Where Left Is Right / The Old Site

RJ, at Night Light -- a self-confessed "'roots music' guy" -- takes a break from politics to wax lyrical about vocalists who "have a special quality to their voices, that unnamable something that induces an almost physical pleasure response." He calls these singers the ones with it (and each is "one of them").

RJ's discussion begins with simple mentions of Barry White, Emmylou Harris, and Muddy Waters, and goes on to include Dionne Warwick (but emphatically not, Deo gratias, Whitney Houston), Stevie Winwood, Ray Charles, Van Morrison, David Ruffin, Aretha, Dolly Parton, Michael McDonald, Ralph Stanley...

Group voices can have it too, and so can the tonal quality of certain instruments in combination, even when the singers or instruments don't have it independently. The Davis Sisters (especially on their classic song "I Forgot More Than You'll Ever Know"), or Lou Rawls backing Sam Cooke on "That's Where It's At," or the organ/violin blend on Don & Dewey’s classic soul instrumental "Justine" - they all had it. The Everly Brothers have it as a duo, sometimes, particularly on songs like the relatively obscure "Oh What a Feeling." There are certain blends of voices or instruments seem to work every time, no matter who the participants are. That’s why I want to be reincarnated as three black women who can sing, or two Texans who can play twin fiddles.

Man. What a playlist you could build just from RJ's selections.