Ruth Brown – Miss Rhythm (Greatest Hits and More)

Track listing DISC 1: 1. So Long 2. Hey Pretty Baby – (previously unreleased) 3. I’ll Get Along Somehow – (part 1) 4. I’ll Come Back Someday 5. Sentimental Journey 6. R.B. Blues 7. Teardrops From My Eyes 8. Standing on the Corner 9. I’ll Wait For You 10. I Know 11. Don’t Cry – (previously unreleased) 12. Shrine of St. Cecilia, The – (previously unreleased) 13. It’s All For You – (previously unreleased) 14. Shine On 15. Be Anything 16. 5-10-15 Hours 17. Have a Good Time 18. Daddy Daddy 19. Mama He Treats Your Daughter Mean 20. Wild Wild Young Men DISC 2: 1. Ever Since My Baby’s Been Gone 2. Love Contest 3. Oh What a Dream 4. Old Man River 5. Somebody Touched Me 6. Mambo Baby 7. I Can See Everybody’s Baby 8. As Long as I’m Moving 9. It’s Love Baby 10. I Gotta Have You 11. Love Has Joined Us Together 12. I Wanna Do More 13. Lucky Lips 14. One More Time 15. This Little Girl’s Gone Rockin’ 16. Why Me 17. I Can’t Hear a Word You Say 18. I Don’t Know 19. Takin’ Care of Business 20. Don’t Deceive MeBy the time she left Atlantic Records in 1963, Ruth Brown could look back on 24 R&B hits dating back to her first, “So Long,” in 1949. Raised in the church, her chops honed in Lucky Millinder’s Big Band, she could deliver technique and attitude to burn, breaking hearts with smoky ballads and raising the roof with brash jump-blues numbers. Over the years her reedy, delicate voice evolved into a deep, full-bodied instrument, more expressive in its varied colors than it was early on, and she used it to devastating effect, especially on her double-entendre workouts (“Wild Wild Young Men”). The 40 tracks on this 2 CD set chart all the early, towering entries, as well as some interesting non-hits (among these a scintillating foray into gospel-based pop, “I Can See Everybody’s Baby”) and three previously unreleased cuts. In recent years Brown has delivered exemplary work on the Fantasy and Bullseye Blues labels, but Miss Rhythm is the rock the legend is built on. –David McGee