Jackie DeShannon toured with The Beatles, dated Jimmy Page, and hung out with Elvis. She also has placed sixteen singles on the Billboard Magazine <\/i>charts and released over twenty studio albums. Her original compositions have been recorded by many artists, and in 1982, \u201cBette Davis Eyes\u201d won her the Grammy Award for Song Of The Year. <\/p>\n
Collectors Choice Music has just issued several of her classic albums, and this is the best value, since you receive two albums for the price of one. Me About You, <\/i>issued in 1968, and To Be Free, <\/i>issued in 1970, are now seeing the light of day for the first time in decades.<\/p>\n
Me About You <\/i>catches DeShannon trying to change with the times. Music was evolving in 1968, and she was trying to present a more mature mix of material. She depended upon the songwriters of the day for her material; she only wrote three of the tracks on this disc.<\/p>\n
Her vocal style was fully developed by the time she recorded this album. She still had purity to her style, but added an ability to provide passion and emotion as well. <\/p>\n
She recorded three songs by the songwriting team Garry Bonner and Alan Gordon. The title song is given an urgency not heard on The Turtles\u2019 version. \u201cWhat Ever Happened To Happy\u201d is smooth and perky, while \u201cI\u2019m With You\u201d comes very close to a country sound. <\/p>\n
There are a number of other highlights here. She takes the old Four Tops tune \u201cI\u2019ll Turn To Stone\u201d in a pop direction. Two Tim Hardin tracks, \u201cBaby Close Its Eyes\u201d and the bonus track \u201cReason To Believe,\u201d are given simple renditions, as is The Lovin\u2019 Spoonful\u2019s \u201cDidn\u2019t Want To Have To Do It.\u201d<\/p>\n
Her best original compositions are the ballad \u201cSplendor In The Grass\u201d and the nice love song \u201cI Keep Wanting You.\u201d<\/p>\n
To Be Free <\/i>is a very different affair. DeShannon mostly leaves the cover songs behind and writes or co-writes eight of the 11 tracks on the disc. She also is backed by a number of background singers in places, which helps to fill out the sound. <\/p>\n
\u201cLivin\u2019 On The Easy Side,\u201d \u201cWhat Was Your Day Like,\u201d and \u201cChild Of The Street\u201d show a great deal of lyrical and musical growth by DeShannon, leaving the simplicity of many of her early compositions behind. \u201cBrighton Hill,\u201d inspired by her love of the English countryside, features a very smooth pop vocal and should have been a big hit single.<\/p>\n
She always had an affinity for soul music, and here, she successfully presents a medley of the odd combination of The Supremes\u2019 \u201cYou Keep Me Hangin\u2019 On\u201d and Little Anthony And The Imperials\u2019 \u201cHurt So Bad.\u201d <\/p>\n
The pairing of Me About You <\/i>and To Be Free <\/i>is a nice slice of late \u201860s, early \u201870s pop music by an artist who is often ignored. This one is a keeper. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":59,"featured_media":30087,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"artist":[8468],"rating":[5617],"class_list":["post-41724","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-jackie-deshannon","rating-rating-b-plus"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/41724","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=41724"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/41724\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/30087"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=41724"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=41724"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=41724"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}