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Ritchie Valens - Ritchie Valens Audio CD

A fair review of the Ritchie Valens "Ritchie Valens" Audio CD. Please note that the below review is the views of the authors, and authors only. You can get a complete list of all Ritchie Valens reviews here, or go back to the Ritchie Valens tabs.

Ritchie Valens Band: Ritchie Valens
Title: Ritchie Valens
Rating:
Release Date: 2006-08-15
Media: Audio CD

Tracks: 1: That's My Little Suzie 2: In a Turkish Town 3: Come on, Let's Go 4: Donna 5: Boney-Maronie 6: Ooh My Head 7: Bamba 8: Bluebirds Over the Mountain 9: Hi-Tone 10: Framed 11: We Belong Together 12: Dooby-Dooby-Wah

The Sixth Best Record Released in 1959
The day Richie Valen perished in a plane crash along with Buddy Holly and the Big Bopper. I'm guessing everybody knows about the day the music died. Richie was only eighteen years old, his musical career only eight months old. He only had one album. This is it. It came out in 1959 and it is rock and roll.

Richie took a Mexican folk song, added a beat and became a star for the ages. Who knows how far he'd have gone with a voice like that, with a beat like that. I've heard Bob Keanes say that Ritchie, born Ricardo Steven Valenzuela, never wrote anything down, never sang the same words twice. He made it up as he went along. If that's true, that's really something. And I believe it, because Mr. Keane was Ritchie's manager and producer.

This album opens with a rocking "That's My Little Suzie". "She rocks all day and she rocks all night. " A classic rocker with an infectious guitar. "Donna, Donna", is still played on the radio today and they'll be playing it a hundred years from now. "La Bamba", that Mexican folk song I mentioned above, will make you get up and dance. It's a rocker. But this album offers more than rockers. "In a Turkish Town" is a short ballad that sadly shows us the voice we've lost, the voice that could have graced so many ballads.

I'm guessing that everything Ritchie ever put on tape has been released in one form, or another, but this is his first album, his best album. Thirty-four days after this record came out Ritchie flipped a coin and won a seat on an airplane and we lost a star.

This Record is Number 6 on my list of the Best Thirteen Records of 1959.


Ritchie Valens debut...
That you can't shake them from your day. The energy and purity in these recordings is so infectious. Why would you want them to be?
They rock, they roll, they have a great rhythm, and a great blues. I love the back beat too. It is so loose and so imperfect that it is well. . . perfect.

Sure, It is obviously a classic record. But it is more than that. It is a "desert island record". That should be appreciated more than it is. It is an undeniably influential recording. That caught the ears of so many who have come after it.
The songs have no backing vocals but they are wrapped in a melody that brings on harmony vocals and I'm sure was an influence on the multi-vocal Doo-Wop recordings of the early 60's.
What I love about the lack of backing vocals is that it adds a loneliness to the sound of the record.
Which is more than applicable to his legacy.
For this price and the quality of the music. This is a tremendous bargain and a great way to introduce music to kids and adults alike.
It has an innocence to its sound that can only be performed by someone as young as he was, 17.
I think if you have purposely sought out this album or if you have stumbled on it here. Buy it.
If you like rock-n-roll. That is.


You can see a complete list of all Ritchie Valens discography, or go back to the Ritchie Valens tabs. There is also a good guide on how to read guitar tabs here.

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