Aretha Franklin - Montreux Jazz Festival, Casino de Montreux, Montreux, Switzerland, 6-12-1971

Guest poster Fabio from Rio is in the process of making an interesting Aretha Franklin compilation. While I was helping him gather songs for that, I came across this concert. It was broadcast on T.V. in 1971, so the sound quality is excellent. However, it seems to have languished in obscurity as an audio bootleg. I'm hoping to help fix that with this post.

Franklin's peak years were 1967 to 1974. In terms of the song list, this was pretty standard for the time, and there's a lot of similarity with her 1971 live album, "Aretha Live at Fillmore West." But there are very few live recordings from that era with great sound quality, so I figure this is worth posting.

As a nice bonus, the leader of her band in this concert was saxophonist King Curtis, a star in his own right. He features prominently on the first two songs before Franklin even came to the stage, especially "Soul Serenade," which was a hit for him in 1964. Sadly, he died just two months later when he was stabbed by a stranger in New York City. 

This album is 54 minutes long. 

01 Soul Serenade [Instrumental] (Aretha Franklin)
02 Aretha Introduction [Instrumental] (Aretha Franklin)
03 Respect (Aretha Franklin)
04 [You Make Me Feel Like] A Natural Woman (Aretha Franklin)
05 I Say a Little Prayer (Aretha Franklin)
06 Call Me (Aretha Franklin)
07 Brand New Me (Aretha Franklin)
08 Share Your Love with Me (Aretha Franklin)
09 Don't Play That Song [You Lied] (Aretha Franklin)
10 Bridge Over Troubled Water (Aretha Franklin)
11 Dr. Feelgood [Love Is a Serious Business] (Aretha Franklin)
12 Spirit in the Dark (Aretha Franklin) 

https://pixeldrain.com/u/FtxvfkAE

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/8YFwGQVz8UY0sPs/file

The cover image is a screenshot from this exact concert. 

Aretha Franklin - Festival de Jazz d'Antibes, Juan-les-Pins, France, 7-21-1970

Here's a really nice Aretha Franklin from 1970, right in the middle of her peak era of the late 1960s and early 1970s.

There are very few concert bootlegs of Franklin from this time period. This is probably the earliest one, other than a 1968 Stockholm concert that I've posted at this blog already. She also released a 1968 live album. There's more live material from 1971 and 1972. But this helps fill a gap between the 1968 recordings and the ones from 1971 and after.

This definitely has soundboard-level sound quality. I don't know if that's because it's from an FM radio broadcast, or TV broadcast, or other, but it sounds as good as official live albums from this time period.

Note that two of the songs, "Put on a Happy Face" and "A Brand New Me," were sung by her back up singers. I believe one of those singers was Carolyn Franklin, her sister, who also helped her write some songs. 

This album is 52 minutes long. 

01 [I Can't Get No] Satisfaction (Aretha Franklin)
02 Respect (Aretha Franklin)
03 [You Make Me Feel Like] A Natural Woman (Aretha Franklin)
04 I Say a Little Prayer (Aretha Franklin)
05 talk (Aretha Franklin)
06 Eleanor Rigby (Aretha Franklin)
07 Since You've Been Gone [Sweet Sweet Baby] (Aretha Franklin)
08 Tighten Up [Instrumental Version] (Aretha Franklin)
09 Put on a Happy Face (Aretha Franklin)
10 A Brand New Me (Aretha Franklin)
11 Dr. Feelgood [Love Is a Serious Business] (Aretha Franklin)
12 You Send Me (Aretha Franklin)
13 Spirit in the Dark (Aretha Franklin) 

https://pixeldrain.com/u/JmvpkgXc

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/rkl5PP8I67WKvJE/file

I got lucky with the cover photo, because it's from this exact concert. It's the only one that I found. The original was in black and white, but I colorized it with the help of the Kolorize program.

Ray Charles with Aretha Franklin - The Midnight Special, NBC Studios, Burbank, CA, 3-30-1973

Here's a particularly good episode of the "Midnight Special" TV show. This one stars soul music legend Ray Charles, with another soul music legend, Aretha Franklin, as his guest.

I've been wanting to post some music from Ray Charles in his 1950s and 1960s prime for a long time now. But there's so much released already, including tons of live stuff, that I didn't think I had anything really noteworthy. But I think this is noteworthy. It's not exactly from his best years, but it's pretty close.

What really blows me away though is that the Queen of Soul, Aretha Franklin, was only a guest on this one show in the show's early years. Later, they seemed to realize they'd missed her, and she hosted the show three times, from 1976 to 1979. But this was her only appearance prior to that. She did just one song on her own, "A Brand New Me," and a duet with Charles, "Two to Tango." I put that duet from this exact performance on one of the Franklin stray tracks album I made.

The portion of the show with just Charles is a bit strange, because it involved a lot of talking, instead of just him singing. Track 3 actually should be about three minutes longer. I loped off a bunch of it because it was a conversation between Charles and comedian Bill Cosby. I cut that out because screw Bill Cosby! (In case you're not aware, he's been convicted of rape, and it turns out he did lots of horrible things to many women.) Also, frankly, it wasn't very funny or interesting. Cosby also apparently performed on the song "Every Saturday Night," but I can't hear him. But on top of that, Charles talked for about three minutes while introducing the duet with Aretha Franklin. And there's even more talking, about seven minutes, between him and comedian Carol Burnett. Most of that involved Burnett telling a story. So yeah, lots of talking.

All the songs here are from the episode hosted by Charles, which was broadcast on March 30, 1973, except for one. That's the last one, "Early in the Morning." That comes from the April 14, 1973 episode. I haven't checked, but it's possible that was an outtake from this hosted episode that was broadcast a bit later.

Charles hosted the show one more time, in 1976. So I look forward to posting that once that episode eventually gets released on YouTube.  

In case you're curious, the only other acts in this episode were the comedy team of Freeman and Murray, plus music by the Earl Scruggs Revue. 

This album is 50 minutes long. 

01 talk (Ray Charles)
02 Eleanor Rigby (Ray Charles)
03 talk (Ray Charles)
04 Every Saturday Night (Ray Charles)
05 talk (Ray Charles)
06 A Brand New Me (Aretha Franklin)
07 Georgia on My Mind (Ray Charles)
08 talk (Ray Charles)
09 Takes Two to Tango (Ray Charles & Aretha Franklin)
10 talk (Ray Charles & Carol Burnett)
11 talk (Ray Charles)
12 Shake (Raelettes with Ray Charles)
13 I Can Make It through the Days (Ray Charles with the Raelettes)
14 What'd I Say (Ray Charles)
15 talk (Ray Charles)
16 What'd I Say [Reprise] (Ray Charles)
17 Early in the Morning (Ray Charles)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/ZAN535h4

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/5GrGgqIfNDz6H5U/file 

The cover image is a screenshot I took from this exact episode. 

Various Artists - 25th Anniversary Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Concert, Madison Square Garden, New York City, 10-30-2009

I just posted the first day of the two-day long 25th Anniversary Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Concert, in 2009. Here's the second day.

This second day concert followed the same format as the one on the first day. Read my write-up for more details about this two-day concert in general. Suffice to say that for this day, four major musical acts were chosen: Aretha Franklin, Jeff Beck, Metallica, and U2. Each of them hosted one fourth of the concert, and each had special guests join them during their sections. 

