Steve Lukather - ...and on guitar (1979)

Steven Lee Lukather was born on 21 October 1957 in the San Fernando Valley, California, and from an early age he was playing keyboards and drums, teaching himself how to play the guitar starting at age seven. His father had bought him a Kay acoustic guitar and a copy of 'Meet The Beatles', and it was an album which he later said changed his life, being particularly influenced by the guitar playing of George Harrison. At Grant High School he met David Paich, and the Porcaro brothers Jeff, Steve, and Mike, all of whom eventually became members of Toto, but by the early 70's he became interested in the idea of becoming a session musician, a vocation that provided opportunities to play with a variety of famous artists. Jeff Porcaro had been playing drums with Steely Dan since 1973, and became a mentor to Lukather, furthering his interest in session work. His first job in the music industry was studio work with Boz Scaggs, after which Paich and Jeff Porcaro asked Lukather to join them in forming a band with his brother Steve, Bobby Kimball, and David Hungate, naming themselves Toto, either after the dog in 'The Wizard Of Oz', or according to an urban myth, after writing 'toto' on their demo tapes to distinguish them from other bands, they then adopted the name, as 'in toto'  was Latin for "all-encompassing", referring to the band members playing on so many records and in so many musical genres. During the 70' and 80's Lukather achieved notability as one of the most sought-after session guitarists in Los Angeles, reputedly playing guitar tracks on more than 1500 albums in his 36 years as a session musician. Named by Gibson Guitar Corporation as one of the Top 10 session guitarists of all time, he has performed on many notable tracks, including Earth, Wind & Fire's 'Faces' album, soloing on the tracks 'Back On The Road' and 'You Went Away', two tracks from the Lionel Richie album 'Can't Slow Down', and on 'Richard Marx's 'Repeat Offender', as well recording virtually all of Michael Jackson's 'Thriller' with Jeff Porcaro. With such a massive back-catalogue to choose from, compiling a representative album took quite a while, but in the end I decided just to concentrate of the period between the formation of Toto and the release of their first album, so all of these tracks are from just the two years from 1977 to 1978, with a couple from 1979 to flesh out the second disc. While I was collecting these recordings I noticed that he'd played on quite a lot of sessions for female artists, and in the end it was logical to split them into two discs, one for the guys and one for the gals. Most of the male artists were US singer/songwriters, not always well-known, but generally able to knock out a good song, and so while the original track listing also included songs from Alice Cooper, Peter Criss of KISS, and Japanese songsmith Tahao Kisugi, by excising those songs, it ends up a very cohesive, laid-back singer/songwriter album, so much so that it almost sounds like the work on one artist. The female singers are a more diverse bunch, ranging from Diana Ross and Barbara Streisand to Olivia Newton-John and Helen Reddy, and while he isn't always given the chance of a solo on some of the tracks, his work is nevertheless integral to the song. So enjoy this very small selection of the session-work of Steve Lukather, amounting to less that 1/50th of his total recorded output.  

Track listing

Disc One: The Guys
01 The War Was Over (from 'Terence Boylan' by Terence Boylan 1977)
02 Brother Of Mine (from 'Heart And Soul' by Danny Peck 1977) 
03 A Clue (from 'Down Two Then Left' by Boz Scaggs 1977)
04 But Love Me (from 'A Song Between Us' by Kenny Nolan 1978)
05 Back In Business (from 'Blue Virgin Isles' by Ted Gärdestad 1978)
06 Let The Fire Burn All Night (from 'Craig Fuller & Eric Kaz' by Craig Fuller & Eric Kaz 1978)
07 Can't Be Seen (from 'Dane Donohue' by Dane Donohue 1978)
08 Fly With Me (from 'Single' by Bill Champlin 1978)
09 Lady Of The Night (from 'A Long Time Coming' by David McCluskey 1978) 
10 Change Of Heart (from 'Touch Me' by Cory Wells 1978)
11 Long Time Till The First Time (from 'Yesterdaydreams' by Brian Cadd 1978)
12 Something's Missing (In My Life) From 'Keeping Time' by Paul Jabara 1978)
13 Sons And Daughters (from 'West Coast Confidential' by Steven T. 1978)

Disc Two: The Gals
01 Top Of The World (from 'Baby It's Me' by Diana Ross 1977)
02 Daydream (from 'Lisa Dal Bello' by Lisa Dal Bello 1977)
03 Love Breakdown (from 'Songbird' by Barbra Streisand 1978)
04 It's The Falling In Love (from '...Too' by Carole Bayer Sager 1978)
05 A Little More Love (from 'Totally Hot' by Olivia Newton-John 1978)
06 One After 909 (from 'We'll Sing In The Sunshine' by Helen Reddy 1978)
07 It's Not Impossible (from 'Well Kept Secret' by Juice Newton 1978)
08 Lady In The Dark (from 'Wild Child' by Valerie Carter 1978) 
09 You're The One (from 'Cheryl Lynn' by Cheryl Lynn 1978)
10 Love Is A Crazy Feeling (from 'Kiki Dee' by Kiki Dee 1978)
11 Think It Over (from 'Dance Forever' by Cheryl Ladd 1978)
12 Get Up (from 'Suspended Animations' by Evie Sands 1979)
13 Git Down (Guitar Groupie) (from 'Take Me Home' by Cher 1979)

