This is a particularly good song, and the lyric looks especially interesting seeing it now on written down. It seems to make some sense when it's sung, but a lot of this social protest looks damned peculiar on the page. Check out verse two, for example:
Slaughterhouse is killin' hogsTwisted children killin' frogs
Poor dumb rednecks rollin' logs
Tired old ladies kissin' dogs
I hate the human love of that stinkin' mutt — I can't use it
Try to make it real compared to what.
At the risk of appearing ignorant, I'd never heard of Leela James before, who is singing the duet, but she gives probably the best guest vocal on the record. She's about the least known name here, but stands there flatfooted and belts this thing out properly. This one is definitely going into iPod rotation for the hiking mix.
The other standout is the Stevie Wonder classic "Blame It On the Sun," recorded with George Michael. This is the best composition on the album, and it seemed to inspire rather more emotional investment from Ray than the other tracks. Also, George Michael is a real singer. His pen has gone dry in recent years, but he was able to sound credible sharing a record with Ray Charles.
Another pick that's pretty good is somewhat the oddball track stylistically and technically. It's a duet of "Busted" with Willie Nelson, actually recorded together, live on stage in 1991.
As to the post-mortem duets issue, it's not really a cutting issue in practice. The performances go together fine on the record. If I hadn't read about the controversy, I wouldn't have known that Ray was not sharing a mic with these performers.
My problem with these duets is that most of the duet partners just are not very memorable, even the ones with big names. "You Are My Sunshine" was pretty rote, and I couldn't have told Chris Isaak here from some American Idol.
This brings us to an interesting failure, which gets some significant credit for being an interesting attempt. Ray performs "Imagine" as a gospel song, with Ruben Studdard and the Harlem Gospel Singers. Why in hell was Ray even fooling with some idiot from American Idol, anyway?
Article comments
1 - Rehan
Well, I would like to comment on one of the above lines w.r.t George Michael. His pen hasn't dried yet. Actually, people are simply not aware of his new music. His album Patience was his best solo album. This is far most the best songwriting material.
2 - cj
I have to disagree with you on the song "Imagine". I love it and think it is the best on the whole cd. I tend to listen to it over and over, instead of the other songs. Ray Charles and Ruben Studdard do an excellent job. Most of the songs on the cd are good, but "Imagine" is the best.
3 - Mark Thomas
My favorite by far is "IT ALL GOES BY SO FAST" with Mary J. Blige, which is worth the cost of the album.
I also loved Compared to Waht and Busted and a lot of the other tracks.
This is a MUCH better album than Genius and Company, where Ray was not in good voice at all. If you ask me, tha album sounded much more contrived.