I was a bit surprised by the choice of Jeff Beck, since his record sales weren't nearly as big as the others. It turns out that section was supposed to be for Eric Clapton, but he got sick at the last minute and had to back out. So Beck was another "guitar hero" to fill a similar role.

I detailed in my write-up for the first day of this concert how I put a longer concert out of material from a DVD, plus the HBO broadcast, plus an audience bootleg. That's the same case here, except I didn't find an audience boot for all the otherwise missing songs. I did find such a boot for some of the Metallica songs, but that didn't even have the entire Metallica set. But it did get me "You Really Got Me," with Ray Davies of the Kinks as the guest. 

The Wikipedia page for this concert lists all the songs that were performed, in their correct order. Here's that page:

25th Anniversary Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Concerts - Wikipedia 

Based on that, it looks like I'm missing five songs. Here are the songs that I couldn't find:

Drown in My Own Tears - Jeff Beck (or possibly Aretha Franklin, I'm not sure)
Cause We've Ended as Lovers - Jeff Beck
Rough Boy - Jeff Beck & Billy Gibbons
One - Metallica
Stone Cold Crazy - Metallica 

That's too bad, but at least the vast majority is here. If anyone has any of the missing songs, please let me know. The first day concert that I posted is a little over four hours long, whereas this one is two and a half hours long. If you add in the missing songs, this probably totals about three hours, not four. So I think the first day one is a little longer, and better. I'll bet some of that was due to Bruce Springsteen, as his section on the first day was extra long.

One interesting note about this concert is that the collaboration of Metallica with Lou Reed - a very unexpected pairing - eventually led to the recordings of the album "Lulu," a joint Metallica and Lou Reed release, in 2011. 

A couple of performers who appeared in the first day concert also appeared in this one. Jeff Beck played a song on the first day, and had his own section here. Sting sang duets on both days. And Bruce Springsteen had his own section on the first day, and sang two songs with U2 here. Jerry Lee Lewis also opened both days with a song.

The sound quality is generally excellent. The quality is actually higher here than on the first day, because I only have one song sourced from an audience boot this time ("You Really Got Me," as mentioned above). I ran into many of the same problems with the first day, such as having to smooth over the transitions between songs by adding extra cheering noises. Read my write-up about the other concert for more details on all that. 

This album is two hours and 33 minutes long.

01 talk (Tom Hanks)
02 Great Balls of Fire (Jerry Lee Lewis)
03 Baby, I Love You (Aretha Franklin)
04 Don't Play That Song [You Lied] (Aretha Franklin)
05 Make Them Hear You (Aretha Franklin)
06 talk (Aretha Franklin)
07 Chain of Fools (Aretha Franklin & Annie Lennox)
08 Theme from New York, New York (Aretha Franklin)
09 Think (Aretha Franklin & Lenny Kravitz)
10 [I Never Loved a Man] The Way I Love You (Aretha Franklin)
11 Respect (Aretha Franklin)
12 People Get Ready (Sting & Jeff Beck)
13 Freeway Jam [Instrumental] (Jeff Beck)
14 talk (Jeff Beck)
15 Let Me Love You Baby (Buddy Guy & Jeff Beck)
16 Big Block [Instrumental] (Jeff Beck)
17 Rice Pudding [Instrumental] (Billy Gibbons & Jeff Beck)
18 Foxy Lady (Billy Gibbons & Jeff Beck)
19 A Day in the Life [Instrumental Version] (Jeff Beck)
20 For Whom the Bell Tolls (Metallica)
21 talk (Metallica)
22 Turn the Page (Metallica)
23 talk (Metallica)
24 Sweet Jane (Lou Reed & Metallica)
25 talk (Metallica)
26 White Light-White Heat (Lou Reed & Metallica)
27 talk (Metallica)
28 Iron Man (Ozzy Osbourne & Metallica)
29 Paranoid (Ozzy Osbourne & Metallica)
30 talk (Metallica)
31 You Really Got Me (Ray Davies & Metallica)
32 All Day and All of the Night (Ray Davies & Metallica)
33 Enter Sandman (Metallica)
34 Vertigo (U2)
35 Magnificent (U2)
36 talk (U2)
37 Because the Night (U2, Bruce Springsteen & Patti Smith)
38 I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For (U2 & Bruce Springsteen)
39 Mysterious Ways (U2)
40 Where Is the Love - One (U2 & the Black Eyed Peas)
41 talk (U2)
42 Gimme Shelter (U2, Mick Jagger, Fergie & will.i.am)
43 talk (U2)
44 Stuck in a Moment You Can't Get Out Of (U2 & Mick Jagger)
45 Beautiful Day (U2)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/UZjACSG5

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/mtktsXHvZPk8rgE/file

The cover photo is from this exact concert. From left to right: Bono, The Edge, Fergie, and Mick Jagger.

Aretha Franklin - PBS Soundstage, Park West, Chicago, IL, 5-13-1985

The flood of "PBS Soundstage" shows continues with a 1985 concert by Aretha Franklin.

In 1985, Franklin was at the peak of a commercial revival, after having some tough years in the late 1970s especially. Her 1985 album "Who's Zoomin' Who?" sold over a million in the U.S. and was the best selling album of her career. This concert took place about two months before the release of that album. So some hit songs from that album weren't played, like "Who's Zoomin' Who?" and "Sisters are Doin' It for Themselves." However, the biggest hit from it, "Freeway of Love," was released in advance from the album, and that was performed here. It would reach Number Three on the U.S. singles chart. "Sweet Bitter Love" also appeared on that album.

This concert is officially unreleased. The sound quality is very good.

This album is 58 minutes long.

01 talk (Aretha Franklin)
02 Love Is the Key (Aretha Franklin)
03 Love All the Hurt Away (Aretha Franklin)
04 Day Dreaming (Aretha Franklin)
05 I Say a Little Prayer (Aretha Franklin)
06 See Saw (Aretha Franklin)
07 Rock Steady (Aretha Franklin)
08 Something He Can Feel (Aretha Franklin)
09 Think (Aretha Franklin)
10 Ain't No Way (Aretha Franklin)
11 Respect (Aretha Franklin)
12 Sweet Bitter Love (Aretha Franklin)
13 It's My Turn (Aretha Franklin)
14 Freeway of Love (Aretha Franklin)
15 Didn't It Rain (Aretha Franklin)
16 Jump to It (Aretha Franklin)
17 Respect [Reprise] (Aretha Franklin)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/P59kFyCT

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/5zn13pdx5RTwTla/file

The cover photo is a screenshot I took from this exact concert. The video I took it from was rather low-res, so I ran it through Krea AI twice to get it looking better. Also, using Photoshop, I erased some distracting things in the background.

Jamaica World Music Festival, Montego Bay, Jamaica, 11-26-1982, Part 3: Aretha Franklin

The third set from the second day of the 1982 Jamaica World Music Festival is a performance by soul music legend Aretha Franklin.

I'd guess this set is one of the most popular bootlegs from this festival, and for good reason. There aren't that many Aretha Franklin bootlegs with excellent sound, and this definitely has excellent sound, just like the rest of the festival. (And keep in mind I've remixed all the songs from all the acts, so this version sounds better than ever before.) This is the only worthy concert recording of hers that I know of from the early 1980s.

