TORME HAS A POSSE

I gotta be honest. I always thought of Ronnie Milsap as one of those crossover country artists of the seventies that came close to ruining the genre for me, not that I was a big fan back then anyway. Crossover country did what smooth jazz did. It made me not want to venture further than what I'd heard by happenstance. The whole broad encompassing genres, country and western and jazz, would have to wait. And they did. For years. I just hate crossovers.

Today I was flabbergasted to run across a Wilson Picket type song by Milsap, "Wish You Were Here" that was damn good. I didn't even believe it was the same Milsap until I hunted down another reference, but still, I couldn't find the exact year. Judging by the facts that he started recording under his own name in 1966, and the record was produced by Huey P. Meaux, I figure the vintage is somewhere  there in the mid-late sixties. I dig it. And here again is another Mel Torme type moment. Dismissing an artist's entire oeuvre because of a vague impression from decades earlier. That forehead of mine is getting a dent in it.

~ NOTE: ALL MEDIA IS HOSTED BY THE BLOGS & SITES NAMED BELOW ~

Listen:
Ronnie Milsap - Wish You Were Here mp3 at Boogaloo Time
Four more South Texas soul obscuros at Boogaloo Time