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This is the third volume in Kent's "Fame Recordings" series by George Jackson, and true to the hype, it's as good as the other two CD compilations. Jackson was a renowned songwriter for several decades, penning pop and R&B hits for a variety of name artists, but he was a great, expressive singer too. For some totally bizarre reason, most of the stellar stuff that he recorded was not released at the time it was made, but sat on the shelf for a few decades, Thankfully, the folks at Kent have brought these musical treasures to our attention. This is simply great soul music.
What's most different about this particular compilation are the inclusion of so many songs that Jackson did NOT write himself. Among those are one song, "Don't Let a Good Thing Go To Waste," by fellow Fame staff songwriter Dan Greer, two songs by O.B. McClinton, and the funky "Switch Tracks" (credited to three writers). Many of the other songs on here are co-written with a variety of others, most often Raymond Moore. One of the co-written tunes, the sweet "Gotta Have Soul", is a pleasing duet with one of the song's co-writers, Marjorie Ingram.
The songs on this CD were all recorded in the 1960s up through the early 1970s. The earliest recorded song is the CD's closing track, "Won't Nobody Cha-Cha With One," from 1963. It's a "home demo" recorded in New Orleans at Cosimo Matassa's studio ("under the supervision of Ike Turner", says the liner notes) when Jackson was only 18 years old! Despite the demo quality of the recording, I think it's one of the best things on this CD. A truly great tune.
The title track, which drifts in a slight country direction, is also one of this collection's highlights and (to quote the liner notes again) 'includes a tear-in-your-beer dialogue between George and an unidentified man midway through." Two other standout tracks are "That From the Heart" and "Add a Little Sunshine," both of which feature the Fame Studio band of Jimmy Johnson, Barry Beckett, David Hood, and Roger Hawkins, just a few months before they left the studio and became the legendary Muscle Shoals Rhythm Section.
Once again, Kent and Ace have outdone themselves with another excellent, well-researched, and well-presented compilation of rare recordings, complete with an 8-page booklet. If you've enjoyed the other CDs in this series, or are a fan of 60s and 70s Southern Soul music, you're in for a treat with this one. Sadly, George Jackson passed away in 2013, but as evidenced by this compilation of his recordings, he was much more than a fine songwriter; he was a magnificent recording artist too.
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