Live at Small's Paradise

AMG Review of Live at Small's Paradise

Bruce Eder
All Music Guide

There's very little in the way of audience ambience or other interaction on this recording, done at a club in Harlem, but it does have all of the other expected virtues of a concert recording. The tension of a live performance runs throughout its ten songs, which include the most soulful rendition of "Blowin' in the Wind" this side of Sam Cooke's version, and a King Curtis vocal on "Road Runner." Not as important a document as Live at Fillmore West, which came considerably later in Curtis' career, but not to be ignored, either.