Franklin's golden years were the late 1960s and early 1970s. She had a pretty rough late 1970s, with disco not suiting her. But she had a career rebound in the 1980s. That rebound really began this year, 1982, with the hit "Jump to It," which reached Number One on the U.S. R&B chart. Her 1982 album was also titled "Jump to It." Two other songs here come from that, "It's Your Thing" and "I Wanna Make It Up to You," but note that "It's Your Thing" is an early 1970s soul classic by the Isley Brothers. "Love Me Forever" and "Hold On, I'm Coming" are from her previous two albums at the time (though note "Hold On, I'm Coming" is the 1960s Sam and Dave soul classic). All the other songs are from her late 1960s/ early 1970s heyday.

This album is 59 minutes long.

33 talk (Aretha Franklin)
34 Hold On, I'm Coming (Aretha Franklin)
35 Love Me Forever (Aretha Franklin)
36 talk (Aretha Franklin)
37 It's Your Thing (Aretha Franklin)
38 I Wanna Make It Up to You (Aretha Franklin)
39 Daydreaming (Aretha Franklin)
40 Rock Steady (Aretha Franklin)
41 I Say a Little Prayer (Aretha Franklin)
42 Respect (Aretha Franklin)
43 Baby, Baby, Baby (Aretha Franklin)
44 Ain't No Way (Aretha Franklin)
45 talk (Aretha Franklin)
46 A Brand New Me (Aretha Franklin)
47 Jump to It (Aretha Franklin)
48 talk (Aretha Franklin)

https://www.upload.ee/files/16411031/VA-JmicaWrldMsicFstvlMntgoByJmica__11-26-1982Prt03ArthaFrnklin_atse.zip.html

alternate:

https://pixeldrain.com/u/QqPNbEJ4

The cover photo is from this exact concert.

Aretha Franklin - Music Hall Center for the Performing Arts, Detroit, MI, 11-12-1986

Aretha Franklin is best known for her music of the late 1960s and early 1970s, but she had a pretty successful career resurgence in the mid-1980s. However, she never released a live album in or from the 1980s, except for an all-gospel one. I've found a few bootlegs from this time period, but I thought they were lacking due to sound quality or other reasons. However, I've put together one here that I think is excellent. It's all from the same concert, but it comes from two very different sources. So I don't think there's any version that presents it as one full show like this.

This was special concert for Franklin, because it was taped for a TV special, simply called "Aretha!" I found an old New York Times article that quoted Bonnie Burns, the producer of the special: ''Aretha had been approached for years about doing her own television special, but she declined all the offers. But now she thought the time was right, and we gave her creative approval on all elements of the show - she picked the songs, the wardrobe, the musicians, and she wants to do it in Detroit, because that's her home base."

The TV show was only an hour long, however. But songs from the concert were also selected for a radio show called "Music Machine." Many of the songs selected for that were different. So I compiled all the songs I could find. However, I couldn't find a complete set list for the concert. I had to make educated guesses about the song order (since the order was largely the same for both, just with different songs added or removed). I may be a little off, but the vast majority should be correct.

In case you're curious, here's some more comments about the concert that producer, from the same New York Times article: "[Franklin] wanted it to define musically the last 25 years for her. First she does a chunk of old hits, then a chunk of newer stuff, and then a few songs that just meant something to her personally - like 'Love All the Hurt Away,' which she recorded as a duet with George Benson, although here she sings both parts herself. And then comes the big gospel numbers, because that's so much of her roots."

This concert is an hour and 18 minutes long. It could be that there were additional songs not included in either source. However, this is just about the length of a typical concert from that era, so if something's missing, it probably isn't much.

01 I Can't Turn You Loose (Aretha Franklin)
02 Get It Right (Aretha Franklin)
03 Love All the Hurt Away (Aretha Franklin)
04 I Never Loved a Man [The Way I Love You] (Aretha Franklin)
05 Today I Sing the Blues (Aretha Franklin)
06 Won't Be Long (Aretha Franklin)
07 Try a Little Tenderness (Aretha Franklin)
08 Rock-a-bye Your Baby With a Dixie Melody (Aretha Franklin)
09 Skylark (Aretha Franklin)
10 Respect (Aretha Franklin)
11 Chain of Fools (Aretha Franklin)
12 [You Make Me Feel Like] A Natural Woman (Aretha Franklin)
13 Angel (Aretha Franklin)
14 Who's Zoomin' Who (Aretha Franklin)
15 talk (Aretha Franklin)
16 These Dreams (Aretha Franklin)
17 Dr. Feelgood [Love Is a Serious Business] (Aretha Franklin)
18 Freeway of Love (Aretha Franklin with Clarence Clemons)
19 Look to the Rainbow (Aretha Franklin)
20 Oh It Is Jesus (Aretha Franklin)
21 The Old Landmark (Aretha Franklin)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/WtXNGKaP

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/ObyA5hwBSCy51Rx/file

The cover is a screenshot taken from a video of this exact concert. In March 2025, I upgraded the cover image with the use of the Krea AI program.

Various Artists - Newport Jazz Festival, Nassau Coliseum, Uniondale, NY, 7-8-1973

Here's something interesting and a little different that what I usually post. Also, this is unreleased and barely even mentioned on the Internet. In one concert in 1973, there were sets by Ttto Puente, Duke Ellington, Donny Hathaway, Ray Charles, and Aretha Franklin. What a collection of talent! Each of them played about 30 to 35 minutes. And while the recordings aren't perfect, they're all soundboards.

I've had a hard time finding out much about this concert, because this great event has mostly disappeared down the memory hole. But I did find one New York Times article from the day after the concert, which you can read here:

Roaring Newport Finish A Fervent Gospel Shout - The New York Times (nytimes.com)

It doesn't reveal that much. But from various sources, I gather that, by 1973, the Newport Jazz Festival had grown increasingly ambitious. Although mainly based in Newport, Rhode Island, it began putting on concerts in New York City in order to draw bigger crowds. It also began booking musical acts that weren't really jazz, which helped bring in those bigger crowds. This would continue after 1973, with "Newport Jazz Festival" concerts being held all over, even as far away as Japan. This concert was on the last day out of about a week of music. Others who played in festival included Stevie Wonder, the Staple Singers, War, and Roberta Flack. But I don't have any music except what's here.

Probably the most surprising thing about this concert is the involvement of jazz pianist and band leader Duke Ellington, because his heyday was in a much earlier era. In fact, he was born in the 1800s! (1899, to be precise.) That meant he was 74 years old at the time of this concert. Despite his age, he was still going strong musically, putting out new albums and regularly playing concerts. But he didn't last much longer, dying less than a year later. Much of Ellington's set is instrumental, with an orchestra. There is a female vocalist, Anita Moore, on some of the songs near the end.

Tito Puente might be the most famous Latin jazz musician. I don't know that much about him or his music. However, I already posted an album here where he collaborated with Steve Winwood in the 1990s. Much of his set also is instrumental.

The rest of the concert was much more about soul than jazz. Donny Hathaway was a great singer and musician, but he suffered mental health issues and committed suicide in the late 1970s. There are very few live recordings by him, so I'm glad to see this one get more exposure.

Ray Charles, of course, is a musical legend. I've been wanting to post more of his music, but there isn't a lot of great worth that hasn't already been officially released. So it's also good to give his set here more exposure. The same goes for another musical legend, Aretha Franklin. I'd guess there are less than 10 concert recordings from her late 1960s and early 1970s peak years, so it's also nice to have this reach more listeners.

