Howard Tate - I Learned It The Hard Way

Given the amount of Howard Tate posted here in the past you may be asking yourself "Do I really need this one?"...Yes you do! The majority of this disc is material not included on any previous post here...or anywhere else for that matter!

"Howard Tate: I Learned It All the Hard Way (CD)
(2016/Playback) 29 tracks. 29 songs strong retrospective of soul singer Howard Tate. It includes his essential recordings for labels like Verve, Turntable, Atlantic, Epic and HT. Although he was relatively unknown during his lifetime, his recordings are now traded up from Deep Soul fans. His songs have been covered by artists such as Janis Joplin, BB King, Jimi Hendrix or Ry Cooder."

Howard Tate - Get It While You Can (The Legendary Sessions)

 Howard Tate (August 13, 1939 – December 2, 2011) was an American soul singer and songwriter.

He moved with his family to Philadelphia in the early 1940s. In his teens, he joined a gospel music group that included Garnet Mimms and, as the Gainors, recorded rhythm and blues sides for Mercury Records and Cameo Records in the early 1960s. Tate performed with organist Bill Doggett and returned to Philadelphia.

Mimms, leading a group called the Enchanters, introduced Tate to record-producer Jerry Ragovoy, who began recording Tate for Verve Records. Utilizing New York session musicians such as Paul Griffin, Richard Tee, Eric Gale, Chuck Rainey, and Herb Lovell, Tate and Ragovoy produced, from 1966 to 1968, a series of soul blues recordings that are regarded as some of the most sophisticated of the era. "Ain't Nobody Home" (1966), "Look at Granny Run Run" (1966), "Baby I Love You" (1967), and "Stop" (1968) all written or co-written by Ragovoy, were well received by record buyers. "Ain't Nobody Home", "Look At Granny" and "Stop" charted in the Top 20 in the US Billboard R&B chart.

Janis Joplin performed another of Tate's Ragavoy songs, "Get It While You Can", (on Pearl) during this time. Tate's reputation among critics was high. As Robert Christgau wrote in his review of Tate's Verve material, "Tate is a blues-drenched Macon native who had the desire to head north and sounds it every time he gooses a lament with one of the trademark keens that signify the escape he never achieved. He brought out the best in soul pro Jerry Ragovoy, who made Tate's records jump instead of arranging them into submission, and gave him lyrics with some wit to them besides."

Tate, working apart from Ragovoy, made an album called Howard Tate's Reaction that was released in 1970 on Turntable Records. Produced by Lloyd Price and Johnny Nash, it was distributed in small quantities. Christgau wrote, "Tate's voice is potent enough to activate more inert material." The record was reissued, as Reaction, in 2003. Ragovoy and Tate reunited for the 1972 Atlantic Records Howard Tate, which included more songs by Ragovoy, along with Tate's cover versions of Bob Dylan's "Girl from the North Country" and Robbie Robertson's and Levon Helm's "Jemima Surrender."

After recording a single for Epic Records and a few songs for his own label, Tate retired from the music industry in the late 1970s. He sold securities in the New Jersey and Philadelphia area, and in the 1980s developed a dependence on drugs, ending up living in a homeless shelter. In the mid-1990s, Tate began counselling drug abusers and the mentally ill, and worked as a preacher.

A disc jockey from Camden, New Jersey, Phil Casden, discovered Tate's whereabouts early in 2001, and in spring 2001 Tate played his first date in many years, in New Orleans. He then began working with Ragovoy on an album that was released, as Rediscovered, in 2003. It included covers of songs by Elvis Costello and Prince, as well as a new version of "Get It While You Can."

At the Roskilde Festival in 2004, he sang "Love Will Keep You Warm" with Swan Lee. The song can be found on Swan Lee - The Complete Collection (2007).

In 2006, Shout! Factory released Howard Tate Live, recorded in Denmark in 2004. Working with producer, arranger and songwriter, Steve Weisberg, Tate recorded A Portrait of Howard, which was released in 2006 on the independent Solid Ground label. It included compositions by Randy Newman, Nick Lowe, Lou Reed and Carla Bley, as well as songs written by Tate and Weisberg. In late 2007, Tate recorded Blue Day in Nashville with producer Jon Tiven, and this was released in 2008.

Tate was also a judge for the 6th annual Independent Music Awards to support independent artists' careers.

2010 saw a release of a limited vinyl only, direct-to-disc live recording from Blue Heaven Studios, with Tate and his touring quartet performing songs from his catalog.

