1 	Get It Up For Love 	4:33
2 	Fool For You Anyway 	5:38
3 	A Star In The Ghetto 	7:01
4 	The Message 	5:17
5 	What Is Soul 	4:34
6 	Someday We'll All Be Free 	5:13
7 	Imagine 	4:56
8 	Keepin It To Myself 	4:30

Ben E. King – lead vocals
Alan Gorrie, Hamish Stuart, Onnie McIntyre – guitar
Roger Ball – keyboards
Roger Ball – alto saxophone
Malcolm "Molly" Duncan – keyboards, tenor saxophone
Alan Gorrie – bass
Steve Ferrone – drums, percussion
Alan Gorrie, Hamish Stuart, Debra Gray, Luther Vandross, Robin Clark – backing vocals
Lewis Del Gatto – baritone saxophone (tracks: 2, 5, 8)
Michael Brecker – tenor saxophone (tracks: 2, 5, 8)
Marvin Stamm, Randy Brecker – trumpet (tracks: 2, 5, 8)
Barry Rogers – trombone (tracks: 2, 5, 8)

Benny and Us resulted from a chance meeting in Miami between Ben E. King and the Average White Band, who were vacationing there just when King was starting work on a new album. The finished LP yielded two hit singles and became King's best-selling LP, rising to number 33. The sound is soulful and funky, very bright and passionate -- the upbeat, relentlessly catchy "Get It Up for Love" and the soaring, horn and string driven "A Star in the Ghetto" made respectable showings on the R&B charts, and a good portion of the rest ("The Message," "What Is Soul") is pretty powerful stuff as well. "Imagine" is so busy and so self-consciously earnest that it's difficult to enjoy, but King is so good in the moments when he is on target, that it's hard to skip this track, even if it is the weakest number here. The radiant "Keepin' It to Myself" and the poignant cover of Donny Hathaway's "Someday We'll All Be Free," by contrast, are among King's very best records. Benny and Us was a good enough record that it nearly led to a joint tour (as opposed to some joint appearances, which actually happened) between King and the Average White Band -- one can only marvel at what those shows must have sounded like, and lament that fact that no live album was cut. It also marked King's last major appearance on the charts for Atlantic. To date, however, it's only available as an import from Sequel Records. That reissue, apart from excellent sound, also includes alternate edits of "Fool for You Anyway," "The Message," and, especially "Star in the Ghetto," including the 12" single version of the latter -- all are worth hearing. ---Bruce Eder, Rovi

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1) The Jugglers (AWB/Gorrie)
2) McEwan's Export (Gorrie)
3) When Will You Be Mine (AWB/Gorrie)
4) Queen Of My Soul (Stuart)
5) Love Won't Let Me Wait (Barrett, Eli)
6) Soul Searching (Gorrie, Stuart)
7) Whatcha Gonna Do For Me (Doheny, Stuart)
8) If I Ever Lose This Heaven (Sawyer, Jones, Ware)
9) Schoolboy Crush (AWB/ Ferrone/ Gorrie/ Stuart)
10) Cloudy (Gorrie, Stuart)
11) I'm The One/Cut The Cake ( AWB/ Gorrie/ McIntosh/ Stuart/ Ball)
12) Pick Up The Pieces ( Ball/ Duncan/ Gorrie/ McIntyre/ McIntosh/ Stuart)

Rocky Bryant - Drums, Percussion
Alan Gorrie - Bass, Guitar, Guitar (Bass), Piano, Vocals
Klyde Jones - Bass, Guitar, Guitar (Bass), Keyboards, Vocals
Onnie McIntyre - Guitar, Vocals (Background)
Fred Vigdor - Keyboards, Saxophone, Vocals (Background)

This great live set is perfomed with the guys in the group that still hit the Jazz clubs all over the world, and while it is not as great as my old favorite "Person To Person" from the 70's, it is a very solid set from the much smaller AWB of the new millenium. In this CD the AWB fan will find sevral funky remakes of old favorites including "Cloudy" and "If I ever lose this Heaven" as well as "The Jugglers", which only long, long time fans are likely to remember, as it came from their first LP the CD for which has been long out of print and unavailable. Mine got burgled out of my truck, and I haven't found a replacement yet. But in any case as these gents pass from middle age into the next phase of life, they still have that funky edge, and the newer members of the group fill in quite nicely.

