Saturday, July 09, 2005

Ace Cannon - Soul For Sale

The best in Cannon's canon?

We here at It's Great Shakes headquarters have dubbed Ace Cannon "Mr. Hit and Miss". The Hi Records catalogue contains lots of goodies but ol' Ace can be particularly frustrating. It seems that for every good record he released, there are two or three mediocre ones. Thankfully, his stuff is pretty easy to come by and, thus inexpensive. That makes separating the wheat from the chaff pretty tolerable.

That brings us to today's record, "Soul For Sale", one of the big payoffs in Ace Cannon's repertoire. In fact, I can't imagine that he recorded anything better than this 1969 cooker. It kicks off from note one with pounding snares that make for a really bouncy beat and some funky guitar. Then, horns join in. It's actually a bit before we hear Ace's sax but it's worth the wait. This is the most swinging stuff I've heard from him. And for good measure, the break features a great Hammond B3 organ. Whoo, I never knew that Ace could be so soulful and rockin', especially at the same time.

The playing is really terrific on this record. Unfortunately, I have no idea who the other players are. Of course, I'd like to know. Can anyone fill me in?

Oh, and inexpensive this record was. It cost one thin dime.

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