Track Listing

1. Anything To Say You're Mine
2. My Dearest Darling
3. Trust In Me
4. A Sunday Kind Of Love
5. Tough Mary
6. I Just Want To Make Love To You
7. At Last
8. All I Could Do Is Cry
9. Stormy Weather
10. Girl Of My Dreams (Rendered As 'Boy Of My Dreams)
11. My Heart Cries
12. Spoonful
13. It's A Crying Shame
14. If I Can't Have You

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #1031 in Music
• Released on: 1999-07-27
• Number of discs: 1
• Formats: Extra tracks, Original recording remastered

Amazon.com essential recording
This is Etta James's first full-length album, recorded for Chess Records' Argo subsidiary in 1960. It taps all aspects of her then-blossoming talent. There's the crooning rock ballad "My Dearest Darling" and the elegantly symphonic "Sunday Kind of Love." Her classic, brokenhearted "All I Could Do Was Cry" follows the sweet title track and the bawdy blues stomper "I Just Want to Make Love to You." And there's a version of Harold Arlen's "Stormy Weather," which Lena Horne made famous. James's fine way with such a wide embrace of material wouldn't again be this well displayed on a single album until she was united with producer Jerry Wexler for 1977's Deep in the Night. --Ted Drozdowski

Amazon.com
The R&B queen's classic collection is augmented this time around by a long-overdue digital remastering, plus a few bonus tracks, presumably for those who found the original album a little on the brief side. In addition to James's well-known hits, including "I Just Want to Make Love to You" and "Stormy Weather," there are four additional songs: "My Heart Cries," "Spoonful," "It's a Crying Shame," and "If I Can't Have You." Although one might cynically suggest that these were added to give Etta fans something to purchase besides The Essential Etta James, it's definitely true that these tracks are worth hearing. --Genevieve Williams

Customer Reviews

Gotta Get Etta, at last!
So glad I got this album! It's all here! Won't point out my fav cuts; if you're a blues/Etta lover you'll figure yours out - they're all there. If you're not(yet), this will be your epiphany - this stylist and the selections are astounding. [Note "Sunday Kind Of Love" and "Stormy Weather".]

Etta James at last!
The music quality had been fixed up,(do'nt know the word) to sound really great! I listened to the music when I was a teen, forty-five years ago. It sounded better now, even though I truly thought it was the best & loved the songs then!

Etta James, National Treasure
This is one of the most pleasurable CDs on the market. This collection of Etta's songs showcases her considerable talent as a blues singer. Though the instrumentation is dated on some of the songs (the strings soar a little too high), her voice saves the day, alternately powerful and vulnerable.

Her version of "I Just Want to Make Love to You" rocks harder than the Rolling Stones version, and that is no small feat. 'At Last' is a great song, and her vocal interpretation is the best out of many artists who attempted it. 'Sunday Kind of Love' is another masterpiece, as is her rendition of 'Stormy Weather'. Not a bad song on the record.
Etta James is a national treasure. Thanks for the beautiful, heart-felt music.

As an aside, does anyone else see a resemblance between Etta's singing and Janis Joplin?