Robert Cray With Albert Collins - In Concert (1999)

Tracklisting: 01 - Robert Cray with Albert Collins - Intro - The Chicken 02 - Robert Cray with Albert Collins - That Will Never Do 03 - Robert Cray with Albert Collins - I've Gotta Take A Chance 04 - Robert Cray with Albert Collins - One More Kiss 05 - Robert Cray with Albert Collins - I'm So Satisfied 06 - Robert Cray with Albert Collins - A. Collins Intro B. Don't Lose Your Cool 07 - Robert Cray with Albert Collins - Angel of Mercy 08 - Robert Cray with Albert Collins - That Ain't The Way To Do It 09 - Robert Cray with Albert Collins - I Don't Want You Cuttin' Off My Hair 10 - Robert Cray with Albert Collins - Don't Want No Woman 11 - Robert Cray with Albert Collins - Watch Me Baby 12 - Robert Cray with Albert Collins - Collins Instrumental Jam 13 - Robert Cray with Albert Collins - Alberts Alley mp3 256kbps

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daba_1 (2010-02-07)

Tin-eared critics have frequently damned him as a yuppie blues wannabe whose slickly soulful offerings bear scant resemblance to the real down-home item. In reality, Robert Cray is one of a precious few young (at this stage, that translates to under 50 years of age) blues artists with the talent and vision to successfully usher the idiom into the 21st century without resorting either to slavish imitation or simply playing rock while passing it off as blues. Just as importantly, his immensely popular records helped immeasurably to jump-start the contemporary blues boom that still holds sway to this day. Blessed with a soulful voice that sometimes recalls '60s-great O.V. Wright and a concise lead guitar approach that never wastes notes, Cray's rise to international fame was indeed a heartwarming one. For a guy whose 1980 debut album for Tomato, Who's Been Talkin', proved an instantaneous cutout, his ascendancy was amazingly swift -- in 1986 his breakthrough Strong Persuader album for Mercury (containing "Smoking Gun") won him a Grammy and shot his asking price for a night's work skyward.
Robert Cray was born on August 1, 1953 in Columbus, GA. An Army brat who grew up all over the country before his folks settled in Tacoma, WA, in 1968, Cray listened intently to soul and rock before becoming immersed in the blues (in particular, the icy Telecaster of Albert Collins, who played at Cray's high school graduation!). Cray formed his first band with longtime bassist Richard Cousins in 1974. They soon hooked up with Collins as his backup unit before breaking out on their own. The cinematic set caught a brief glimpse of Cray (even if they weren't aware of it) when he anonymously played the bassist of the frat party band Otis Day & the Knights in National Lampoon's Animal House. Cray's Tomato set, also featuring the harp of Curtis Salgado, was an excellent beginning, but it was the guitarist's 1983 set for HighTone, Bad Influence, that really showed just how full of talent Cray was. Another HighTone set, False Accusations, preceded the emergence of the Grammy-winning 1985 guitar summit meeting album Showdown! for Alligator, which found the relative newcomer more than holding his own alongside Collins and Texan Johnny Copeland. Strong Persuader made it two Grammys in two years and made Cray a familiar face even on video-driven MTV.
Unlike too many of his peers, Cray continued to experiment within his two presiding genres, blues and soul, on sets for Mercury such as Midnight Stroll, 1990, I Was Warned, 1992, and Shame + A Sin in 1993. After switching to Rykodisc in the late 90s Cray released Take Your Shoes Off in 1999, and Shoulda Been Home in 2001, proving that the "bluenatics" (as he amusedly labels his purist detractors) have nothing to fear and plenty to anticipate from this innovative, laudably accessible guitarist. Touring regularly with the likes of Eric Clapton and Bob Dylan, Cray stayed active in the studio, as well, signing with Sanctuary Records and releasing Time Will Tell in 2003, Twenty in 2005, a pair of live albums, Live from Across the Pond in 2006 and Live at the BBC in 2008, and This Time, which was issued by Vanguard Records in 2009.

daba_1 (2010-02-07)

Albert Collins, "The Master of the Telecaster," "The Iceman," and "The Razor Blade" was robbed of his best years as a blues
performer by a bout with liver cancer that ended with his premature death on November 24, 1993. He was just 61 years old. The
highly influential, totally original Collins, like the late John Campbell, was on the cusp of a much wider worldwide
following via his deal with Virgin Records' Pointblank subsidiary. However, unlike Campbell, Collins had performed for many
more years, in obscurity, before finally finding a following in the mid-'80s.
Collins was born October 1, 1932, in Leona, TX. His family moved to Houston when he was seven. Growing up in the city's Third
Ward area with the likes of Johnny "Guitar" Watson and Johnny "Clyde" Copeland, Collins started out taking keyboard lessons.
His idol when he was a teen was Hammond B-3 organist Jimmy McGriff. But by the time he was 18 years old, he switched to
guitar, and hung out and heard his heroes, Clarence "Gatemouth" Brown, John Lee Hooker, T-Bone Walker and Lightnin' Hopkins
(his cousin) in Houston-area nightclubs. Collins began performing in these same clubs, going after his own style,
characterized by his use of minor tunings and a capo, by the mid-'50s. It was also at this point that he began his "guitar
walks" through the audience, which made him wildly popular with the younger white audiences he played for years later in the
1980s. He led a ten-piece band, the Rhythm Rockers, and cut his first single in 1958 for the Houston-based Kangaroo label,
"The Freeze." The single was followed by a slew of other instrumental singles with catchy titles, including "Sno-Cone," "Icy
Blue" and "Don't Lose Your Cool." All of these singles brought Collins a regional following. After recording "De-Frost" b/w
"Albert's Alley" for Hall-Way Records of Beaumont, TX, he hit it big in 1962 with "Frosty," a million-selling single.
Teenagers Janis Joplin and Johnny Winter, both raised in Beaumont, were in the studio when he recorded the song. According to
Collins, Joplin correctly predicted that the single would become a hit. The tune quickly became part of his ongoing
repertoire, and was still part of his live shows more than 30 years later, in the mid-'80s. Collins' percussive, ringing
guitar style became his trademark, as he would use his right hand to pluck the strings. Blues-rock guitarist Jimi Hendrix
cited Collins as an influence in any number of interviews he gave.
Through the rest of the 1960s, Collins continued to work day jobs while pursuing his music with short regional tours and on
weekends. He recorded for other small Texas labels, including Great Scott, Brylen and TFC. In 1968, Bob "The Bear" Hite from
the blues-rock group Canned Heat took an interest in the guitarist's music, traveling to Houston to hear him live. Hite took
Collins to California, where he was immediately signed to Imperial Records. By later 1968 and 1969, the '60s blues revival
was still going on, and Collins got wider exposure opening for groups like the Allman Brothers at the Fillmore West in San
Francisco. Collins based his operations for many years in Los Angeles before moving to Las Vegas in the late '80s.
He recorded three albums for the Imperial label before jumping to Tumbleweed Records. There, several singles were produced by
Joe Walsh, since the label was owned by the Eagles' producer Bill Szymczyk. The label folded in 1973. Despite the fact that
he didn't record much through the 1970s and into the early '80s, he had gotten sufficient airplay around the U.S. with his
singles to be able to continue touring, and so he did, piloting his own bus from gig to gig until at least 1988, when he and
his backing band were finally able to use a driver. Collins' big break came about in 1977, when he was signed to the
Chicago-based Alligator Records, and he released his brilliant debut for the label in 1978, Ice Pickin'. Collins recorded six
more albums for the label, culminating in