I'm not sure of the exact order of the sets. I do know Tito Puente went first, since that's mentioned in the first track. And the New York Times article mentioned that Aretha Franklin went last. I'm guessing with the other three. If anyone knows the correct order for sure, please let me know and I'll fix it. It's too bad none of these musical greats played with each other on this day, but you can't have everything.

This album is two hours and 43 minutes long.

01 talk (Tito Puente)
02 Ritual Fire Dance [Instrumental] (Tito Puente)
03 Oye Como Va (Tito Puente)
04 talk (Tito Puente)
05 110th Street and 5th Avenue [Instrumental] (Tito Puente)
06 talk (Tito Puente)
07 Nina y Se (Tito Puente)
08 El Rey del Timbal [Instrumental] (Tito Puente)
09 C Jam Blues [Instrumental] (Duke Ellington)
10 Sophisticated Lady [Instrumental] (Duke Ellington)
11 Up Jump [Instrumental] (Duke Ellington)
12 Things Ain't What They Used to Be [Instrumental] (Duke Ellington)
13 Take the 'A' Train [Instrumental] (Duke Ellington)
14 New York. New York (Duke Ellington)
15 I Got It Bad [And That Ain't Good] (Duke Ellington)
16 Scat Spectacular (Duke Ellington)
17 Satin Doll (Duke Ellington)
18 One More Time for the People (Duke Ellington)
19 What's Going On (Donny Hathaway)
20 You've Got a Friend (Donny Hathaway)
21 Little Ghetto Boy (Donny Hathaway)
22 Valdez in the Country (Donny Hathaway)
23 Love, Love, Love (Donny Hathaway)
24 The Ghetto [Instrumental] (Donny Hathaway)
25 talk (Ray Charles)
26 Let the Good Times Roll (Ray Charles)
27 Georgia on My Mind (Ray Charles)
28 The Long and Winding Road (Ray Charles)
29 Look What They've Done to My Song Ma (Ray Charles)
30 Don't Change on Me (Ray Charles)
31 talk (Ray Charles)
32 I Can't Stop Loving You (Ray Charles)
33 Eleanor Rigby (Ray Charles)
34 I Can Make It Thru the Day [But Oh Those Lonely Nights] (Ray Charles)
35 Shake (Ray Charles)
36 Rock Steady (Aretha Franklin)
37 Oh Me Oh My [I'm a Fool for You Baby] (Aretha Franklin)
38 Angel (Aretha Franklin)
39 Day Dreaming (Aretha Franklin)
40 Spanish Harlem (Aretha Franklin)
41 Brand New Me (Aretha Franklin)
42 talk (Aretha Franklin)
43 Dr. Feelgood [Love Is a Serious Business] (Aretha Franklin)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/prPnV26E

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/CLQX63ZkIKVuKC8/file

I didn't find much written about this concert, but I got luckier when it came to photos. I found some pictures of Ray Charles and Aretha Franklin from this exact concert, so I picked the best of both. I couldn't find any photos of the other three, so that determined who I had on the cover. 

However, I also found a promotional advert for the concert. I cut that up and rearranged it a bit, but what you see at the top is all from that. I didn't change any of the text for the portions that I did include.

Aretha Franklin - Duets, Nederlander Theatre, New York City, 4-28-1993

By the 1990s, Aretha Franklin had fallen from her golden era (1960s and 1970s) when it came to new material, but her mighty voice was still strong. A problem was that she suffered production issues, due to trying to sound current. That wasn't nearly as much of a problem when it came to live performances. Here's a very interesting one, because it's chock-a-block with duets with other big name musicians.

This was a benefit concert done for AIDS research. It was broadcast on national TV in the US as "Duets." As such, it was professionally recorded, and the sound quality is excellent. It also means that things moved very quickly, to make the best use of every second of screen time. Typically, even before the clapping from one song had finished, someone started had started to introduce the next one. Apparently, in real time, the show lasted four hours, with big delays between songs and multiple retakes. But then things were edited down for an hour-long show.

However, I found a review of the concert at the time in the New York Times, which you can read here:

https://www.nytimes.com/1993/04/29/arts/review-pop-aretha-franklin-in-stellar-company-and-on-her-own.html

From that, it sounds like this contains all of the songs performed, or at least all of the good stuff. (There's mention of a song Franklin lip-synced to at the end, strangely enough.) According to that review, Franklin sang circles around nearly all of her star guests, and I agree.

Musically, she wisely stuck to doing her classic songs, avoiding any songs from her latest album at the time, "What You See Is What You Sweat" (which wasn't very good). She also did two Motown songs she'd never done before, "Just to See Her" and "This Old Heart of Mine."

This seems like the sort of thing that was designed for an official release, but I see no sign of that having ever happened. By the way, it's rather odd in my opinion (since I don't see a logical Aretha connection), but actor Robert De Niro introduced one of the songs. And actor Dustin Hoffman also was on stage, but whatever role he had must have been cut from this recording.

This album is 54 minutes long.

01 Chain of Fools (Aretha Franklin with Elton John, Smokey Robinson & Rod Stewart)
02 talk (Aretha Franklin & Elton John)
03 Border Song [Holy Moses] (Aretha Franklin & Elton John)
04 talk (Gloria Estefan)
05 Coming Out of the Dark (Aretha Franklin & Gloria Estefan)
06 talk (Smokey Robinson)
07 Just to See Her (Aretha Franklin & Smokey Robinson)
08 talk (Robert De Niro)
09 I Never Loved a Man [The Way I Love You] (Aretha Franklin)
10 Think (Aretha Franklin & P.M. Dawn)
11 talk (Bonnie Raitt)
12 Since You've Been Gone [Sweet Sweet Baby] (Aretha Franklin & Bonnie Raitt)
13 [You Make Me Feel Like] A Natural Woman (Aretha Franklin with Bonnie Raitt & Gloria Estefan)
14 talk (Rod Stewart)
15 This Old Heart of Mine (Aretha Franklin & Rod Stewart)
16 People Get Ready (Aretha Franklin & Rod Stewart)
17 Spirit in the Dark (Aretha Franklin & Elton John)

https://www.upload.ee/files/15289916/ArethaF_1993_DuetNederlandrTheatreNewYrkC__4-28-1993_atse.zip.html

The cover photo comes from this exact concert. Franklin is in front with her hand held up. Behind her, from left to right, is: Smokey Robinson, Gloria Estefan, Rod Stewart, and Bonnie Raitt. The font, including the colors, comes from one of her albums. I replicated that for the additional writing.

Tom Jones - This Is Tom Jones, Volume 5 (1970)

I haven't posted much since getting back from vacation, been busy, but I hope to post a bunch in the next few days to make up for it. First up is some more Tom Jones. This is the fifth out of six volumes of his performances from his TV show, "This Is Tom Jones."

As with the other volumes, this has a lot of duets on it. In fact, ten out of the 14 songs are duets. And also like those others, he sings and plays with some of the biggest stars in music at this time. The duets here are with: Leslie Uggams, Ray Charles, Smokey Robinson, Burt Bacharach, Aretha Franklin, Jerry Reed, and the Supremes. I must admit I'd never heard of Uggams before, but it's ridiculous that he had so many duets with those other big stars. And consider that this is only from one portion of one season of his show, and I was only able to find some of the duets done during that time.

