The Best of Chess Records

Performer: Various Artists
Producer: Leonard Chess; Phil Chess; Willie Dixon; Andy McKaie (Compilation)
Distributor: Universal Distribution

Notes: Audio Remasterer: Erick Labson. Liner Note Author: Bill Dahl. If you loved the songs you heard in the film CADILLAC RECORDS, based on the seminal Chicago blues label Chess, just wait until you hear the original versions, performed by the artists who put Chess on the map. The bedrock of Chicago blues is here with Muddy Waters's "I Can't Be Satisfied" and Little Walter's "Juke," but early rock & roll is represented too, by Chuck Berry's "Nadine" and "Promised Land." Come to think of it, this is a top-shelf Chess sampler even if you've never seen the aforementioned film. This compilation issued by Universal is a well-designed -- and deserving -- cash-in of the film and soundtrack to Cadillac Records, a Hollywood adaptation of the Chess Records label and story, its artists, and founder Leonard Chess. It contains 16 cuts, all of which are the original versions of songs re-recorded for the film by contemporary artists. If only this could have been the bonus disc to the soundtrack instead of what was issued on the deluxe edition of it -- which was, basically, more of the same (yawn). Here, Etta James' "At Last" proves its superiority to the Beyonc� Knowles version; and Chuck Berry's "Maybellene" and "Nadine" get the full, propulsive rhythmic guitar and controlled feedback attack atop some heated dramatic vocals. Little Walter's original of "Last Night" is here (a re-recorded version appears in the film), and he is one of two Chess artist who made the soundtrack's final cuts (Buddy Guy made the two-disc deluxe version). Muddy Waters' original versions of "(I'm Your) Hoochie Koochie Man," with its slightly menacing sexual bravado, as well as Howlin' Wolf's "Smokestack Lightnin," and Bo Diddley's "I'm a Man" are all here, offering a stark and profound contrast to the all but sterile music that appeared in the film. It's actually easy to see why this set didn't become the actual second disc in the deluxe edition. These versions are so superior to what was re-recorded -- with the exception of Jeffrey Wright's takes on Waters -- and placed in the film, it would have made the soundtrack sound utterly limp and anemic. For those who crave to know more of the story, this is the real score to a movie which could never really be made. This is joyous, emotionally charged, and even dangerously subversive music, making the Best of Chess Records an essential purchase. ~ Thom Jurek

Rolling Stone (p.66) - 5 stars out of 5 -- "[With] the still-shocking power of Waters' and James' singing, and the poetry of Berry's road songs..."

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