On December 2, 2011, Tate died from complications of multiple myloma and leukemia, aged 72

Howard Tate - Blue Day (with Jon Tiven)

Now here is another of the Jon and Sally Tiven reclamation projects, as promised, I also have one with Little Milton coming up next. Jon Tiven seems to have a real talent at this stuff because Blue Day easily outstrips any of the other albums of Tate's final comeback. Strong songs, strong arrangements, strong performance by the star... There are some other projects with Garnet Mimms (Is Anybody Out There?), Betty Harris (Intuition), Don Covay (Adlib), Syl Johnson (Two Johnson's Are Better Than One), and of course the Arthur Alexander album that I've already posted. Should anyone wish to contribute one of those, please leave me a message and an email and I'll get it posted.

"On Blue Day, veteran soul and gospel singer Howard Tate lays down a set so utterly crackling with energy, vitality, and sheer grit one could be forgiven for forgetting that, at the turn of this century, he hadn't recorded in nearly 30 years and had been virtually forgotten and left for dead -- a victim of his own excesses. Tate was quite literally rediscovered by his former producer Jerry Ragovoy and brought back into the recording studio to work his vocal magic on tracks written for him by a stellar cast of songwriters in 2003. In 2006, he recorded A Portrait of Howard backed by the Carla Bley Band as well as a host of guests including Lou Reed, Leonard Cohen band vocalist Perla Batalla, and cellist Jane Scarpantoni. But Blue Day leaves that record in the dust, quite literally. At the age of 70, Tate is in absolutely top form as a singer and song interpreter. Produced by guitarist, songwriter, and multi-instrumentalist Jon Tiven, and recorded at his Nashville studio with wife Sally Tiven on bass and all-star drummer Chester Thompson, the album also features a few choice guests like Jonell Mosser, Mike Farris, Dan Penn, Steve Cropper, Felix Cavaliere, and Joe Bonamassa. Tate is literally unleashed on these tracks, allowed the full range of his voice and his fierce, fiery persona. He is a preacher these days, and his blues and soul singing has been given great depth and dimension by his returning to the roots of his raising in the church.

Tiven wrote or co-wrote all 15 of these cuts, but without Tate's singing, they'd be merely good songs. He makes them great ones. The sound on this set is fat and warm, but it's spare, too -- it feels live, close, and full of kinetics and heat. There is plenty of space for Tate to inhabit each line and literally soar above the backing band. The opener, "Miss Beehive," is an attention-getter because it's about Amy Winehouse, her gift, and her self-destructive tendencies. It can be interpreted as tongue in cheek, but it's actually an empathic response to the demons that haunt her -- ones Tate knows only too well. Tiven may have written the tune, but the compassion in its grain lies firmly with the singer, and the arrangement recalls everything from Stax to Motown (the backing chorus and horn chart arrangement evoking those on "Heatwave" is a nice touch). But it's on "40 Days" where the deep well of Tate's soul origins comes pouring from his voice. It's a hard-luck tale of lost love where you become ensnared inside the singer's world and can't extract yourself. On "If God Brought You to It," the raucous wail of Delta blues and the gospel of the Southern black church come roiling up from the body of this duet with Farris. Essra Mohawk provides a killer backing vocal and Billy Block provides the crushing four-on-the-floor drumbeat. The shuffling soul-blues of "First Class" features Cavaliere's keyboards, Cropper on guitar, and Mosser on backing vocals, and this track is a standout. The hunted minor-key blues of "Buried Treasure" may have been written for Tate, but you can hear traces of the voices of both Syl Johnson and Al Green in it as well. The bottom line is this set is all killer and no filler. Tate is at the absolute top of his game at 70; he's making up for lost time with a vengeance." Thom Jurek, AMG

Check out how utterly BAAAD ASS Sally Tiven is on bass!! She tears it up on Improvising!

Howard Tate - Live

Remember Howard Tate? That luminescent Verve album with Jerry Ragovoy was followed by a very good album on Lloyd Price's label and then a reunion with Ragovoy that produced a fine eponymous album in 1972 but the audience for Tate's sound had evaporated and Howard Tate retired from the music industry in the late 1970s. He sold securities in the New Jersey and Philadelphia area, and in the 1980s developed a dependence on drugs, ending up living in a homeless shelter. In the mid-1990s, Tate began counseling drug abusers and the mentally ill, and worked as a preacher.

A disc jockey from Camden, New Jersey, Phil Casden, discovered Tate's whereabouts early in 2001, and in spring 2001 Tate played his first date in many years, in New Orleans. He then began working with Ragovoy on an album that was released, as Rediscovered, in 2003. It included covers of songs by Elvis Costello and Prince, as well as a new version of "Get It While You Can."

At the Roskilde Festival in 2004, he sang "Love Will Keep You Warm" with Swan Lee. The song can be found on Swan Lee - The Complete Collection (2007).

In 2006, Shout! Factory released Howard Tate Live, recorded in Denmark in 2004.