{"id":42074,"date":"2010-08-15T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2010-08-15T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/reviews\/memphis-blues\/"},"modified":"2010-08-15T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"2010-08-15T00:00:00","slug":"memphis-blues","status":"publish","type":"review","link":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/reviews\/memphis-blues\/","title":{"rendered":"Memphis Blues"},"content":{"rendered":"

Make no mistake \u2013 Cyndi Lauper is one of the greatest female vocalists that has ever lived. Her incredible depth and range leaves almost all of her contemporaries eating her dust. She is an awesomely powerful live performer and can hold a note for an eternity. I saw her show a couple of years ago and was lucky enough to have a front row, dead center seat in the intimate theater, and several times her voice almost lifted me off the ground.\u00a0 <\/o:p><\/p>\n

So I know having been a long time fan that Lauper puts in 100% to everything she does and nothing less will do. I mention all of this because I still can\u2019t quite figure out just why Memphis Blues<\/i> even exists. Lauper\u2019s profile has been shot right back into the mainstream thanks to her engaging performance on a rubbish TV show that was seen by old fans who were unaware that she was still \u201cout there\u201d and, of course, newly converted fans who are now eager for more of Cyndi Lauper.\u00a0 <\/o:p><\/p>\n

So instead of capitalizing on this and writing some new material for what would have made a great return to the pop world that made her a star, Lauper chose to do yet another covers album, and a blues one at that. Unfortunately, this ends up being possibly the worst album of her entire career. It\u2019s the first time I\u2019ve ever heard a Lauper release and actually cringed because she sounds so out of her depths. She is constantly showed up by her special guests, and although her band has put in a stellar performance, it just doesn\u2019t work; this is one trick that Lauper just couldn\u2019t pull off.\u00a0 <\/o:p><\/p>\n

Back in 2003, she made a fantastic album (Stay<\/i>), covering some old standards with some radical arrangements and her trademark powerhouse voice in fine form. That record was brilliant because everything the material demanded Lauper could deliver so well. That is exactly what makes this disc so disappointing; not everyone can actually sing the blues, and Lauper is definitely one. I mean, you either have it or you don\u2019t, and there\u2019s no harm in trying, but someone should have pulled the plug on this one long before it was finished.\u00a0 <\/o:p><\/p>\n

Hearing Lauper trying desperately to match the intensity of Charlie Musselwhite\u2019s harmonica on opener \u201cJust Your Fool\u201d is just embarrassing to say the least. And even when she\u2019s trying to play it cool on \u201cRollin\u2019 And Tumblin,\u201d she is again outplayed by a smoking hot Ann Peebles. If only this were an Ann Peebles album, now that would\u2019ve been something. Allen Toussaint and B.B. King appear on \u201cEarly In The Morning,\u201d which is easily the best song on the disc by far.\u00a0 Lauper\u2019s performance is not great, but she plays it cool and her guests both offer beautiful performances.\u00a0 <\/o:p><\/p>\n

Jonny Lang\u2019s guitar and voice are the only redeeming qualities to be found on \u201cHow Blue Can You Get?\u201d and Robert Johnson\u2019s \u201cCrossroads,\u201d because once again, Lauper just doesn\u2019t have the blues in her. I don\u2019t know what else to really say about this record, to be honest. It\u2019s just a bad idea that never should have made it to fruition. I can\u2019t write it off completely, though, because the band and guests all gave great performances, I mean, musically, it\u2019s fantastic. But that\u2019s all that is positive about it, and that to me (a big Lauper fan), is a hard pill to swallow.<\/o:p><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":67,"featured_media":30412,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"tags":[],"artist":[8234],"rating":[11205],"class_list":["post-42074","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-cyndi-lauper","rating-rating-d-plus"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/42074","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\/67"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=42074"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/42074\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/30412"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=42074"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=42074"},{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=42074"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=42074"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}