Doris Duke: "I'm A Loser"

Yeah, I know, starting out on a bummer note.  But c’mon, what is misery if not a universal characteristic?  This record isn’t “northern soul,” or “southern soul,” or even “deep soul”...it’s heartbroken soul.  I don’t think I have heard such pain on a record in a very, very long time, if ever.  Sure, many artists indulge in a track here and there that revels in melancholy, but rarely are they so bold as to create a whole album around that feeling.  The sad thing is, when you hear forty to fifty minutes of such low, down-and-out tragedy, you can’t help but worry about the person behind it all.  Doris Duke, of course, is a distant memory to most, and so who knows what inspired her to wreak such emotional havoc on wax.  She absolutely succeeds in creating a mood; a bleak, scorched-earth soundscape aided immensely by Jerry “Swamp Dogg” Williams’ able production and songwriting skills.  Songs like “I Can’t Do Without You” and “Ghost Of Myself” are world-weary, heart-wrenching pleas made palatable by the church-ified, Southern-rooted grooving of the session band, featuring Jesse Carr and (possibly) Duane Allman on guitars.  Other tunes, like “He’s Gone” and “Feet Start Walking,” have a vacant, spacious energy to them that suits the material perfectly, mirroring the empty resignation apparent in Duke’s voice; she sings like a person who has nothing left to give, nothing emotional left to invest.  The truth is, this is one of those underground masterpieces that will never be heard by enough people, yet that is what makes it so desirable to the committed few, and indeed, records like these are the very reason the term “deep soul” was coined in the first place.  Keep on diggin, y’all.