Sam Cooke

Night Beat - RCA 1963

Tracks: 1. Nobody Knows The Trouble I've Seen / 2. Lost And Lookin' / 3. Mean Old World / 4. Please Don't Drive Me Away / 5. I Lost Everything / 6. Get Yourself Another Fool / 7. Little Red Rooster / 8. Laughin' And Clownin' / 9. Trouble Blues / 10. You Gotta Move / 11. Fool's Paradise / 12. Shake Rattle And Roll

Comments:

"Night Beat" from 1963 is considered one of Sam Cooke's best albums. Since the album does not contain any of Cooke's hits or best known songs, the cause of the album's reputation is rather achieved through its overall casual late-night blues mood.

Cooke has written three of the twelve songs, and all three are among the album's strongest. Best known is probably "Mean Old World", which has both elements of blues and pop. "You Gotta Move" is also figreat with its light arrangement that allows room for a fine acoustic guitar.

A young Billy Preston also helps to put his stamp on "Night Beat" - listen for example to his somewhat unconventional organ playing on "Little Red Rooster"

The traditional "Nobody Knows the Trouble I've Seen" is also given a refreshingly simple arrangement, again, the acoustic guitar clear in the soundstage.

Some of the songs are perhaps a little too neatly arranged to be really interesting, but of course all numbers are well produced with Cooke's voice as the focal point.

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