This amazing compilation assembles all of
Lloyd Price's hit recordings made in New Orleans and Los Angeles in 1952 and 1953.
Price grew up in New Orleans and got his first break in 1952 at the age of 20 when trumpeter
Dave Bartholomew lined him up with the Specialty record company.
Price's very first recording was the
Louis Jordan-inspired "Barnyard Rock," but what put him across very quickly was "Lawdy Miss Clawdy," a handsome bit of R&B that hit the Billboard R&B chart at once and stayed there for six months. Backed by seven mighty masters of New Orleans dance music including
Bartholomew and pianist
Fats Domino,
Price belted out half a dozen tasty tunes including the catchy "Chee Koo Baby," a New Orleans rhumba closely resembling the music of
Dave Bartholomew's rival,
Professor Longhair. The background vocals by the band during "Oo-Ee Baby" make
Price's act sound a little like
Hank Ballard & the Midnighters. His rocking & rolling "Mailman Boogie" almost certainly helped to ignite a trend in popular music that is still commonly associated with
Bill Haley and
Elvis Presley. Each
Lloyd Price recording is an exercise in soulful finesse, be it slow dance, R&B, rocking boogie, or a little more of that perpetually rolling Crescent City rhumba. He generally liked to work with a gutsy sax soloist backed by another load of saxes and a good solid rhythm section.
Price reached a new level of expressivity when he sang "If crying was murder, baby, you'd have been dead long ago." Some of these grooves are difficult to sit still to. "Walkin' the Track" has a twist component that won't let go. "Lloyd's Lament (Old Echo Song)" introduces a more unusual formula as
Price sings the wordless melody off mike like a background singer and speaks over the band during the bridge like one of
the Ink Spots. The pianist on the session of April 16, 1953, is believed to have been
Huey Smith, and it sure does sound like him, especially given the smoking hot "Where You At," the beautiful resonance of
Smith's "Too Late for Tears" and "Lord, Lord, Amen!," and
Price's own "Carry Me Home."