Brand New Ray Charles Collection Coming
The Tangerine Master Series now presents No One Does It Like...Ray Charles! collecting for the first time ever a number of mid-1960s singles, B-sides, and non-LP tracks never before gathered together on a single cohesive album.
The instant classic collection captures Ray Charles at the height of his powers, offering a rare glimpse into a prolific and creatively explosive moment in his career. Tracks like "My Baby Don't Dig Me," "Without Love (There Is Nothing)," "Worried Life Blues," and a top 10 rendition of Doc Pomus and Mort Shuman's classic "No One" showcase his unmatched range and soul.
An essential addition to the Ray Charles canon and a snapshot of an artist at the peak of his creative brilliance, No One Does It Like...Ray Charles! arrives everywhere on Friday, November 21.
"A discography can define legacy, it can define a tenure of greatness, but to appreciate the gifts of Ray Charles, one has to avoid taking such a wide-lens approach, which is a way of saying that each Ray Charles song is a universe," writes award-winning poet, essayist, and cultural critic Hanif Abdurraqib in an exclusive essay penned expressly for this new release. "No One Does It Like...Ray Charles! is an offering which makes that plain....All of the songs on this album existed, somewhere, before this, stretched out alongside the massive career of Ray Charles. But this is the first time they've been curated and organized in one single place. Before this, these songs existed primarily as scattered singles or one-off bonus tracks, but they all came out of an Era where Charles was at his best, a 1960s run where he showcased his brilliance, and his range, and also a decade where he was at his most prolific, releasing multiple albums every year. Because of this, it can feel like we have all heard Charles at the highest level, we have witnessed and dissected his greatness, and we have the massive run of albums to prove it all.
"To listen through this body of work is to hear what I think is Ray Charles at the height of his powers, specifically as a singer. Attacking each note in each song until he can wring everything out of it. To put it another way, this is Ray Charles at the height of his power of feeling. It is easy to look at these specific songs and say Ray Charles had the blues, but the blues are a primary color. In order for them to become touchable, in order for them to actually live outside of the body, they have to be intertwined with other colors. The blues are made up of many parts: longing, fear, desire. I love a singer who can show you how the paint is mixed."
No One Does It Like...Ray Charles! marks the latest installment in the ongoing Tangerine Master Series, following the arrival earlier this month of 1970's out of print classic Love Country Style, available everywhere now for the first time since its original release. A fan favorite that's one of the finest examples of Charles' crossover work, Love Country Style is the most soulful of his country records, as well as arguably the album that's the most connected to the current sound of today's country superstars. The album finds Charles once again embracing his love for the genre by delivering heartfelt renditions of songs by Mickey Newbury and Jimmy Webb with his signature blend of soul and sophistication. Backed by lush gospel-tinged arrangements, songs like his iconic version of "Ring of Fire" and "Don't Change On Me" (which hit the top 20 at R&B as well as the overall top 40) highlight Charles's unrivaled ability to transform country standards into something unmistakably his own. Out of print since its original release more than 50 years ago, Love Country Style now finally returns, fully restored and remastered in cooperation with the Ray Charles Foundation.
[an error occurred while processing this directive]