I'm A Bad, Bad Girl: The Esther Phillips Story

 Labeling Esther Phillips a blues singer is doing her a disservice because over the course of her rocky career she tackled R&B, soul, jazz, pop, disco, and even country with equal authority. This versatility was also something of a curse because record labels simply didn't know what to do with her. Unfortunately this was the least of her troubles which also included a life long addiction to hard drug starting in her teens and finally killing her before her fiftieth birthday.

 Esther Phillips was born Esther May Jones on December 23, 1935 in Galveston, Texas. In 1948, she won an amateur contest in Los Angeles, singing Dinah Washington's "Baby Get Lost" at a nightclub belonging to bluesman Johnny Otis. Otis brought the 13-year-old into the studio for a recording session with Modern Records and added her to his live revue. Billed as "Little Esther," and sounding mature beyond her years, she recorded "Double Crossing Blues" with Johnny Otis, selling 400,000 copies before her 14th birthday. More successful singles followed including "Mistrustin' Blues," "Misery," "Cupid Boogie," and "Deceivin' Blues."

 She had a falling out with Otis purportedly over money which led to her departure from his show. In 1951 and 1952, she recorded for the Federal label. She recorded infrequently through the remainder of the 1950s: six sides for Decca in 1953, three for Savoy in 1956, and then three more in 1959. By the late '50s, her experiments with hard drugs had developed into a heroin addiction.

  Little Esther worked in small nightclubs around the South, and continued to battle her addiction which led her to frequent hospital stays. In 1962, she was rediscovered while singing at a Houston club by future country star Kenny Rogers, who got her signed to his brother's Lenox label. She renamed herself Esther Phillips and recorded a country-soul reading of the soon-to-be standard "Release Me," which was released as a single. "Release Me" hit big, topping the R&B charts and hitting the Top Ten on both the pop and country charts. She recorded a country-soul album of the same name, but Lenox went under in 1963.

 Phillips’ wasn't out of work long and her Lenox contract was picked up by Atlantic Records. Atlantic recorded Phillips in many different styles, but none of the resulting singles really caught on and the label dropped her in late 1967. She did have brief success with a remake of the Beatles song "And I Love Him" which just missed the R&B Top Ten in 1965 and reading of Percy Sledge's "When a Woman Loves a Man" which also made the R&B charts.

 Phillips checked into a rehab facility in the late 60's and cut some sides for Roulette in 1969 and re-signed with Atlantic. A late-1969 live gig at L.A.'s Freddie Jett's Pied Piper club produced the album "Burnin'", a highly acclaimed live set (Atlantic issued more material from this same engagement on the "Confessin' the Blues" album issued in 1975). Despite that success, Atlantic still wanted her to record pop tunes and when these failed to hit she was let go for good.

 In 1971, she signed with the Kudu label, a subsidiary of CTI. Her debut album , "From a Whisper to a Scream", was released in 1972 to strong sales and highly glowing reviews, particularly for her performance of Gil Scott-Heron's candid heroin-addiction tale "Home Is Where the Hatred Is." Aretha Franklin so admired the album that when the Queen of Soul was awarded a Grammy she graciously gave her Grammy to Phillips, saying that she deserved it more. She recorded several more albums for Kudu over the next few years and achieved long overdue success, performing in high-profile venues and numerous international jazz festivals. In 1975, she scored her biggest hit single since "Release Me" with a disco styled reading of Dinah Washington's "What a Diff'rence a Day Makes" (Top Ten R&B, Top 20 pop), and the accompanying album of the same name became her biggest seller yet.

 In 1977, Phillips left Kudu for Mercury. She recorded four albums for the label, but with little commercial success and after 1981's "A Good Black Is Hard to Crack", she found herself without a record deal. Her last R&B chart single was 1983's "Turn Me Out," a one-off for the small Winning label. She continued to perform and record until 1984, when she was admitted into a hospital for liver and kidney failure. She died on August 7, 1984 at the age of 48.

Essential Listening

The Johnny Otis Rhythm & Blues Caravan: The Complete Savoy Recordings (Savoy): A fantastic 3-CD collection of vintage R&B from the early day of the Johhny Otis band. Includes early hits by Little Esther like "Cupid's Boogie", "Wedding Boogie" and "Double Crossing Blues."

Burnin'/Confessin' The Blues (Collectibles): A great twofer collecting "Burnin'" and "Confessin' the Blues" on one CD. "Confessin' the Blues" dates from 1966 and 1970 and is perhaps her finest blues recording backed by all-star big band and produced by King Curtis. The aptly titled "Burnin'" is a scorching live album recorded at the Pied Piper in Los Angeles in 1970.

From A Whisper To A Scream (CTI): This 1971 date garnered a Grammy nomination but seems to be out of print. Phillips is at her mature best on the unflinching ""Home Is Where the Hatred Is", "Scarred Knees" and a fine reading of "How Blue Can You Get?."

The Best of Esther Phillips 1962-1970 (Rhino): This two-CD, 40-song set is an excellent overview of her work drawing from about half a dozen albums and numerous singles. Includes gems like "Release Me", "No Headstone on My Grave", "And I Love Him", "Cry Me a River Blues" and many others.