Review: Jackie Wilson - He's So Fine (1958)
Tracks: 1) Etcetera; 2) To Be Loved; 3) Come Back To Me; 4) If I Can’t Have You; 5) As Long As I Live; 6) Reet Petite; 7) It’s Too Bad We Had To Say Goodbye; 8) Why Can’t You Be Mine?; 9) I’m Wanderin’; 10) Right Now; 11) Danny Boy; 12) It’s So Fine.
REVIEW
A few unfortunate circumstances have conspired to make Jackie Wilson a much lesser presence in the mainstream R&B pantheon than he truly deserves. One is his relatively «solitary» status: despite being born in Michigan and having lived most of his life in Detroit — in fact, ironically, it was the success of his first single, written by Berry Gordy, that helped fund Berry’s label in 1959 — Jackie was never signed to Motown, recording exclusively for Brunswick Records during his peak years, and thus eluded the enduring popularity of Motown’s top names, persisting through the years and decades together with the general legend of Motown. He may have had Top 10 singles all the way up to 1967, but hits fade out of memory quite easily if they are not supported by well-kindled artistic mythology, and nobody was there to help kindle and re-kindle it for Jackie the way Motown and Atlantic steadily supported their own superheroes throughout the 20th century.
Another reason is that, for all his talent and stage presence, Jackie Wilson never had a lot of «social relevance». He was an entertainer, a singer and dancer, who’d spent all his life singing love songs and nothing but love songs — no ‘Change Is Gonna Come’ or ‘Papa Was A Rollin’ Stone’ behind his belt. He was as «R&B-deluxe» as B. B. King was «blues de-luxe»: formally admired and revered, but rarely taken seriously, and rarely scrutinized and explored by those generations who were born too late to catch his latest catchy single on the radiowaves. Michael Jackson may have paid tribute to him upon his death in 1984, calling him a pioneer and a great entertainer, but he never repeated his predecessor’s mistake: had he not dared to get out of his own relative comfort zone with Thriller, his own legend might have faded away just as easily as Jackie Wilson’s did.
In 1957, however, African-American performers were not expected to radiate a lot of «social relevance»: they were expected to entertain black and (select) white audiences alike, and this is exactly what Jackie did, first with a three-year stint as lead singer with Billy Ward and the Dominoes (in which he had replaced Clyde McPhatter himself), and then, having gained enough confidence, with his solo career. Signed to the Brunswick sub-label of Decca, he remained based in Detroit, where he had formed an auspicious partnership with Berry Gordy Jr. — primary songwriter for his first batch of singles, most of which have been included on this LP from March ’58.
The very first of these put Wilson on the map firmer and steadier than anything he’d done with the Dominoes: ‘Reet Petite’ is a two-and-a-half minute explosion of light-headed R&B exuberance, a song that all but guarantees to get you up on your feet and blow your mind at the same time. The musical sound is fast, tight, and sharp — unfortunately, I have not been able to locate any actual credits, but the rhythm and brass sections kick as much ass as any given Atlantic team at the time, and that’s really saying something. But the chief attraction is, of course, Wilson’s vocal performance, which is every bit the equivalent of a young Jimi Hendrix displaying each and every one of his guitar gimmicks to a stunned audience during some early live performance of ‘Killing Floor’. In trying to convey the full spectrum of his feelings for the lucky lady, Jackie scats, stutters, croons, roars, yells, howls, and goes through several octaves — not to mention rolling his R’s on the "rrrreet petite, the finest girl you ever wanna meet" chorus in a way Louis Jordan (whose ‘Reet Petite And Gone’ obviously served as the inspiration behind the lyrics) could never think of.
If the boppy sound of the song happens to remind you of Elvis, specifically in his ‘Don’t Be Cruel’-style avatar, you are on the right track: Elvis was a big fan of Jackie from as early as his days with the Dominoes, while Jackie, in turn, frequently proclaimed his admiration for the King, humbly insisting that he took as much from Elvis as Elvis took from him. There can be no doubt, of course, that Presley’s own stuttering, hiccupy style that he adopted so naturally on his fast pop-rock numbers, came from African-American R&B, and you will be hard pressed to find a black performer whose style matches Elvis’ more closely than Jackie Wilson. He does generally sound a bit softer and sweeter (which does not necessarily make him a softer and sweeter person — heck, he might have had a career in boxing instead of singing had his mother not pulled him out of it at an early age!), but softness and sweetness come to him more naturally than they do to Elvis.
