Robert Gordon, for better or worse, will always be associated with Elvis Presley. His deep baritone voice has the tone and timbre of Elvis, and Elvis was a major musical influence upon his life. It helps that Gordon handle many of Elvis\u2019 trademark songs with ease. Gordon cashed in commercially with a series of excellent rockabilly albums in the late 70s and early 80s. His out-of-print work with Link Wray on the Private Stock Label is well worth seeking out.<\/p>\n
Chris Spedding has been a noted session guitarist for almost 40 years. He has also released about a dozen solo albums, but only 1981s Friday The 13th<\/i> was issued in the So what career path does Robert Gordon choose for his 2007 album release? He wisely reunites with Chris Spedding and releases an album of Elvis Presley covers. It was the safe path, the professional path and hardly the most adventurous path.<\/p>\n It\u2019s Now Or Never <\/i>presents mixed results. Elvis\u2019 material has been covered thousands of times \u2026 do we really need more of the same? On the other hand, Gordon sings Elvis so effortlessly and reaches deep enough into the catalog that would, for those not already burnt out, would make this good listening.<\/p>\n Gordon fares best with the uptempo numbers. \u201cI\u2019m Left, You\u2019re Right, She\u2019s Gone\u201d and \u201cMy Baby Left Me\u201d are from Elvis\u2019 Sun Label days and fit Gordon\u2019s style well. While Gordon\u2019s versions do not match Presley\u2019s energy they are worth hearing; the former\u2019s versions are refined and slick as opposed to Elvis\u2019 rawness and seemingly one-take approach. Spedding contributes some good guitar licks but is professional enough not to tread on his vocalist\u2019s territory. <\/p>\n \u201cA Mess Of Blues,\u201d \u201cI Beg Of You,\u201d \u201cLawdy Miss Clawdy\u201d and \u201cDon\u2019t Be Cruel\u201d continue Gordon\u2019s string of slick uptempo covers. Gordon even rolls out the Jordanaires, who provide some old-fashioned vocal backing on many of the tracks. <\/p>\n The slower-tempo songs create some problems. The lack of instrumental energy puts Gordon\u2019s voice up front and exposes some of its flaws. \u201cDon\u2019t Leave Me Now\u201d plods a bit and \u201cPeace In The Valley\u201d is a song that Robert Gordon just cannot pull off. <\/p>\n There is nothing offensive about It\u2019s Now Or Never <\/i>and at times Gordon delivers excellent interpretations of some classic material. For those still interested in Elvis,\u00a0 rockabilly or these two musicians, It\u2019s Now Or Never <\/i>is a pleasant album worth hearing.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":59,"featured_media":29150,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"tags":[],"artist":[8123],"rating":[5615],"class_list":["post-40680","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-robert-gordon-chris-spedding","rating-rating-b"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/40680","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/review"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/59"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=40680"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/40680\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/29150"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=40680"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=40680"},{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=40680"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=40680"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}