Ry Cooder (1970) (Vinyl record album review)

Album name: Ry Cooder

Artist name: Ry Cooder

Year: 1970

Number of discs: one

Label: Reprise Records

Collection: Friedman

Buy it on Amazon: $125.77

My review

Level of familiarity before listening

I don’t have any familiarity with Ry Cooder at all, as far as I know.

What I expected

Country rock.

What it was actually like

This was mostly blues, and all the songs except one were covers, but all of them were primarily about Cooder’s guitar skills.

A few low points were Available Space, the only original song, and Dark Is the Night, which were both quick instrumental jams rather than fully thought out songs.

I also was not very impressed by One Meat Ball, which I had to interpret as a novelty song due to its slightly goofily and atonally Oompa Loompa sound, and lyrics about someone who… could only afford one meatball in a restaurant[1].

Cooder’s version of Lead Belly’s song Pigmeat was also not great. I strongly disliked the horns that gave it a very unnecessarily cacophonous and Oompa Loompa sound[2].

A high point, on the other hand, was Do Re Mi, a rock reinterpration of the Woodie Guthrie song that was totally the same song but also totally different (and here is a hilarious Oompa Loompa version). I also loved How Can a Poor Man Stand Such Times and Live?, another rock version of a folk classic with electric guitar solo.

Police Dog Blues was acoustic, with much more adventurous guitar than one would normally hear in a blues song like that, and Goin’ to Brownsville was similar (though I suspect that it might not have been about the Brownsville near me).

Grade

4/5: would listen again

References[+]

References

↑1 | For what it’s worth, Costco sells meatballs in tomato sauce in the refrigerated section, and they’re really good.
↑2 | And if you’re only going to cover one Lead Belly song, why not choose Pick a Bale of Cotton?