"Top Of The Line" by PRINCE PHILLIP MITCHELL – Second Album from May 1979 on Atlantic Records (November 2007 Rhino "CLASSIC SOUL ALBUM - REMASTERED & EXPANDED" CD Reissue – Bill Inglot Remaster) - A Review by Mark Barry...

This Review Along With Over 300 Others Is Available in my

SOUNDS GOOD E-Book on all Amazon sites
HIGHER GROUND

SOUL, FUNK and JAZZ FUSION 
Exceptional CD Reissues and Remasters  

Just Click Below To Purchase for £6.95

Thousands of E-Pages - All Details and In-Depth Reviews From Discs 

(No Cut and Paste Crap)

"…Lying Here Next To You In My Birthday Suit…"

The cool and seductive "Top Of The Line" is the second Soul album ace songwriter PRINCE PHILLIP MITCHELL made for the mighty Atlantic Records in the late Seventies (1979).

This UK released November 2007 Expanded CD on Rhino remasters the album to a very high quality for the first time and adds on a bonus Previously Unreleased instrumental cut (54:07 minutes total playing time). Here's the break down for Rhino 8122-76434-2 (Barcode 081227643423):

1. Top Of The Line

2. Use Your Body

3. Highlight Of My Life

4. In Between Lovers

5. I'm So Happy

6. If It Ain't Love It'll Go Away

7. Paying The Price

8. Let's Get Wet

Tracks 1 to 8 are the album "Top Of The Line" released in the USA on Atlantic SD 19231 in May 1979

Track 9 is "Take Me Away (Instrumental)" which is a Previously Unreleased album outtake - the lyrics were never completed nor added to the mix...

Rhino's long-time tape engineer BILL INGLOT has remastered the first generation master tapes and the sound is typically great - warm, funky and with plenty of wallop without having to turn it up. Once again the booklet has an essay on the album and artist by noted writer CHARLES WARING that is excellent.

This is smooth loverman Soul where our hero is a bedroom dynamo and his girl is "dynamite" in the candlelight (and anywhere else that's convenient). "Top Of The Line" is a great groove with strings ("number one...second to none...") while "Use Your Body" is over five minutes of "give it all you've got..." and vocally he gets a tad ecstatic every now and then. The swooning continues with the slick "In Between Lovers" but even better is the Teddy Pendergrass funk of "I'm So Happy" - a lovely upbeat dancer with sighing girly vocals. "Paying The Price" sees him duet with The Jones Girls while "Let's Get Wet" is not really a subtle song where one of The Jones Girls literally say "not tonight Phil..." before the song goes into a pulsing Disco rhythm.

"Top Of The Line" is not really as good as its predecessor "Make It Good" from 1978 (which is also in this series) - but both are old-school Soul albums worth revisiting in your boudoir soon...

PS: This release is part of Rhino's "CLASSIC SOUL ALBUM - REMASTERED & EXPANDED" Series. Most titles are first time onto CD and are rare soul albums from the Warner/Atlantic/Cotillion/Elektra vaults:

1. Ace Spectrum - "Inner Spectrum" (see REVIEW)

2. Blue Magic - "Blue Magic" (see REVIEW)

3. Donny Hathaway - "Come Back Charleston Blue O.S.T." (see REVIEW)

4. Leroy Hutson - "Paradise" (see REVIEW)

5. Ronn Matlock - "Love City" (see REVIEW)

6. Gwen McCrae - "Gwen McCrae"

7. Gwen McCrae - "On My Way"

8. Prince Phillip Mitchell - "Make It Good" (1978 US Debut LP on Atlantic) (see REVIEW)

9. Prince Phillip Mitchell - "Top Of The Line" (1979, his 2nd album on Atlantic) (see REVIEW)

10. The Voices Of East Harlem [featuring Donny Hathaway] -"Right On Be Free" (see REVIEW)

"Paradise" by LEROY HUTSON – July 1982 US Album on Elektra Records (October 2007 UK Rhino 'Classic Soul Album' CD Reissue - Bill Inglot Remaster) - A Review by Mark Barry...

