Artist	Song
Ray Charles	What'd I Say, Pts. 1 & 2
from Pure Genius: The Complete Atlantic Recordings (1952-1959) [Remastered] (2005)
John Lee Hooker	Boom Boom
from Burnin' (2007)
Mose Allison	The Seventh Son
from The Prestige Collection: Mose Allison - Greatest Hits (2006)
Hank Williams	Your Cheatin' Heart
from Hank Williams: 40 Greatest Hits (1988)
Woody Guthrie	Rambling Round
from The Asch Recordings, Vol. 1-4 (1999)
Leadbelly	Easy Rider
from Take This Hammer - The Complete RCA Victor Recordings (2003)
Bob Dylan	It's All Over Now, Baby Blue
from Dylan (2007)
Muddy Waters	Got My Mojo Working
from Muddy Waters: His Best (1956-1964) (1997)
Bobby "Blue" Bland	Ain't Nothing You Can Do (Single Version) [Stereo]
from The Definitive Collection (2007)
Lightnin' Hopkins	Mojo Hand
from The Fire & Fury Story (Disc 3) (2006)
Solomon Burke	Cry to Me
from The Very Best of Solomon Burke (2005)
Mahalia Jackson	Willing to Run
from The Original Apollo Sessions (2006)
Jackie Wilson	Reet Petite
from Jackie Wilson: 20 Greatest Hits (2002)
Big Joe Williams	Baby Please Don't Go
from Big Joe Williams and the Stars of Mississippi Blues (2005)
Jimmy Reed	Bright Lights, Big City
from The Very Best of Jimmy Reed (2005)
Jelly Roll Morton	Black Bottom Stomp
from Bluebird's Best: Jazz King of New Orleans (Remastered) (2002)
The Carter Family	Wildwood Flower
from RCA Country Legends: The Carter Family (2004)

Comment:

In Belfast's postwar poverty, records — especially country, blues, and soul imports from the States — were considered a luxury. But not by George Morrison, who regarded them as his son's [i]education[/i]. And Van was a fanatical student. The chest-thumping swagger of John Lee Hooker's "Boom Boom" stomps its mud-caked boots all over Morrison's early years (think "T. B. Sheets" and "Jackie Wilson Said"), and just like Hook, when Van's at a loss for the perfect lyric, he pulls a [i]hawl[/i] or [i]hunh[/i] straight from the gut. Hank Williams spills out a charcoal-mellowed barrelful of hillbilly heartbreak in "Your Cheatin' Heart," letting the high-lonesome whine of the pedal steel do his cryin’ for him. And on "What'd I Say, Pts. 1 & 2," Brother Ray steams up the studio in a tail-feather-shakin' call-and-response with the Raelettes that's one-half primal scream, one-half pelvic thrust. From Leadbelly to Billie Holiday, Van traveled from the sharecropper’s sun-baked fields to the Big Apple’s smoke-filled hotspots in song.

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