Apparently this was a shocking album at the time: a young black RnB singer taking on the country genre. I guess that beyond the race aspect, this was still an age where artists largely stuck to their pigeon-hole, less of the freewheeling genre-mixing that would come later.
Stripped of that shock and 'historical' importance, it's still a strong album... not Ray's best, but still a good collection of tracks. It works best (to my tastes) when it's Ray putting his touch on songs that still sound well rooted in the country vein, so I prefer the ballads to the brassier, jazzier renditions on here.
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