For MAC users

Press command+shift+period (to show hidden files) and a grayed out folder '...and on guitar" will appear and the mp3s will be inside. Either drag those to another folder OR rename the folder without any periods at the beginning. Press command+shift+period to once again hide the hidden files.

Duane Allman - ...and on guitar (1971)

Before Duane Allman became a guitar hero in the Allman Brothers Band, he was a hotshot session guitarist who was logging tons of studio time with some of the best R&B singers in the world. After the Allman Brothers started to be appreciated for their albums, Duane continued to record with other artists, most notably with Eric Clapton in Derek And The Dominos, until his death in 1971. Some of his best recordings were with artists like John Hammond, who was the son of the record-company exec who helped launch the careers of everyone from Billie Holiday to Bob Dylan, and from Aretha Franklin to Bruce Springsteen. Like his father, he loved rural acoustic blues music and built a cult career paying tribute to his heroes, attracting some famous fans, including Jimi Hendrix, Eric Clapton and Allman, who played on a couple of Hammond's albums. Clarence Carter was a blind R&B singer who hit the Top 10 with 'Patches' and 'Slip Away,' which Gregg Allman later covered, but on 'The Road Of Love' from 1969 he takes on soulful blues with some help from an eager horn section and Duane Allman's jagged guitar. Delaney & Bonnie had lots of famous friends and fans, including Clapton, Leon Russell and George Harrison, and their 'Livin' On The Open Road' is a bluesy R&B rocker with a positively piercing guitar solo provided by Allman. Boz Scaggs spent two years with the Steve Miller Band when he booked some time at the famous Muscle Shoals recording studio, working with its terrific in-house session group, and his eponymous 1969 album is filled with great music, including the superb 'Waiting For A Train'. Aretha Franklin's 'This Girl's In Love With You' includes some great covers, such as The Band's standard 'The Weight', as well as the soulful 'It Ain't Fair', and fellow soul-maestro Wilson Pickett also benefited from Allman's guitar prowess on his 'Hey Jude' album, most noticeably on the title track. Alongside these legendary US performers, he also played with a number of lesser-known artists, such as Johnny Jenkins, Eric Quincy Tate, Judy Mayhan, and Sam Samudio, as well as renowned bluesman Otis Rush, and Canadian rocker Ronnie Hawkins. Most of the songs on here were included on the extensive 2013 'Skydog' album, but they were scattered throughout the seven discs, and included multiple tracks from some artists, and so I've extracted what I consider to be the best of them from the years 1969 to 1971. So that this is not just a rip-off of that record, I've managed to track down one additional song that wasn't on 'Skydog', from Judy Mayhan, and I've only selected the recordings where you can really hear the contribution that Allman is making to the music, thereby condensing the 7CD set into one concise 55-minute album.  

Track Listing

01 Twice A Man (from '2 Jews Blues' by Barry Goldberg  1969)
02 You Reap What You Sow (from 'Mourning In The Morning' by Otis Rush 1969)
03 Dirty Old Man (from 'New Routes' by Lulu 1969)
04 Cryin' For My Baby (from 'Southern Fried' by John Hammond 1969) 
05 Hey Jude (from 'Hey Jude' by Wilson Pickett 1969)
06 The Road Of Love (from 'The Dynamic Clarence Carter' by Clarence Carter 1969)
07 Waiting For A Train (from 'Boz Scaggs' by Boz Scaggs 1969) 
08 Ghost Of Myself (from 'I'm A Loser' by Doris Duke 1969)
09 Everlovin' Ways (from 'Moments' by Judy Mayhan 1970)
10 Comin' Down (first album demo by Eric Quincy Tate 1970)
11 Down In The Alley (from 'Ronnie Hawkins' by Ronnie Hawkins 1970)
12 It Ain't Fair (from 'This Girl's In Love With You' by Aretha Franklin 1970) 
13 Down Along The Cove (from 'Ton-Ton Macoute!' by Johnny Jenkins 1970) 
14 Beads Of Sweat  (from 'Christmas And The Beads Of Sweat' by Laura Nyro 1970) 
15 Living On The Open Road (from 'To Bonnie From Delaney' by Delaney & Bonnie 1970) 
16 Relativity (from 'Sam, Hard And Heavy' by Sam Samudio 1971)