The duets with Aretha Franklin are particularly significant, in my opinion. They did four songs together, for almost 10 minutes of music. I doubt Franklin ever dueted with anyone as much as she did with Jones on this TV appearance. And while the Ray Charles duet is technically only one track, it's a medley of three songs that lasts seven minutes.

As with the other albums in this series, this is sourced from DVDs and YouTube videos. The DVD tracks sound better, not surprisingly, but it all had to meet my usual sound quality standards.

Even if you're not much of a Tom Jones fan, there's a lot to like here. Yeah, there are a few cheesy show-biz tunes. But there also are plenty of duets with some all-time greats, generally doing classic songs.

This album is 47 minutes long.

01 Somewhere (Tom Jones & Leslie Uggams)
02 Venus (Tom Jones)
03 If I Ruled the World (Tom Jones)
04 That Thing Called Love - Understanding - Bright Lights (Tom Jones & Ray Charles)
05 I Heard it Through the Grapevine (Tom Jones & Smokey Robinson)
06 What the World Needs Now (Tom Jones with Burt Bacharach)
07 Raindrops Keep Falling on My Head (Tom Jones & Burt Bacharach)
08 It's Not Unusual - See Saw (Tom Jones & Aretha Franklin)
09 Spirit in the Dark (Tom Jones & Aretha Franklin)
10 The Party's Over (Tom Jones & Aretha Franklin)
11 Funky Chicken (Tom Jones)
12 Guitar Man (Tom Jones & Jerry Reed)
13 River Deep, Mountain High (Tom Jones & Supremes)
14 Try a Little Tenderness (Tom Jones)

https://www.upload.ee/files/16700848/TOMJNS1970_ThisIsTmJnsVolum5_atse.zip.html

As with the other albums in this series, I figured it would be more interesting to show a photo of Jones from one of his duets on the cover rather than him alone. So I chose him singing with Aretha Franklin from the performance featured here.

Aretha Franklin - Hold On, I'm Coming - Selected Best Tracks (1980-1982)

Earlier this year, the Aretha Franklin box set "Aretha" was released. It dealt with all parts of her musical career. I haven't been that big on the later part of her career, from the early 1980s until her death in 2018, and I'm still not. But the box set made me realize there was a lot of good music from her later career that I'd missed. So I used to have two stray tracks albums for the early 1980s to the end of her career. I'm revamped that, so I now have four albums for that time period. Two of them are new, and two are radically changed. Here's the first new one.

My main problem with later music from her is the bad production. This album deals with three years at the start of the 1980s, before the production really got bad, in my opinion. For this album, anything she did is fair game. I included "School Days" from her 1980 album "Aretha," "Hold On, I'm Coming" from her 1981 album "Love All the Hurt Away," and "Jump to It" and "It's Your Thing" from her 1982 album "Jump to It."

As you can see, that means a majority of the songs don't come from her studio albums. I think non-album tracks tended to not suffer from the usual production problems from that time period. Three of those songs are officially unreleased: a version of "Sweet Sixteen" with B. B. King, "God Bless the Child," and "Nobody Knows You When You're Down and Out" with blues legend Big Mama Thornton. All three of those come from TV show appearances, so the sound quality is pretty good.

Two more songs come from the "Aretha" box set: "Amazing Grace" and a duet version of "I Say a Little Prayer" with Dionne Warwick. Finally, "Think" was a hit for her in 1968, but I prefer this version from the "Blues Brothers" movie soundtrack, because the original version only has one iteration of the chorus, and this version has two.

This album is 41 minutes long.

If you're interested in this time period of her career and you've download the early 1980s stray tracks album "Freeway of Love" already, I highly, highly recommend you get the updated version I'm posting at the same time I post this. That album has been radically transformed, with most of the songs different than before. Here's the link to the revised "Freeway of Love":

https://albumsthatshouldexist.blogspot.com/2018/08/aretha-franklin-freeway-of-love-various.html

01 Think [1980 Version] (Blues Brothers with Aretha Franklin)
02 School Days (Aretha Franklin)
03 Sweet Sixteen (Aretha Franklin & B. B. King)
04 Amazing Grace (Aretha Franklin)
05 God Bless the Child (Aretha Franklin)
06 Nobody Knows You When You're Down and Out (Aretha Franklin & Big Mama Thornton)
07 I Say a Little Prayer (Dionne Warwick & Aretha Franklin)
08 Hold On, I'm Coming (Aretha Franklin)
09 Jump to It (Aretha Franklin)
10 It's Your Thing (Aretha Franklin)

https://www.upload.ee/files/15114694/ArethaF_1980-1982_HldOnComing_atse.zip.html

The cover uses a promotional photo from 1980. 

Aretha Franklin - Rolling in the Deep - Selected Best Tracks (2002-2014)

In late 2021, the Aretha Franklin box set "Aretha" was released. It dealt with her entire career. Listening to it, I realized I'd missed some good songs from the latter part of her career. I found enough to turn the two stray tracks albums from the early 1980s until her death in 2018 to four stray tracks albums. This is the last one. (Due to declining health, she didn't sing much in her last four years.)

Generally speaking, I found her music from the 1980s on to be marred by bad production. So only four songs here are from her studio albums. There's two songs from her 2011 album "A Woman Falling Out of Love": "My Country 'Tis of Thee" and "Sweet Sixteen." And there's two songs from her 2014 album "Sings the Great Diva Classics": "No One" and "Rolling in the Deep."

Speaking of "Rolling in the Deep," of course that was a huge hit by Adele. Personally, I think Adele's version is fantastic. It's such an inherently great song that Franklin's version is pretty good too, even though hers isn't nearly as good as Adele's. However, there's a big problem with Franklin's version, in my opinion: near the end, she switches into some of the soul classic "Ain't No Mountain High Enough." That's a problem, because the sentiment of that song is the exact opposite of "Rolling in the Deep!" It might work musically, but it's a disaster lyrically. So I've created my own version here where I've tried my best to cut out the "Ain't No Mountain High Enough" part. The edits aren't that great due the way different parts of the song overlap, but I did what I could.

As for the other songs here, two more have been officially released. "At Last," a duet with Lou Rawls, comes from the "Aretha" box set. And "You've Got a Friend," a duet with Ronald Isley, comes from a Ronald Isley album.

Although the remaining songs are officially unreleased, they generally sound very good. Some of them come from TV show performances.

This album is 49 minutes long.

In making this album, I radically transformed a different stray tracks album that used to cover this time period, "A Deeper Love." So if you get this, I highly recommend you get the updated version of that one. The link is here:

https://albumsthatshouldexist.blogspot.com/2018/08/aretha-franklin-deeper-love-various.html

01 At Last (Aretha Franklin & Lou Rawls)
02 Until You Come Back to Me [That's What I'm Gonna Do] [Live] (Stevie Wonder & Aretha Franklin)
03 I Adore You [And I Abhor You] [Edit] (Aretha Franklin)
04 Make Them Hear You (Aretha Franklin)
05 You've Got a Friend (Aretha Franklin & Ronald Isley)
06 My Country 'Tis of Thee (Aretha Franklin)
07 Sweet Sixteen (Aretha Franklin)
08 Signed, Sealed, Delivered, I'm Yours (Aretha Franklin)
09 I Will Always Love You (Aretha Franklin)
10 [Your Love Keeps Lifting Me] Higher and Higher (Aretha Franklin)
11 No One (Aretha Franklin)
12 Rolling in the Deep [Edit] (Aretha Franklin)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/zN2xCRNE

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/CDUoBSmJiWtzgY0/file

Franklin's version of "Rolling in the Deep" had a limited release as a single. The cover art I used here is simply the single cover. In March 2025, I upgraded the cover image with the use of the Krea AI program.

