 'N Soul" but it never overwhelms the soul portion. Perfectly balanced. These performances are just spectacular. Burke's voice is so powerful but under perfect control. He's pure talent and emotion. The only other soul artist that I've ever heard who's on this level is the legendary Aretha Franklin. And the band isn't slacking here either. They understood the assignment. Everyone's pulling their weight and working towards the same goal. It's just... really impressive. Started strong and just kept getting better, earning every bit of a 5-star review by the end.

im into it

Didn't get a chance to listen to this on Friday. So listening now. oooooh I like it! I this guys voice. And the style is just so soul! I love it! Had to play If You Need Me a couple times. Make that 3 times. I'm going to add that to my karaoke list. In fact I should expand my voice styles. I'll be looking into doing more mo town type songs. This was a great album!!

He’s no Otis but solid listened 2x before I realized it repeated

Straight ahead soul with nothing to complain about.

This was a truly lovely listen; absolutely adding it to my rotation and am really glad this app connected me with it. 5/5

Genial

What this list was made for. A hidden gem. Underappreciated, phenom of a voice. I loved it.

Saw Solomon Burke once in Newcastle just before he passed away later that year on a flight to Amsterdam. This album is from 1964. I did not know it but recognized half of the songs. The other tracks were generally great as well.

A very enjoyable album. It made for good background music as well as music to unwind after a long day. I particularly liked Cry For Me and Won't You Give Him (One More Chance).

Me ha encantado. No conocía ninguna canción. Una voz muy bonita. Y emociona su interpretación.

Best yet

Wow what a voice! And a great vibe!

Great finding!

This rocks. Love the constraints imposed by the physical length of a single album platter. So much soul jammed into 2 and a half minutes many times over.

A true classic. I enjoyed this one.

Yeah, this is fucking great.

Solomon Burke is timeless. His voice is addictive.

Great, love the voices!

wow, genieten

I really really liked this album. Some of my favorites: If You Need Me Won't You Give Him (One More Chance) Hard, Ain't It Hard I liked the production a lot. I don't listen to basically anything pre mid-60s, and I like how the guitar was panned all the way to one channel with other instruments sometimes solitary in a channel and sometimes mixed stereo. It felt like the guitar was next to me and not "around me" like I'm used to. I listened through it twice and want to listen again. 5/5

Loved it!! Beautiful R&B album. Never listened to this geezer before, so I'll definitely check out more of his craft.

Was a great listen for a monday

Boy this is the real thing. Such a voice. He used to be one of my mum's favourites and I can see why. Love it.

amazing. beginning to end amazing. favorite: cry to me

So great. So influential. Love stuff like this.

excelente gracias 1001 por ofrecerme esta joyita

Bluesy and smooth

Good music and lyrics.

Weak for soul

Lovely and soothing.

Loved it!

So soulful. Great gem.

New to me. Classic soul 1.0

Loved

Good variety! I liked this one a lot

Sehr nice!

Very smooth sounding. Enjoyed listening.

Canela en rama

What an absolute gem. His voice has the power of Sam Cooke and Otis Redding. The songs are irrisistable.