The Isley Brothers Twist & Shout

The Isley Brothers: O'Kelly Isley, Ronald Isley, Rudolph Isley (vocals).
Includes original release liner notes by Jerry Blavat "The Geator With The Heator." Originally released on Wand (LP 653) except tracks 14 & 15 - Wand (singles 127 and 131), and track 12 which is a previously unreleased track.
On this album, the Isleys tried to mine the "Twist & Shout" groove for all it was worth. Produced by Bert Berns, over half the material was written or co-written by "Russell" -- the same Russell who co-wrote "Twist and Shout," which was a pseudonym for Berns himself. Not that this was necessarily a bad thing. "Twist and Shout" was a stone classic, and many of the other tunes do their best to emulate its groove with Latin rhythms and the Isleys' frayed, gospelish vocals. Some of the tracks, though, do little more than rework the basic riff, and even the ones that aren't blatant rewrites don't measure up to the hit. The ballad "Time After Time" is a nice change of pace, and the brothers are never less than energetic and entertaining, but this is really not that strong as a whole. ~ Richie Unterberger

• Genre: Blues
• Format: Vinyl