The houseguests in his music-filled childhood home, Freddy Cole has said, included "Ellington, Basie and Hamp." That would be the Duke, the Count and Lionel Hampton, three of the greatest names in jazz. Cole, now 66, had other music influences as a boy too: Not only was his mother a pianist and choir director but three older brothers—including the legendary Nat "King" Cole—were established musicians by the time Freddy launched his own performing and recording career in the 1950s. Over the years, he has released more than a dozen albums, mostly on small regional labels, and earned a devout following with his gorgeous autumnal baritone, expressive phrasing and pitch-perfect feel for jazz standards, pop tunes and love ballads. Cole's gifts are displayed marvelously on this CD for a national label. With fine, moody accompaniment from pianist Cedar Walton, saxophonist Grover Washington Jr., guitarist Hiram Bullock and others, he may now, finally, get his own deserved share of stardom.
Bottom Line: Graceful jazz vocals from a late star's younger brother
Mary Cutrufello (Mercury)
Album of the week
Listen to her yowl and growl to that big boss beat, and it will come as a shock to learn that transplanted Texan Mary Cutrufello is actually a Connecticut Yankee—and a Yale grad, no less. With her power-chord guitar style and the unabashed Springsteen-like swagger with which she delivers her driving rockers, she sounds like someone who has spent more time in the half-light of smoky Texas road-houses than in the stacks of an Ivy League library. Assembling a group of rock veterans for her album debut—including drummer Kenny Aronoff and bassist Bob Glaub—Cutrufello, 27, captures the exuberant feel of an expert bar band at the zenith of a hot midnight set. Even when she occasionally slows the paint-blistering pace, it's clear that she wrote these songs to play live. Among the album's highlights: an all-out, "Born to Run "-style rocker, "Tonight's the Night" ("Well I'm almost 22 and I'm old enough to know/About the fire in my heart and the fever in my soul/And a voice that keeps sayin' don't you waste another year").
Bottom Line: An Ivy Leaguer gone wrong gives a lesson in powerhouse rock
Dolly Parton (Blue Eye/Decca)
She'll never again be that cherubic 19-year-old with the angelic voice. So now she's a maternally angelic 52-year-old with a still heavenly voice. Dolly Parton has, however, changed labels again, and the title of this album implies that she is attempting to recapture the verve, innocence and healthy ambition of the years before she became a big star and bad-joke target. The music implies that goal too—"Bring back the passion we had back then," pleads the title song—and it succeeds, with an energetic mix that evokes the memory of Parton's best tunes and includes the memorably sweet "Blue Valley Songbird" and "Honky Tonk Songs," which asks, "Why don't more women sing honky tonk songs?" Maybe because none do them better than Dolly herself.
Bottom Line: Down-home feast for country gourmets
Lauryn Hill (Ruffhouse/Columbia)
As one-third of the Grammy-winning hip-hop act the Fugees, Lauryn Hill became a star. On this, her powerful solo debut, the 23-year-old singer-songwriter-producer becomes an artist. Thoughtful and passionate, The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill is an exhilarating mix of warmly expressive singing, hip-hop and reggae-flavored rhythms and Hill's often nononsense lyrics ("Don't be a hard rock when you're really a gem/Baby-girl, respect is just a minimum"). Sometimes celebratory (as in the slightly overwrought ode to her son, "To Zion") and sometimes cautionary (the heartbreaking look at love gone bad, "Ex-Factor"), Hill can seem wise one moment and playfully girlish the next. With help from guitarist Carlos Santana and fellow vocalists Mary J. Blige and D'Angelo (who duets on the sexy "Nothing Even Matters"), Hill sings about nontraditional hip-hop subjects such as God, family, the cost of success and the need to love and be loved. In the process she raises the bar for intelligent, introspective pop.
Bottom Line: Hip hop sung with heart
- Contributors:
- Steve Dougherty,
- Ralph Novak,
- Amy Linden.
Saved by the Bell Reunion
The hookups, the meltdowns, the memoires
The case reveals what was really going on what they think of each other now!
