I assume the first time I ever heard Etta James was when some oldies station played her hit \u201cThe Wallflower (Dance with Me Henry)\u201d during the late 1960s. By the end of the decade, she was sharing time on my turntable with the likes of The Beach Boys, The Beatles, and Led Zeppelin.<\/p>\n
Jamesetta Hawkins (1938-2012) was a seminal music figure during the mid \u201850s as she was a connector between classic rhythm & blues and rock \u2018n\u2019 roll. While she never really crossed totally over to a rock format, her style and sound helped to clear the way for many artists who would follow. <\/p>\n
Her recording career began during 1954 and continued to near her death. She was diagnosed with Alzheimer\u2019s disease during 2008 but managed to issue her final album, The Dreamer, <\/i>in 2011.<\/p>\n
If there is anything better than Etta James in the studio, it is Etta James on stage. She was a constant presence at the Montreux Music Festival, and Eagle Rock Entertainment has now gathered together 11 of her performances spanning four appearances at the festival from 1975-1993. <\/p>\n
She always had a strong blues foundation, and \u201cDust My Broom\u201d (1975) and \u201cSugar On The Floor\u201d (1989) return her to those roots. The six performances, recorded July 15, 1993, have a cohesiveness that is somewhat missing from the second half of the release as they tend to fit together well. Songs such as \u201cI Just Wanna Make Love to You,\u201d \u201cCome To Mama,\u201d and\u00a0 \u201cA Lover Is Forever\u201d explore the gritty and passionate R&B side of her career.<\/p>\n
The two most interesting tracks are from her 1975 appearance. The nine minute \u201cRespect Yourself\u201d and the 10 minute \u201cW.O.M.A.N.\u201d find her at the height of her career and demonstrate how she could work a crowd for an extended period of time. <\/p>\n
The album purports to present the best of her Montreux performances. Personally, I would prefer to have the entire performances rather than just various songs from a number of sets and years. Whether any more of her material exists from these shows is unknown at this time, but the recording of older Montreux shows was spotty.<\/p>\n
Still, it\u2019s nice to have the debut of these songs as they present a fine introduction to her music. Etta James passed away January 20th<\/sup> and Live At Montreux: 1975-1993 <\/i>makes the statement that her like may not pass this way again.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":59,"featured_media":31117,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"tags":[],"artist":[6506],"rating":[5615],"class_list":["post-42803","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-etta-james","rating-rating-b"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/42803","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=42803"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/42803\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/31117"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=42803"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=42803"},{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=42803"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=42803"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}