Grady Martin

In Session - Hillbilly, Rockabilly, and Beyond

(Jasmine Records)

Like fretboard doyen Jimmy Bryant before him, Red Foley sideman Grady enjoyed abundant employ as a session picker. The Nashville sensation's superlative proficiency helped marquee notables excel. Jasmine has issued 32 representative cuts, including "hits...flips, flops, album tracks, and a sprinkling of collectors' rarities" (per the label's characterization). Grady's pearl-shaped tone and august eminence were immediately recognizable and endure as impossibly high standards toward which many surely reach. A few tracks here do feature negligible guitar flourishes. Those serve as paranthetical adornment, and even so are distinctive. When Grady was allowed sufficient space, he tore off exclamations at whose flabbergasting triumphs listeners then and now can only grin appreciatively.

Recommended: "Rock Little Baby" (Cecil Gant), "Turn the Cards Slowly" (Patsy Cline), "Beautiful Baby" (Bobby Lord), "Be Bop Baby" (Autry Inman), "Tennessee Rock'n'Roll" (Bobby Helms), "Hot Rock" (Johnny Carroll), "When My Dreamboat Comes Home" (Grady Martin and the Slew Foot Five), "Diggin' the Boogie" (Roy Hall), "Let's Elope Baby" (Janis Martin), "Lonesome Train" (Johnny Burnette Trio), "Midnight Shift" (Buddy Holly), "Doodlebug Rag" (Brenda Lee), "Make Like a Rock and Roll" (Don Woody), "Flame Of Love" (Ronnie Self), "Everybody's Tryin' To Be My Baby" (York Brothers), "I'm Little But I'm Loud" ('Little' Jimmy Dickens), "Who Baby Who" (Jane Turzy), "El Paso" (Marty Robbins), "Lonesome Number One" (Don Gibson), "Give In To the Blues" (Stonewall Jackson), "Slow Poison" (Johnnie & Jack)

Video: "Turn the Cards Slowly" 

Jasmine Records

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