This 1976 effort contains some of Cooder's most compelling work and finds him re-exploring some of the fundamental influences on a musician known for remarkable eclecticism. Most notable are "Always Lift Him Up", "Smack Dab in the Middle", and a beautiful adaptation of "Stand By Me" (which includes Flaco Jimenez on accordion.) The album opens and closes with covers of Leadbelly, namely "The ...
Ostensibly a collection of Cooder's film music, the two-CD Music by Ry Cooder delivers the cinematic quality of a good soundtrack album but packs the kind of ferocious jams--featuring crack players such as John Hiatt, Jim Keltner, David Lindley, and Jim Dickinson--that you'll never hear on a John Williams score. Cooder's melancholy acoustic and electric-slide moans are a constant, though ...
This 1976 effort contains some of Cooder's most compelling work and finds him re-exploring some of the fundamental influences on a musician known for remarkable eclecticism. Most notable are "Always Lift Him Up", "Smack Dab in the Middle", and a beautiful adaptation of "Stand By Me" (which includes Flaco Jimenez on accordion.) The album opens and closes with covers of Leadbelly, namely "The ...
Ry Cooder may have been an in-demand session guitarist in the late 1960s, but what set him apart in his early solo career was his extraordinary, if eccentric, taste in songs. Here he explores the repertoires of everyone from Johnny Cash to Bahaman folk master Joseph Spence to Leadbelly with enchanting results. While Cooder's vocal skills are no match for his slide guitar and mandolin talents (the ...