"The Wicked Pickett" - Wilson Pickett.

First things first. This album is just about entirely covers. Even the big hit on the album ("Mustang Sally") is a cover. That would seem to indicate that it is a weak album and/or is full of filler. Nothing could be further from the truth.

For starters, the album was recorded entirely in Muscle Shoals, Alabama, at the soon to be famous Fame Studios. Aretha Franklin recorded her first #1 R&B hit there around the same time ("I Never Loved A Man (The Way I Love You") and soon everyone from Paul Simon to Cher was recording in Muscle Shoals. Secondly, this means that the band backing Pickett was one of the strongest backup bands of the 20th century, including little known figures who deserve more credit, such as Spooner Oldham on keyboards, Jimmy Johnson on guitar and Roger Hawkins on drums. This was a mostly White band playing a Wilson Pickett album, and you wouldn't have suspected as much by listening to it!

The covers are well chosen and often improve on the original. The original version of "Mustang Sally" was by the author, Sir Mack Rice, and had been a minor R&B hit before Pickett put his distinctive stamp on it. He sped it up a bit and the band provided a funky backdrop which resulted in one of his most famous performances and is a song that everyone assumes started with him. Other highlights are his hit cover of Solomon Burke's "Everybody Needs Somebody To Love" (sped up in the process) and the Deep Soul classic "She Ain't Gonna Do Right" (written by one of my favorite songwriting duos, Dan Penn & Spooner Oldham). The two other songs co-written by Dan Penn on the album are classics of Deep Soul, the devotional "Up Tight Good Woman" and the heartbreaker "You Left The Water Running".

If you're as much of a Soul fan and a Wilson Pickett fan as I am, this album will not be enough. If that is the case, and you have a bit of spare box set money lying around, you need a copy of "Funky Midnight Mover - The Atlantic Recordings (1962-1978)," a 6-CD set which includes everything he recorded for Atlantic Records, including this album, as well as numerous rarities. It is much, much more consistently strong than I would have thought; only the Discofied second half of disc 5 drags (disc 6 contains the rarities).

"Something/Anything?" - Todd Rundgren

A lot can and has been said about this wide-ranging 1972 double album. It has entered the Rock canon (Rolling Stone top 500 albums, etc.) and was Todd Rundgren's breakthrough album. Does it live up to the hype?

For me the answer is a definite 'yes'. I received this album last Xmas and I have already listened to it over a dozen times I'm sure. The 'something for everything' way the album is chronologically arranged (four album sides, four concepts) could have been distracting and left the album sounding very dated, but somewhat surprisingly that is not the case. The album opens with a tremendous 1-2 punch, namely the purest of pure Pop: "I Saw The Light" and "It Wouldn't Have Made Any Difference". Not one of the most well known songs on the album, but one of my favorites is the theatrical "The Night The Carousel Burnt Down". The music probably adds more to the songs than the lyrics, but the song works. The big hit on the album was "Hello It's Me," which was the only song off of the album that I was familiar with. Interestingly enough it had been previously released by Rundgren's old group, Nazz. It is a memorable tale of uncertainty and longing. A song about "it's complicated" relationships years before the term came into common usage.

The musical joy that this album brought to me made me rush out and investigate his albums preceding this one. Thankfully Edsel Records has the two albums before this one ("Runt" and "Runt. The Ballad Of Todd Rundgren") both available on a double CD with extensive liner notes and extra tracks. They're not quite up to this album, but they did not disappoint.

If you're into 70's Rock, definitely check this out. Be prepared for some musical weirdness though!