Aretha Franklin - Anything Goes - Non-Album Tracks (1975-1979)

A couple of years ago, I posted a single album that contained what I considered all the best of Aretha Franklin's meager late 1970s output. I have since reconsidered, and decided that time is worthy of two albums. I just posted a drastic overhaul of the album I previously posted, called "Rock with Me." It only contains the best songs from her late 1970s albums.

This album deals with that exact same time period, but it only contains non-album songs. The vast majority of them remain unreleased, but two of them finally got a release on the 2021 box set "Aretha." 

Here's my theory about the music in here. In the late 1970s, Aretha Franklin was still considered a musical legend, and was popular enough for many TV shows to want to have her on. But because her recent albums weren't very good, and generally lacked any hit singles, there wasn't much desire for her to play those songs. So instead she often performed well-known songs that she'd never put on any of her albums.

So this album has her doing a really wide variety of songs in different styles. That's why the title "Anything Goes" - one of the songs she does here - fits particularly well. She did everything from old Duke Ellington songs from the 1930s ("Mood Indigo") to mega-hits that had just recently left the charts ("Nobody Does It Better" and "You Light Up My Life.") Creatively, she was treading water, but in retrospect it's nice to have her versions of these classic songs. 

Although most of the songs are officially unreleased, the vast majority come from TV shows or soundboard bootlegs, so the sound quality is generally pretty high. Still, these songs don't sound as good as studio versions of them would.

The two bonus tracks are songs that also come from TV shows, but for whatever reason the recordings of them don't sound as good as the others.

01 The Way We Were (Aretha Franklin)
02 MacArthur Park (Aretha Franklin)
03 Midnight Train to Georgia (Aretha Franklin)
04 God Bless America (Aretha Franklin)
05 Perdido (Aretha Franklin)
06 Shiny Stockings - Mood Indigo (Aretha Franklin)
07 Singing in the Rain (Aretha Franklin)
08 The Greatest Love of All (Aretha Franklin)
09 Anything Goes (Aretha Franklin)
10 Nobody Does It Better (Aretha Franklin)
11 Yesterday (Aretha Franklin)
12 You Light Up My Life (Aretha Franklin)
13 Mary Don't You Weep (Aretha Franklin)
14 Ooo Baby Baby (Aretha Franklin & Smokey Robinson)

He's Got the Whole Word in His Hands (Aretha Franklin)
Isn't She Lovely (Aretha Franklin & the Four Tops)

https://www.upload.ee/files/15114686/ArethaF_1975-1979_AnythingGos_atse.zip.html

One of the highlights of this album is a duet she and Smokey Robinson with his song "Ooh Baby Baby" in 1979. I happened to find a photo from that performance, so I've used it for the cover.

Aretha Franklin - Rock with Me - Selected Best Tracks (1975-1979)

If you've downloaded the Aretha Franklin albums that I've posted here, perhaps you'll recognize this one. I previously posted an album with this exact same name and cover art. But I'm deleting that and reposting this as a new album, because I've drastically changed it.

This album used to contain everything I consider good from her rather fallow late 1970s output. About half of it came from songs released on her albums, and about half were unreleased songs that she largely did on TV shows. But about a month ago as I write this (October 2021), a new box set called "Aretha" was released. It made me realize there was more to this time period that I'd missed.

So I've made two albums that cover that same late 1970s time period. This one collects the best songs from her rather spotty late 1970s albums. The other one, which I'm also posting today, collects the unreleased songs she did in those same years. This works out nicely in that both resulting albums are in the typical 40 to 50 minute album length range.

I think it's undisputed that the prime of her career was from 1967 to 1974. I have all of her albums from that era. But starting around 1975, she took a big dive, both in terms of commercial success and critical acclaim. What happened to her happened to nearly all big soul artists around that time. Disco started to become big, and other musical changes happened like a new prominence of synthesizers and drum machines. Most soul artists changed their sound in order to sound contemporary, and it was a disaster. Franklin's disco music has to be the nadir of her long career. She rebounded some in the 1980s, especially commercially, but still, her music after 1974 was a shadow of her glory days, in my opinion.

Her best album from this time period has to be "Sparkle," released in 1976. It was entirely written and produced by soul great Curtis Mayfield, and his involvement seems to have helped matters a lot. So I've included five songs from that album, but even that one is hit or miss. 

As the 1970s went on, things went from bad to worse, the more disco took hold. Her 1978 and 1979 albums, "Almighty Fire" and "La Dita" have to be her low point. I tried to include at least one song from each of her five late 1970s albums, but it was tough to come up with even one good song from each of those.

So yeah, individually, most of these albums aren't that good. But by picking out the best songs, I think it makes for a good album, overall.

If you think I missed some gems, please let me know.

01 Mr. D.J. [5 for the D.J.] (Aretha Franklin)
02 It Only Happens [When I Look at You] (Aretha Franklin)
03 Rock with Me (Aretha Franklin)
04 Look into Your Heart (Aretha Franklin)
05 Something He Can Feel (Aretha Franklin)
06 Sparkle (Aretha Franklin)
07 Hooked On Your Love (Aretha Franklin)
08 Break It to Me Gently (Aretha Franklin)
09 Mumbles - I've Got the Music in Me (Aretha Franklin)
10 When I Think about You (Aretha Franklin)
11 Honey I Need Your Love (Aretha Franklin)
12 I'm Your Speed (Aretha Franklin)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/t9ZLzjxL

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/mi4ygPxrtZZMzhx/file

I made the cover based on a photo from the 1970s but I don't know the exact year.In March 2025, I upgraded the cover image with the use of the Krea AI program.

Aretha Franklin - Tree of Life - Non-Album Tracks (1972-1973)

Aretha Franklin released studio albums in 1972 and 1973. But she easily had enough material for another album, as you can see here.

The first seven songs, plus the last one, all come from the archival release "Rare and Unreleased Recordings from the Golden Age of the Queen of Soul." The next two come, "How I Got Over" and "Old Landmark," from the live album "Amazing Grace." I know lots of people rave about that album, but I'm not into gospel music. These two songs are ones I like, probably because they're more lively. In fact, I believe James Brown performed "Old Landmark" in the 1980 movie "The Blues Brothers."

The song "Somethin' Stupid" stupid is an unreleased studio outtake. Frank Sinatra and his daughter Nancy had a big hit with it in 1967.  "It Takes Two to Tango" is an unreleased duet between Aretha Franklin and Ray Charles, from a 1973 TV show.

This album is 42 minutes long.

