freddie scott - "cry to me" (from the cry to me : the best of freddie scott lp, available for purchase here.)

in brief : more unfairly forgotten soul.

if you're familiar w/ "cry to me," it's probably in versions by the stones or, as heard in dirty dancing (which really was a great soundtrack), by solomon burke. the stones were still learnin' the blues when they recorded "cry to me", and it says more about them--look at us! we're competent!--than about the song itself. king solomon's, on the other hand, is assured but not smooth; it's a brotherly slap upside the head that asks, "wtf is wrong w/ you?" freddie scott, though, poor freddie scott, slows the song down to a sub-crawl. i've never heard anything w/ a pulse this slow live to tell the tale--but by the sound of it, freddie probably wishes he hadn't.

freddie sounds like he's singing directly to the mirror, tears streaming down his face. it's the mid-60's and he's already showing that it's okay, if not necessarily cool, for a man to cry. his tone on the bridge is just about the most tortured thing i've ever heard, and when he screams, it's like you've overheard your neighbors having a terrible fight; you feel bad, but you also feel really uncomfortable--and maybe somehow implicated. voyeuristic soul? call it what you will, just be sure to listen, and never mind the guilt.