Lonnie Mack

As the third and final volume of the trilogy of Ace compilations covering Lonnie Mack's 1960s Fraternity recordings, this at a glance looks like a mop-up of the bottom of the can. If that's so, though, it's quite an enjoyable mop-up, albeit with an erratic streak in both the quality and form of the material. About half of this is previously unreleased, including some alternate takes of officially released sides. Some of the 1963-1967 singles are really fine, like the instrumental "Nashville," which has mean blues-rock licks on par with anything Mack's done -- meaning that they're on par with anyone's blues-rock licks. Otherwise there are some honky-tonk twist instrumentals; some quite fine blue-eyed soul vocals with horns, like "She Don't Come Here Anymore" and "Crying Over You"; and a genuine hit (low-charting, admittedly, at number 78), "Honky Tonk '65." It gets wackier: a rather cool instrumental adaptation of "I Left My Heart in San Francisco," mixing lounge horns with biting guitar riffs; a mix of surf reverb and soundtrack theme on "When I'm Alone"; and straight country music on "Are You Guilty?" There are also rare singles by Beau Dollar & the Coins, Denny "Dumpy" Rice, the Charmaines, and Max Falcon on which Mack played, as well as a mono version of his big hit, "Memphis." Some of this CD is so-so, but the high points ensure that it won't disappoint Mack lovers. ~ Richie Unterberger, All Music Guide