01 Sweetest Smile and the Funkiest Style (Aretha Franklin)
02 This Is (Aretha Franklin)
03 Do You Know (Aretha Franklin)
04 Tree of Life (Aretha Franklin)
05 Can You Love Again (Aretha Franklin)
06 I Want to Be with You (Aretha Franklin)
07 Suzanne (Aretha Franklin)
08 How I Got Over (Aretha Franklin)
09 Old Landmark (Aretha Franklin)
10 Somethin' Stupid (Aretha Franklin)
11 It Takes Two to Tango (Aretha Franklin & Ray Charles)
12 The Happy Blues (Aretha Franklin)

https://www.upload.ee/files/15113504/ArethaF_1972-1973_TreeofLfe_atse.zip.html

I gave this album the title "Tree of Life" because that's the name of one of the songs in it, and it sounds like a worthy album title to me. After I did that and I considered what the album cover should be, I decided to go for a literal interpretation instead of using a photo of Franklin, as I'd usually do. I did an image search for the phrase "tree of life," and found a painting by Lioudmila Perry by that name that I liked. I hope she doesn't mind me using it for the cover. If so, I'd be happy to change it to something else.

Aretha Franklin - The Columbia Years, Volume 2 - Selected Best Tracks (1964-1966)

Note that, back in 2018, I posted an album at this blog of Aretha Franklin's tenure at her first record company, Columbia Records. It was simply called "The Columbia Years." Last month (August 2021), a new box set of her entire music career was released, simply called "Aretha." Listening to that, I found some good songs from her Columbia time period that I'd missed. Then I went back and listened to more of her stuff from that time period, and found more. 

The net result was that I found enough material to turn a single album about 45 minutes long into two albums that long. So, if you're interested in this music at all, note that this is called "Volume 2," and make sure you get "Volume 1" as well. The songs are in rough chronological order, and this covers the second half of that time. But, in my opinion, her musical sound was fairly consistent during her time at Columbia, so "Volume 1" is just as good as "Volume 2."

1964 was a particularly busy year for Franklin. She recorded four albums that year, though one of them was shelved until much later. So most of the songs here come from that year. I believe she last recorded for Columbia in 1965, though some of it wasn't released until 1966. As far as I can tell, she didn't record any albums in 1966. But in early 1967 she cut a new album for Atlantic Records ("I Never Loved a Man the Way I Love You") that would be a big hit and send her on the path to becoming a superstar.

As a whole, I like her music on Atlantic Records much better than what she did for Columbia. That said, I selected the songs that I considered the best, which usually are also the ones with a similar sound to her Atlantic style. I tended to avoid the syrupy ballads with lots of strings in favor of more soulful songs. Most of these could have fitted on her late 1960s albums without anyone blinking an eye. So if you like those you should like this stuff, though there are fewer uptempo songs.

This album is 46 minutes long. Please don't forget to check out Volume 1. Here's the link for that:

https://albumsthatshouldexist.blogspot.com/2018/08/aretha-franklin-columbia-years-various.html

01 Lee Cross (Aretha Franklin)
02 A Little Bit of Soul (Aretha Franklin)
03 Nobody Knows The Way I Feel This Morning (Aretha Franklin)
04 Evil Gal Blues (Aretha Franklin)
05 Soulville (Aretha Franklin)
06 I'll Keep On Smiling (Aretha Franklin)
07 Every Little Bit Hurts (Aretha Franklin)
08 The Shoop Shoop Song [It's in His Kiss] (Aretha Franklin)
09 Walk On By (Aretha Franklin)
10 One Room Paradise (Aretha Franklin)
11 Running Out of Fools (Aretha Franklin)
12 Muddy Water (Aretha Franklin)
13 One Step Ahead (Aretha Franklin)
14 [No, No] I'm Losing You (Aretha Franklin)
15 Can't You Just See Me (Aretha Franklin)
16 Take a Look (Aretha Franklin)
17 Cry like a Baby (Aretha Franklin)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/EHQG27D2

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/M0yFlXLIXUI87Hi/file

After splitting the original "Columbia Years" album I made in two, I decided to make new covers for both parts. I was only album to find one good color photo of Franklin from the right time period, but one was enough! :) This is a promo photo from 1964. In March 2025, I upgraded the cover image with the use of the Krea AI program.

Aretha Franklin - Swing In, WDR Studio-L, Cologne, Germany, 5-17-1968

It's frustrating how little well recorded live soul music there is from the 1960s and 1970s. Even for big names like Aretha Franklin, you're lucky if you get an official live album or two, usually short and flawed, and quality bootlegs are extremely rare. But this is one of those nice rare instances.

Franklin became a big star in 1967, and arguably had an even bigger year in 1968. A lot of Europeans discovered American soul music in the late 1960s. When soul stars toured Europe then, they usually were surprised by the size and passion of the fans there. Franklin was so big in 1968 that she was given her own entire episode of a German TV show called "Swing In."

This show has its plusses and minuses. A minus is that there was a very talkative MC who spoke in German a lot. I edited him out entirely, even carefully removing a bit where he talked over part of the end of the song "Respect." He also did a short interview with Franklin right in the middle of the show (with everything being painstakingly translated in German and English in real time). I cut that out too. The video of this concert has appeared on YouTube around 2018, so if you want to see it, including the missing German bits, you can watch it there.

One other minus is that Franklin pretty much never says a word between songs. I'm guessing this is because she surmised the German audience wouldn't understand her, as well as the fact that she only had an hour for the concert and couldn't afford to waste any time. 

One minus is also a plus in the sense that the German audience was unusually polite and subdued for a soul music audience at the time. They were even subdued compared to other European audiences, because one can see video on YouTube of a much more lively Aretha Franklin concert in Amsterdam in 1968. But this is a plus because one can clearly hear the music instead of lots of screaming and cheering. Also, it's a big plus that the recording exists at all, since this sort of soul bootleg from the time is so rare, as I mentioned above.

By the way, there's an official live Franklin album called "Aretha in Paris." Not only is it also from 1968, it was recorded only about a week before this concert. But I much prefer this recording to that one. The sound quality is similar, and the performance here is as good or better. Plus, especially with the extra songs I've included, this is longer.

I've added three songs at the start of the German concert, and three more after its end. These extra songs are arguably the most interesting of all, because she played some unusual songs, none of which were on the "Aretha in Paris" album. Highlights include a duet with Frankie Valli, of all people, and a strange medley with Sammy Davis. Jr. I put some at the start because those are chronologically earlier (including two songs from 1967), while the songs at the end are from later in 1968.

01 Do Right Woman, Do Right Man (Aretha Franklin)
02 That's Life (Aretha Franklin & Frankie Valli)
03 Groovin' (Aretha Franklin)
04 You Are My Sunshine (Aretha Franklin)
05 [I Can't Get No] Satisfaction (Aretha Franklin)
06 Night Life (Aretha Franklin)
07 [You Make Me Feel Like] A Natural Woman (Aretha Franklin)
08 Baby, I Love You (Aretha Franklin)
09 Dr. Feelgood [Love Is a Serious Business] (Aretha Franklin)
10 Since You've Been Gone [Sweet Sweet Baby] (Aretha Franklin)
11 Good to Me as I Am to You (Aretha Franklin)
12 I Never Loved a Man [The Way I Love You] (Aretha Franklin)
13 Chain of Fools (Aretha Franklin)
14 Soul Serenade (Aretha Franklin)
15 Respect (Aretha Franklin)
16 I Say a Little Prayer (Aretha Franklin)
17 Come Back Baby (Aretha Franklin)
18 What Is Soul - Think - Respect - What I'd Say (Aretha Franklin & Sammy Davis, Jr.)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/GCQY2z4S

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/u9EoWJxhvKXA1Gd/file

For the cover art photo, I could have used a screenshot from the actual show. But that was somewhat low resolution. Instead, I found a high quality photo from a rehearsal for the "Swing In" show that took place a couple of days earlier. I colorized the black and white photo to make it more interesting. (The video of the concert is in black and white as well.)

