Dobie Gray

Anybody who has cut a standard like "Drift Away" can hardly be called unappreciated, but a hit of that magnitude can tend to overshadow the rest of an artist's career. Such is the case with Dobie Gray, who not only had a huge number five hit with "Drift Away" in 1973, but had a number 11 hit eight years earlier with "The 'In' Crowd." Two big hits, both widely known, which is more than most artists get, and Gray continued to chart throughout the '70s, albeit in the lower reaches of the R&B charts. All of this suggests that Gray was a minor talent, but that's misleading, as Hip-O Select's excellent four-disc box set Drift Away: A Decade of Dobie (1969-1979) proves. Chronicling the music Gray made after "The 'In' Crowd," it illustrates that Gray wasn't just a powerful yet nuanced soul singer, but that he restlessly tried different sounds and styles. The first tracks on this set collect his singles for the L.A. soft pop label White Whale, where he cut versions of Joe South's "Rose Garden" and Paul Williams' "Do You Really Have a Heart" that perfectly fit the label's breezy, lazy style while retaining a soulful edge. After that, it moves to his Drift Away album, recorded for Decca in 1973. It was a wonderful blend of soul, pop, and '70s singer/songwriter, best heard on the title track, which may have been the peak of the record, but is far from the only good cut here. After that hit, Gray started to get even more idiosyncratic on his subsequent albums for MCA (1973's Loving Arms and 1974's Hey Dixie) and Capricorn (1975's New Ray of Sunshine and 1976's Let Go). Using Drift Away as a base, Gray delved into country, developing a tremendous country-soul hybrid that had a loose, funky underpinning. That funkiness started to turn to disco during his Capricorn years -- which is only natural, since it was disco's heyday in the mid-'70s -- but he also flirted with Southern rock and had some imaginative reinterpretations of contemporary hits, like his sweetly funky version of the Eagles' "The Best of My Love." His final two albums of the '70s -- 1978's Midnight Diamond and 1979's Dobie Gray -- were for Infinity, where Gray agreed to fit into the label's smooth urban soul and disco sound; they're not as original as the rest of the music on the set and fall prey to a lot of dated '70s production techniques -- sweeping strings, fuzz guitars, and flutes all fight for space -- but Gray acquits himself with class, making them thoroughly pleasant listens. But the first three discs of this splendid box show that at his best Gray was truly one of the most creative and successful soul singers of the '70s, and that's why any true soul connoisseur should add this to their library. (If only the packaging of the box itself felt worthy of library! A small, book-shaped cardboard set, the discs scrape against cardboard when they're pulled out of their casing, and the whole set feels like it's in imminent danger of destruction. That said, the music is good enough to make this worth the investment, provided that consumers know what they're going to get for their money.) [A Decade of Dobie is available only online at hiposelect.com.] ~ Stephen Thomas Erlewine, All Music Guide