So here's the deal, If you don't have any of the old stuff, get it first, (the "Pickin' up the Pieces" anthology has almost everything you could want on it), but if you have the old stuff already pick up this set (Soul of the City) that shows the "Lords of Northern Soul" still have the goods! --- G. E. Williams, amazon.com

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01. When Will You Be Mine (Gorrie/White) – 4:20
02. Please Don’t Fall In Love (Gorrie/Ball) – 3:43
03. Walk On By (Burt Bacharach/Hal David) – 3:58
04. Feel No Fret (Gorrie/White/Stuart/Ferrone) – 6:33
05. Stop The Rain (Gorrie/Stuart) – 4:30
06. Atlantic Avenue (Gorrie/White/Ferrone) – 3:12
07. Ace Of Hearts (Gorrie/Stuart/Ferrone) – 3:50
08. Too Late To Cry (Stuart) – 3:45
09. Fire Burning (Gorrie/White) – 3:14

10. Kiss Me (Stuart) – 3:49
11. Love Won’t Get In The Way (Gorrie/Christopher/Stuart) – 5:09
12. Love Gives, Love Takes Away (Gorrie) – 4:05
13. Growing Pains (Gorrie/Foster/Stuart) – 4:30

Personnel:
– Alan Gorrie – lead & backing vocals, guitar
– Hamish Stuart – lead & backing vocals, bass
– Steve Ferrone – drums, percussion
– Onnie McIntyre – guitar, backing vocals
– Roger Ball – keyboards, synthesizers, alto saxophone
– Malcolm “Molly” Duncan – tenor saxophone
+
– Lew Delgatto – baritone saxophone (5, 9)
– Mike Brecker – tenor saxophone (5, 9)
– Randy Brecker – trumpet (5, 9)
– Zeca Da Cuica – cuica (6)
– Airto Moreira – percussion (6)
– Luis Carlos Dos Santos – surdo (6)
– Luther Vandross – backing vocals (8)
– Ernie Watts – saxophone (10, 11, 12, 13)
– Bill Reichenbach – trombone (10, 11, 12, 13)
– Gary Grant & Jerry Hey – trumpets (10, 11, 12, 13)
– Gene Paul & Average White Band – producers

From their self-titled sophomore album of 1974 to 1978's Warmer Communications, the Average White Band enjoyed a commercial winning streak in the '70s; all of the albums they recorded for Atlantic during that period went either gold or platinum in the United States (and that is in addition to their impressive sales in Europe). But if any AWB album demonstrated that all good things must eventually come to an end, it was Feel No Fret. This 1979 LP marked the first time since 1973's Show Your Hand (also known as Put It Where You Want It) that an AWB album didn't enjoy either gold or platinum sales in the U.S., and it was also the most uneven album they recorded in the '70s. So what went wrong? Perhaps the absence of Arif Mardin was a factor; Mardin had produced all of AWB's previous Atlantic releases, whereas they produced Feel No Fret themselves. If Mardin had been encouraging the Scottish soul/funk band to go that extra mile, they settled for decent or competent on this record. Feel No Fret is far from a total meltdown, and the material is generally likable -- especially the good-natured "Atlantic Avenue," the slow-grinding "When Will You Be Mine," and a remake of the Burt Bacharach/Hal David favorite "Walk On By" (which became a minor hit and made it to number 32 on Billboard's R&B singles chart). But after Mardin-produced treasures like AWB, Soul Searching, Cut the Cake, and Warmer Communications, AWB followers had become extremely spoiled -- they expected excellence, not a record that was merely adequate. Nonetheless, hardcore devotees (as opposed to casual listeners) will want to hear this album, which Rhino reissued on CD as Feel No Fret...and More (with four bonus tracks added) in 1994. ---Alex Henderson, Rovi

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