 

<iframe sandbox="allow-popups allow-scripts allow-modals allow-forms allow-same-origin" style="width:120px;height:240px;" marginwidth="0" marginheight="0" scrolling="no" frameborder="0" src="//ws-eu.amazon-adsystem.com/widgets/q?ServiceVersion=20070822&OneJS=1&Operation=GetAdHtml&MarketPlace=GB&source=ss&ref=as_ss_li_til&ad_type=product_link&tracking_id=mabasreofcdbl-21&language=en_GB&marketplace=amazon&region=GB&placement=B0009FHKR2&asins=B0009FHKR2&linkId=9f13ae687282f0a67143698f78773a0a&show_border=true&link_opens_in_new_window=true"></iframe>

<iframe sandbox="allow-popups allow-scripts allow-modals allow-forms allow-same-origin" style="width:120px;height:240px;" marginwidth="0" marginheight="0" scrolling="no" frameborder="0" src="//ws-eu.amazon-adsystem.com/widgets/q?ServiceVersion=20070822&OneJS=1&Operation=GetAdHtml&MarketPlace=GB&source=ss&ref=as_ss_li_til&ad_type=product_link&tracking_id=mabasreofcdbl-21&language=en_GB&marketplace=amazon&region=GB&placement=B0009FHKR2&asins=B0009FHKR2&linkId=9f13ae687282f0a67143698f78773a0a&show_border=true&link_opens_in_new_window=true"></iframe>

This Review and 209 more are in my E-Book

Available on AMAZON 

LET'S GO CRAZY - 80ts Music On CD

Your All-Genres Guide To Exceptional CD Reissues and Remasters

Classic Albums, Compilations, 45s

All In-Depth Reviews from the Discs Themselves

Over 1,650 e-Pages of Info

(No Cut and Paste Crap)

This remaster is a straightforward reissue of a long-out-of-print US LP by Soul-Funk man LEROY HUTSON. “Paradise" was issued on Elektra 9 60141-1 - E1 60141 in July 1982 and is reissued here on CD in October 2007 in the UK. When I first reviewed this title in 2008, it was easily available, but here in November 2023 it has been deleted years and has gained a price tag.

 

It has remastered sound and a detailed booklet but unusually - and unlike most of the other CDs in this series - Rhino 8122-76432-2 (Barcode 081227643225) has no bonus tracks (39:00 minutes).

 

1. Classy Lady (5:30 minutes) - Side 1

2. Nice And Easy (4:27 minutes)

3. You Make It Happen (4:55 minutes)

4. Paradise (5:38 minutes)

5. She’s Got It (7:57 minutes) – Side 2

6. Nobody But You (4:44 minutes)

7. Stay At It (5:31 minutes)

 

Co-Produced by Hutson with Nicholas Caldwell, "Paradise" is very much of the time – spring and summer 1982 Kool And The Gang sounding keyboards punctured with Earth, Wind and Fire brass fills - all of it underlined by slappy bass lines. The shadow of Chic's "Risqué", George Benson's "Give Me The Night" and Change's "The Glow Of Love" loom over the whole recording - and you can 'so' hear where acts like Maxwell and D'Angelo got their sound and style from.

 

Highlights include the party opener of "Classy Lady", the Grover Washington Jnr's "Winelight" feel of "Paradise" and the almost Kid Creole & The Coconuts salsa funkiness of "Nobody But You". There's also the Jerry Butler co-written "You Make It Happen" and "Nice & Easy" - a pair of sweet mid-tempo smoochers. But it's not all good of course. "She's Got It" opens with a telephone ringing, then a toilet flushing (I kid you not) then a deep Barry White type voice goes into loverman spiel - it's awful.  A shame that, because the groove of the tune is actually quite good. The dance floor funk of "Stay At It" sounds a little dated too.

 

Long time tape supremo BILL INGLOT has remastered the album and the sound is great - funky and muscular.

 

Like so many albums of the time, this is superb in places, and only ok in others - it's an old-school soul/funk classic given a new lease of life - just shame about the lack of extras though - as it makes it feel a little threadbare.

 

PS: This release is part of Rhino's "CLASSIC SOUL ALBUM - REMASTERED & EXPANDED" Series. Most titles are first time onto CD and are rare soul albums from the Warner/Atlantic/Cotillion/Elektra vaults. I have reviewed all but the two Gwen McCrae titles listed below:

 

1. Ace Spectrum - "Inner Spectrum"

2. Blue Magic - "Blue Magic"

3. Donny Hathaway - "Come Back Charleston Blue O.S.T."

4. Leroy Hutson - "Paradise"

5. Gwen McCrae - "Gwen McCrae"

6. Gwen McCrae - "On My Way"

7. Prince Phillip Mitchell - "Top Of The Line"

8. Prince Philip Mitchell - "Make It Good"

9. The Voices Of East Harlem -"Right On Be Free"