Various Artists - The Hitmakers Sing Randy Newman (1975)

Like the recent Tony Hazzard post, when Randy Newman's debut album came out in 1968, nearly all of the songs had already been released by groups and artists as singles or album tracks, generally in more fully-realised arrangements than Newman's own versions. Newman had been a professional songwriter since he was 17, and cited Ray Charles as his greatest influence growing up, and his first single as a performer was 1962's 'Golden Gridiron Boy', released when he was 18. The single flopped and so he chose to concentrate on songwriting and arranging for the next several years, with an early writing credit being 'They Tell Me It's Summer', which was used as the b-side of the Fleetwoods 1962 single 'Lovers By Night, Strangers By Day'. This led to further commissions from the Fleetwoods, as well as Pat Boone, and some of his other early songs were recorded by Gene Pitney, Jerry Butler, Petula Clark, Dusty Springfield, Jackie DeShannon, the O'Jays, and Irma Thomas, among others, with his work as a songwriter meeting with particular success in the UK. Top 40 UK hits written by Newman included Cilla Black's 'I've Been Wrong Before', Gene Pitney's 'Nobody Needs Your Love', and 'Just One Smile', and the Alan Price Set's 'Simon Smith And The Amazing Dancing Bear'. In fact, Price championed Newman by featuring seven of his songs on his 1967 album 'A Price On His Head'. Newman's eponymous 1968 debut album was a critical success but never entered the Billboard Top 200, and apparently the album sold so poorly that Warner offered buyers the opportunity to trade it in for another record in the company's catalog. It's hard to believe that the album was out of print for over 15 years until it was issued on CD in 1995, as Newman's songs have now been covered by an impressive number of artists, including Barbra Streisand, Helen Reddy, Bette Midler, Alan Price, Van Dyke Parks, Dave Van Ronk, Judy Collins, Glen Campbell, Cass Elliot, Art Garfunkel, the Everly Brothers, Claudine Longet, Bonnie Raitt, Dusty Springfield, Tom Odell, Nina Simone, Lynn Anderson, Wilson Pickett, Pat Boone, Neil Diamond and Peggy Lee, and 'I Think It's Going To Rain Today' has become something of a standard. Ten of the album's eleven tracks were covered both before and after its release, and despite Newman's undoubted songwriting skills, even his most ardent fans couldn't say that his vocals are particularly melodious, and so having professional singers performing his songs adds to them them immensely. As the original album was a bit short, I've added similar covers of half a dozen songs from his 1970 follow-up '12 Songs' to boost it to a very enjoyable 47 minutes.    

Track listing

01 Love Story (The Brothers 1967)
02 No One Ever Hurt This Bad (The Alan Price Set 1967)
03 Living Without You (Keith Shields 1967)
04 So Long Dad (Manfred Mann 1967)
05 I Think He's Hiding (Jack Sheldon 1969)
06 Linda (Jack Jones 1969)
07 Cowboy (Three Dog Night 1970)
08 The Beehive State (The Doobie Brothers 1971)
09 I Think It's Going To Rain Today (Eric Burdon & The Animals 1967)
10 Davy The Fat Boy (Joe Brown 1968)
11 Have You Seen My Baby? (Chris Smither 1970)  
12 Let's Burn Down The Cornfield (Lee Hazlewood 1969)
13 Lucinda (Joe Cocker 1975)
14 Yellow Man (Georgie Fame & Alan Price 1971)
15 Old Kentucky Home (The Beau Brummels 1967)
16 Rosemary (Blood, Sweat & Tears 1973) 

Ry Cooder - ...and on guitar (1971)