For contrast, ‘Reet Petite’ was quickly followed by ‘To Be Loved’, an epic romantic waltz with sugary strings and a wide-ranging, powerhouse delivery that blew every other pop performer at the time out of the water — this is some Celine Dion-level shit we’re talking here, and in the context of the year 1958 that is actually a compliment (though, frankly, the song itself is nothing special — it is only Jackie’s vocal circles in the air that give it personality). The B-side, ‘Come Back To Me’, returns us to the world of fast-paced R&B, and should be particularly notable for the opening "HE-A-E-A-Y " bit which the Isley Brothers later reworked into ‘Shout!’ (a song that would be inspired by several of Jackie numbers, including this one as well as ‘Lonely Teardrops’). Strange enough, for the third single Brunswick picked power ballads for both the A-side and the B-side: ‘As Long As I Live’ and ‘I’m Wanderin’ both followed the formula of ‘To Be Loved’, and while Jackie does a great job on both, the public clearly was not as enamored with him in the role of torch balladeer as it was with his capacity to get them up on their feet and throw cartwheels left and right.
Maybe this is why, when it came to recording a complete LP, the only other ballad on it was ‘Danny Boy’, a song that had been in Jackie’s repertoire since the dawn of time and which he had first recorded at the age of 19 (as «Sonny Wilson»). Technically, this is a true tour-de-force here, as the man tries out every register, every possible inflection to make the song into a little universe of peaks and valleys (listen to him slide downwards upon the first "..do-o-o-own the mountainside..." bit — crooner theater!); the only problem is that there are approximately seven million versions of ‘Danny Boy’ in the universe, and even if this one happens to be the very best — and why not? — it may still be ruined by over-familiarity with the song, and in any case, my attention would rather drift to compositions written specially for Jackie.
And there’s quite a few attention-grabbing moments here indeed, starting with the opening track, ‘Etcetera’, which, all by itself, is a little creative wonder — starting off deceptively with percussion only as a 3/4 waltz, then changing pace after just a couple of beats with some wild laughter from Jackie, who goes on a short spoken rant before subtly and seamlessly breaking into singing... not to mention transforming "et cetera, et cetera" into an unforgettable vocal hook for an exuberant love song. Great vocal, cool twangy lead guitar, weird wobbly vocal harmonies — how come this thing was never a hit single eludes me completely. Furthermore, there are two or three almost as strong candidates down the line: ‘If I Can’t Have You’, ‘Why Can’t You Be Mine’, ‘Right Now’ — all of these are jolly, well-produced, marvelously sung (and quite unpretentious) little pop-rockers that sound better and better with each new listen.
The record ends on one of its strongest notes as well: ‘It’s So Fine’ is a unique blend of mambo and R&B, shifting not only tempos and time signatures between each verse and chorus, but singer moods as well, when Jackie slides from sly and stuttering mumble in the verse to all-out bellowing in the chorus. It’s a special kind of effortless musical transformation that you won’t frequently encounter on any Elvis album — but with He’s So Fine, these quirky surprises seem to be the norm of the day: you really don’t have any idea where exactly this thing is going to go next.
Ultimately, the album is more «pop» («soul pop», if you wish) than «R&B», what with the overall prevalence of catchy pop hooks over jump-blues grooves, but the distinction is pretty vague anyway — with the variety of tackled styles and moods, I’d say the record is more or less equidistant from the already well-established Atlantic sound, the soon-to-be-invented Motown sound, and old-fashioned doo-wop and crooner entertainment. Old-fashioned is an important word here, though, because despite all the creativity in individual details, Jackie’s goals and beliefs do not seem to have drifted far away from those of his mentor’s (Clyde McPhatter) — he is here to simply provide you with a good time, not awaken your inner demons or incite you to save the world or anything. But in 1958, not a lot of people around could boast the same set of pipes and the same level of energy to provide their audiences with a good time.
Only Solitaire: Jackie Wilson reviews