Come Live With Me
Album by Ray Charles
Ray Charles released the album Come Live With Me in January 1974, his first non-jazz album in almost a year and a half. It featured one side of slow, orchestrated ballads, and one side of faster R&B numbers.
Sid Feller arranged the songs on Side 1. The album was preceded by a teaser single, “Come Live With Me”, in October 1973.
About the songs on Come Live With Me
Come Live With Me opens with the ballad “Till There Was You” from Meredith Wilson’s play The Music Man, and it’s a song which Ray sings with a kind of inspired, reaching soulfulness over a very gentle and sweet backing. His uncharacteristically subtle electric piano rings opaquely up from the mire sometimes, but the focus is always on Ray’s magnificent singing performance.
Nearly as slow but more ostentatious is the riveting Jacques Brel composition “If You Go Away”, on which Ray Charles sings Rod McKuen’s lyrics translated from French with an almost somnambulant gentleness, as unexpected minor chords pile up on each other and a rich orchestra weaves in and out with melodramatic sentimentality. “If You Go Away” comes across like a more wistful and exaggerated version of “Something’s Wrong”, Ray’s 1964 B-side.
Ann Gregory’s “It Takes So Little Time” continues with Side 1’s loose theme of dense torch songs, as again Ray trots out his beautiful electric piano and bellows the heavy, sighing words that cut through Sid Feller’s tender arrangement. It’s a fine mixture of weight and airiness, a juxtaposition which is itself counterbalanced by some higher-key singing on which Ray really gets to unleash himself.
The album’s title song finished off Side 1. “Come Live With Me”, the first of two songs on the album written by Boudleux and Felice Bryant. A touching entreaty for a woman to accept an offer of marriage and family, “Come Live With Me” is absolutely lovely, its grand sound matched note for note by Ray’s powerful singing.
Side 2 of Come Live With Me is its R&B side. It opens with Ray Charles’ own composition “Somebody”, a quick-pace gospel rave-up dominated by a large crowd of chattering voices supporting Ray and just generally enjoying themselves. It’s a simple song and is most notable musically for its tuneful bass and funky saxophone (not to mention Ray’s advice to forget about “women’s lib”).
The Bryants’ “Problems, Problems” follows, a mid-tempo horn-led R&B tune with a great, single-note-at-a-time-playing guitar and double-tracked Ray Charles voices that sometimes sing together and sometimes have conversations with one another. Such was Ray’s self-contained life at the time, recording in his very own studio and being able contractually to do whatever he wanted.
Ray’s frequent songwriter and partner in crime Jimmy Lewis contributes “Where Was He”, a catchy and vivid word of warning to a woman thinking of choosing another man – it was I, after all, who was always there for you. Some high-throated Raelets sing the song’s main lines for the choruses, and it’s hard to get their tune out of your head after the enjoyably repetitive song ends in a fade.
“Louise”, written by Leo Robin, is a soulfully sung but lighthearted tune about the titular woman. “Louise” unfortunately is kind of hard to pin down as a song; the sound is somewhat reticent but it bursts with ideas. The subdued wah-wah guitar and the persistent hum of a low-mixed brass section contrast nicely with the stop-start singalong “Louuuu-ise” chorus and Ray’s electric piano.
“Everybody Sing” wraps up Come Live With Me in the form of Sadye Shepard’s intricate and gorgeous plea for togetherness. At times elegiac and then suddenly exhortatory, “Everybody Sing” features a large gang of overdubbed Rays who belt out the song’s irresistible chorus of “everybody sing hiiigh, sing looow” over and over as the song and the album fade out with a final instance of groovy glory.
Record covers
No photos of Ray feature on either the front or the back cover of Come Live With Me, but there would be no doubt to even casual record buyers as to who this is. On a soft night-sky blue, a diffuse image of an orange-skinned Ray with his head back, smiling and wearing his trademark sunglasses, appears. You can just make out his tuxedo and bowtie but the rest of his form fades into the starry sky. The song titles all appear on the front cover under the album and artist names.
The song listing is on the back over a black background, beside which is a fuller version of Ray in a similar pose from a different angle than the front cover. Still all dressed up, he hugs his arms as three colored spotlights shine down on him from above and stage lights twinkle in place of the front cover’s stars.
Liner notes are sparse – there is no wall of text, just credits for Ray as producer, Sid Feller as arranger, and David Braithwaite as engineer.
All in all, it’s one of Ray’s more attractive album covers, especially from the oft-mocked 1965-75 era.
Record labels
These are from a pressing done by the Longines Symphonette Society, a mail-order label from the 1960 and 1970s known for pioneering direct marketing.
Singles with songs from Come Live With Me
Track listing
Side A
1. “Till There Was You”
2. “If You Go Away”
3. “It Takes So Little Time”
4. “Come Live With Me”
Side B
1. “Somebody”
2. “Problems, Problems”
3. “Where Was He”
4. “Louise”
5. “Everybody Sing”
Listen to Come Live With Me
Used copies, and sometimes even still-sealed ones, of Come Live With Me are easy to locate in online sales listings from record sellers everywhere. Watch the listings and wait for an affordable copy in good condition; it shouldn’t be too hard to find. It’s a fine album full of well-considered performances.
Jazz Number II
Come Live With Me
Renaissance