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(More customer reviews)There are those that insist that "Mad Dogs & Englishmen," the 1970 record of the Joe Cocker tour, is the high point in the music career of the gravely voiced soul singer. I can see the reasons for the argument, but even with his once powerful voice worn away by alcohol abuse there is something to be said for his sense of phrasing in the later years. He still came up with a great howl on "When the Night Comes" and if I am only allowed to listen to one Joe Cocker track for the rest of eternity I am going to take the monster 9:27 long live version of "With a Little Help From My Friends" that is on "The Best of Joe Cocker." That being said, if you are talking about an entire album, then "Mad Dogs & Englishmen" is the one to go with, because Cocker live was always better than Cocker in the studio, not that this pronouncement is exactly news to anyone.
It helps to set the scene for the 1970 tour. Two years earlier Cocker had hit the top of the charts in the U.K. with his cover of the Beatles' "A Little Help From My Friends," and when he sang the song at Woodstock he made a name for himself in the colonies. Leon Russell became Cocker's musical director and provided a second hit in England with "Delta Lady." Two albums came out in 1969, "With a Little Help From My Friends" and "Joe Cocker!", both of which went gold. What makes this live album so amazing is that Cocker only sings one song form his first album (and it is not even the title cut but "Feelin' Alright") and only three cuts from the second: "Bird on a Wire," "Delta Lady" and another in a series of classic Beatles coves, "She Came in Through the Bathroom Window." So out of 16 songs on the album, a dozen of them are "new" material for Cocker.
Of course such things are a lot easier when you are a cover artist rather than a singer-songwriter. This frees Cocker to come up with songs by the Rolling Stones ("Honky Tonk Woman") and Bob Dylan ("Girl From the North Country"). But whatever the songs a lot of the credit for Cocker's career and this album have to go to Leon Russell and Chris Stainton for coming up with the greatest live arrangements on the Sixties (Give me George Martin in the studio and Leon Russell). The concert was recorded at New York's Filmore East in the spring of 1970 (as a film as well as an album). There were almost two dozen musicians involved, giving a whole new meaning to Noel Coward's famous song title, and the result is the definitive mixture of rock 'n' roll soul with a big brassy sound and Russell's awesome piano playing behind Cocker's powerful vocals.
Part of the impressive result was a couple of Cocker standards in "Cry Me a River" and "The Letter." It was the cover of the later, originally by the Box Tops, that broke Cocker into the U.S. Top 10 for the first time. Other standout tracks include the slower "Superstar" and "I've Been Loving You Too Long, " along with "Give Peace a Chance." Of course, "Mad Dogs & Englishmen" went gold as well as if there are those who want to argue that Joe Cocker's first three albums were his best, it is hard to argue with them. My preference for this one as the best of the lot is based almost on much as it being a double-album as it being live, but the live part is still the key consideration.
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