Rise

Format

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  FP148722 x CD  £7.00

Label

Fat Possum/Hi

Al Green

Greatest Hits: The Best Of Al Green

Al Green Greatest Hits, here as a double disc, 42 track compendium features the classics Lets Stay Together, How Can You Mend A Broken Heart, Tired Of Being Alone and Love & Happiness amongst many other gems from his catalogue.

For years, Willie Mitchell told anyone who would listen that the one thing Hi Records needed was a young, charismatic male singer with the potential for stardom. In 1969, fate would intervene in the form of a destitute 22-year-old named Albert Greene.

Green - as he would later change the spelling - relocated to Michigan as a child and began singing gospel with his brothers and launched his career with an album for the tiny Hot Line Label in 1967, called Back Up Train. His first single had been a small breakout, but Green had fallen on hard times since then. Stranded in Texas, he asked if he could sit in and earn a few dollars performing with Mitchell that night. "He started singing and I heard that voice and I said, "'Ah-ha! Look what I found here."

It would take a little more than the 18 months for Green to evolve into stardom. The first two albums they recorded were minor masterpieces in their own way, offering inventive R&B interpretations of songs by the Beatles and Doors, among others. The latter LP produced a top 10 hit in the Green-penned "Tired of Being Alone" and a gritty reworking of the Temptations' "Can't Get Next To You."

Released at the end of 1971, "Let's Stay Together" shot up the charts, becoming a No. 1 hit and the biggest pop song of the following year. The accompanying album would also land atop the R&B charts. The next five years would yield arguably the greatest run in the annals of R&B. With Mitchell producing and helping co-write many of Green's hits ("Call Me [Come Back Home]", and "I'm Still In Love With You"), and guitarist Teenie Hodges collaborating on several others ("Love and Happiness," "Here I Am (Come and Take Me]"), Hi would not only come to dominate, but also redefine, soul music in the early '70s.

Tracklist

• Disc 1:
  1. Let's Stay Together
  2. Sha La La (Make Me Happy)
  3. L-O-V-E (Love)
  4. Tired Of Being Alone
  5. Are You Lonely For Me Baby?
  6. I Can't Get Next To You
  7. Here I Am (Come And Take Me)
  8. The Letter
  9. Funny How Time Slips Away
  10. I'm Still In Love With You
  11. You Ought To Be With Me
  12. Livin' For You
  13. Let's Get Married
  14. Full Of Fire
  15. Take Me To The River
  16. Let Is Shine
  17. Have A Good Time
  18. So You're Leaving
  19. You Say It
  20. Oh Me, Oh My (Dreams In My Arms)
  21. Belle

  Disc 2:
  1. Love And Happiness
  2. Call Me (Come Back Home)
  3. Keep Me Cryin'
  4. What Am I Gonna Do With Myself
  5. Driving Wheel
  6. Light My Fire
  7. I'm A Ram
  8. It Ain't No Fun To Me
  9. I've Never Found A Girl (Who Loves Me Like You Do)
  10. How Can You Mend A Broken Heart?
  11. I'm Hooked On You
  12. I Gotta Be More (Take Me Higher)
  13. Love Ritual
  14. What A Wonderful Thing Love Is
  15. For The Good Times
  16. Could I Be The One?
  17. I Tried To Tell Myself
  18. I'm So Lonesome I Could Cry
  19. One of These Good Old Days
  20. Starting All Over Again
  21. Simply Beautiful