Sings The Blues

Description

Nina Simone Sings The Blues marked her first album for RCA and a decisive pivot by the North Carolinian into rawer, honky-tonkier material. Backed by a tight studio backing – guitarist Eric Gale and drummer Bernard ‘Pretty’ Purdie – Simone cakes her voice in the gravel of groove, from the sintering ‘Do I Move You?’ to a haunted reading of ‘I Want A Little Sugar In My Bowl’ and the biting ‘Backlash Blues’, written with poet Langston Hughes. In 1967, fresh from the civil rights era’s upheavals, Simone wrought a pointed, adult statement here.