Ryland Peter Cooder was born on 15 March 1947 in Los Angeles, California, growing up in Santa Monica, California, and graduating from Santa Monica High School in 1964. He began playing the guitar when he was three years old, and a year later he accidentally stuck a knife in his left eye and has had to wear a glass eye ever since. As a youngster he performed as part of a pickup trio with Bill Monroe and Doc Watson, in which he played banjo, but although the band was not a success, it did inspire him to apply banjo tunings and the three-finger roll to guitar instead. He first attracted attention playing with Captain Beefheart and his Magic Band, notably on the 1967 album 'Safe As Milk', after previously having worked with Taj Mahal and Ed Cassidy in the Rising Sons. At a warm-up gig shortly before the Monterey Pop Festival in 1967, Don Van Vliet froze, straightened his tie, then walked off the 10 ft stage and landed on manager Bob Krasnow, later claiming he had seen a girl in the audience turn into a fish, with bubbles coming from her mouth. Cooder decided that this unprofessionalism was the final straw in an already strained relationship, and that he could no longer work with Van Vliet, effectively starting his career as a session musician. In 1968 he played with Randy Newman on his '12 Songs' album, as well recording sessions with The Rolling Stones in 1968 and 1969, with his contribution on mandolin appearing on 'Let It Bleed' and his slide guitar on 'Sticky Fingers', and later teaming up with Mick Jagger, Charlie Watts, Bill Wyman, and longtime Rolling Stones sideman Nicky Hopkins to record the 'Jamming with Edward!' album. Cooder also played bottleneck guitar on the original version of Little Feat's 'Willin'', and contributed slide and bottleneck guitar to a vast array of US singer/songwriters in the early 70's, including Marc Benno, Arlo Guthrie, Scott McKenzie, Ron Elliott, Mark LeVine and Gordon Lightfoot, and in particular on the truly stunning version of the Dionne Warwick/Cilla Black classic 'Anyone Who Had A Heart' by Eve. Throughout the 70's, Cooder released a series of albums that showcased his guitar work, starting with his eponymous debut in 1970, and releasing an album every year until the late 80's. These records explored bygone musical genres and found old-time recordings which he then personalized and updated, and on his breakthrough album 'Into The Purple Valley' he chose unusual instrumentations and arrangements of blues, gospel, calypso, and country songs. During the 80's he moved into film soundtracks, and his contribution to Wim Wnders' 'Paris, Texas' is regarded as some of his best work, but for this collection we're just looking at his session-work on albums from other artists in the early 70's. As Cooder is recognised as one of the foremost exponents of the slide and bottleneck guitar, I've chosen just tracks which feature those instruments, and have still managed to fill two volumes from just four years of recordings..

Track listing

Disc One
01 Sure 'Nuff 'N' Yes I Do (from 'Safe As Milk' by Captain Beefheart & His Magic Band 1967)
02 Richard Lee (from 'Pilgrim's Progress' by Mark LeVine 1968)
03 Heavy On My Mind (from 'LA, Memphis & Tyler, Texas' by Dale Hawkins 1968)
04 Don't Talk Now (from 'Longbranch/Pennywhistle' by Longbranch/Pennywhistle 1968)
05 Smokey Joe's Cafe (from 'The Anders & Poncia Album' by Anders & Poncia 1968)
06 Struttin' Down Main Street (from 'Border Town' by Fusion 1969) 
07 Something Better (single by Marianne Faithfull 1969)
08 Soft Soundin' Music (from 'Harpers Bizarre 4' by Harpers Bizarre 1969)
09 Teach It To The Children (from 'Marc Benno' by Marc Benno 1970)
10 Natural Magic (from the soundtrack of the film 'Performance' 1970)
11 Look In The Mirror (from 'Stained Glass Morning' by Scott McKenzie 1970)
12 Deep River Runs Blue (from 'The Candlestickmaker' by Ron Elliott 1970)
13 Go Back Upstairs (from 'Salty' by Alex Richman 1970)

Disc Two
01 Let's Burn Down The Cornfield (from '12 Songs' by Randy Newman 1970)
02 Me And Bobby McGee (from 'If You Could Read My Mind' by Gordon Lightfoot 1970)
03 Anyone Who Had A Heart (from 'Take It And Smile' by Eve 1970)
04 Willin' (from 'Little Feat' by Little Feat 1970)
05 Fence Post Blues (from 'Washington County' by Arlo Guthrie 1970
06 Don't Drink The Water (from 'Don Everly' by Don Everly 1970)
07 Song For Judith (from 'Living' by Judy Collins 1971)
08 The Blues (All Night Long) (from 'Stories' by David Blue 1971)
09 Mr. Money (from 'Possum' by Possum 1971)
10 Born Under A Bad Sign (from 'Rita Coolidge' by Rita Coolidge 1971)

11 Sister Morphine (from 'Sticky Fingers' by The Rolling Stones 1971)
12 Dirty, Dirty (from 'Crazy Horse' by Crazy Horse 1971)

Thanks to whoever it as who suggested Ry Cooder (sorry I can't find your name) but it's a great addition to the series. 

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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.