I did grab a screenshot of the "Swing In" logo from the video, and I included that as well. Note that most bootlegs that exist of this show claim it was from the German TV show "Rockpalast." But that show didn't start until 1974, and the logo clearly proves this was "Swing In" instead.

In March 2025, I upgraded the cover image with the use of the Krea AI program.

Aretha Franklin with Jimi Hendrix - Save Me (MASH-UP)

As far as I know, Aretha Franklin and Jimi Hendrix never played music together, either on stage or in the studio. But they kind of did, in a weird way, which is what the mash-up is all about.

In 1966, Hendrix was still known as "Jimmy James," and was a little-known lead guitarist backing up various soul music acts. He got occasional work as a session musician. For one such job, he was the guitarist for a 1966 song by Ray Sharpe with the King Curtis Orchestra, called "Help Me." The song was divided into two parts, and the part 2 B-side contained a Hendrix guitar solo.

The song was basically a soul version of "Gloria" by Them (with lead vocals by Van Morrison). It has the same driving three chord guitar pattern, and part 2 of "Help Me" even uses some of the same lyrics. The basic groove of "Help Me" sounded so good that the backing track was reused several times. For instance, King Curtis used it for an instrumental called "Instant Groove." King Curtis was also the original songwriter.

But the most important recycling of the backing track was by Aretha Franklin. She, along with her sister Carolyn, added her own lyrics and melody and completely transformed the song. It was included on her classic 1967 album "I Never Loved a Man the Way I Love You," and the song has become a classic in its own right. Unfortunately, while that version used the backing track that Hendrix played on, his solo was wiped from the final version.

What I've done here is take the Franklin song "Save Me" and then splice the Hendrix solo back in where a guitar solo would logically go. I tweaked the pitch and tempo slightly to get them to match. I think the mash-up works well, but I'll let you be the judge.

Hendrix's solo is about 30 seconds long. If you're expecting the amazing guitar pyrotechnics that he's famous for, you'll be disappointed. His solo is in a very different style than what he became famous for later. It's quite minimalist, and heavily influenced by guitar great Steve Cropper, in my opinion. But still, I think it's quite fascinating to hear his solo style from early 1966, before he changed his name to Jimi Hendrix and made radical changes to his life, dress, and personality.

I made this today because I'm working on posting some albums of Hendrix as a session musician. I'll probably include this on one of those albums, when I'm ready to post it. But I thought it was notable enough to merit its own blog post. I'm really surprised this mash-up hasn't been tried before (or at least I couldn't find one) because it's just combining different versions of the same original recording.

https://www.upload.ee/files/15239497/ArethaFJimiH_Save_MeSongEdit.zip.html

Aretha Franklin - Love Letters - Non-Album Tracks (1973-1974)

Here's the last in my series of albums gathering up Aretha Franklin's stray tracks from her golden era, 1967 to 1974. This covers 1973 to 1974.

Like the other albums in this series, I rely on the rarities compilation "Rare and Unreleased Recordings from the Golden Reign of the Queen of Soul." Four of the songs are from that.

Two others are from Franklin's acclaimed 1972 gospel album "Amazing Grace." A lot of people consider that one of the best albums of her career. But it's a very religious album, and I'm not a religious person. Furthermore, most of it doesn't appeal to me musically, with a lot of slow songs, including long call and response sections, talking and preaching sections, and so on.

However, there are two songs from that album I do like, that show how soul music evolved from gospel: "How I Got Over" and "Old Landmark." You may remember James Brown doing "Old Landmark" in a great church scene in the 1980 "Blues Brothers" movie. If you're like me and you only dabble in gospel music, you'll like these two songs. 

As for the remaining songs, "Just a Lucky So and So" is unreleased and was performed for a TV special celebrating jazz great Duke Ellington. "The Boy from Bombay" and "Til It's Over" come from the 2021 box set "Aretha." "Master of Eyes (The Deepness of Your Eyes)" was released as a single in 1973. "Feel a Little Love" and "Springtime in New York" are both unreleased studio takes, but have very good sound quality.

This album is 41 minutes long.

01 The Boy from Bombay (Aretha Franklin)
02 Just a Lucky So and So (Aretha Franklin)
03 At Last (Aretha Franklin)
04 Love Letters (Aretha Franklin)
05 Master of Eyes [The Deepness of Your Eyes] (Aretha Franklin)
06 Ain't but the One (Aretha Franklin & Ray Charles)
07 Are You Leaving Me (Aretha Franklin)
08 Til It's Over (Aretha Franklin)
09 Feel a Little Love (Aretha Franklin)
10 Springtime in New York (Aretha Franklin)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/ukMD71Ax

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/zHhIh98VJLxsHOn/file

I made the cover based on a concert photo from the Muhammad Ali Variety Special, on May 16, 1975. In March 2025, I upgraded the cover image with the use of the Krea AI program.

Aretha Franklin - Spanish Harlem - Non-Album Tracks (1971)

Here's the next of my stray tracks albums from Aretha Franklin's golden age, 1967 to 1974.

Normally, Franklin was pretty consistent in including her hit singles on her albums. But for whatever the reason, that wasn't the case in 1971.  In that year, she put out three songs as singles that didn't go onto her latest studio album of new material: "You're All I Need to Get By," "Bridge Over Troubled Water," and "Spanish Harlem." Instead, they would go onto a greatest hits album released later that year.

Naturally, the three hit songs I've mentioned plus a B-side make up four tracks here. To fill out the rest of the album, I used four live songs that never appeared on any of her studio albums, and removed the audience noise. The live album is "Don't Fight the Feeling: The Complete Aretha Franklin & King Curtis Live at Fillmore West." Note this is NOT the same as her popular 1971 album "Aretha Live at Fillmore West," but a recent four CD version of all the soundboard recordings that were used to make that 1971 live album. I was careful to only use versions that weren't on the 1971 album.

Some of the live songs were of recent hit songs like "Love the One You're With" by Stephen Stills and "Make It With You" by Bread that got the Aretha soul treatment. In my opinion, these easily could have been hit songs too. So this is an unusually strong collection, with about half of the songs either hits or should-have-been hits.

01 You're All I Need to Get By (Aretha Franklin)
02 I Need a Strong Man [The To-To Song] (Aretha Franklin)
03 Spanish Harlem (Aretha Franklin)
04 Lean On Me (Aretha Franklin)
05 Heavenly Father (Aretha Franklin)
06 Bridge Over Troubled Water (Aretha Franklin)
07 Love the One You're With (Aretha Franklin)
08 Make It with You (Aretha Franklin)
09 Mixed-Up Girl (Aretha Franklin)
10 Reach Out and Touch [Somebody's Hand] (Aretha Franklin)

https://pixeldrain.com/u/U1dqfcfA

alternate:

https://bestfile.io/en/JTsPld92OaXrO9l/file

I made the cover art based on a 1972 concert photo.In March 2025, I upgraded the cover image with the use of the Krea AI program.