Album Review: Hoods and Shades by Andre Williams

Andre Williams has seen and done it all when it comes to music, and he has been seeing and doing it for longer than all but a handful of musicians. Williams has been recording, producing, and writing songs, solo and with or for various groups, since the 1950s. He started at Detroit’s Fortune Records, where he recorded some of his best known songs such as “Bacon Fat” and “Jail Bait”, on which Williams just talks over simple beats of slinky horns, rudimentary percussion, and piano—an original approach at the time.

Full Review >>

Even at age 75, it's hard to think of Andre Williams as mellow, so the idea of the notorious R&B belter making an acoustic-based album is initially hard to fathom. But as Williams has demonstrated over the past decade, his aim isn't so much to perpetuate his image as "Mr. Rhythm" or "the Black Godfather," but to genuinely impart his wisdom learned through decades of living in America's toughest ghettos.

Full Review >>