VA - Velvet Shadows (A Butterboy Compilation) (4 x CDs)

SOUL, JAZZ, BLUES

VA - Velvet Shadows (A Butterboy Compilation) (4 x CDs)

Velvet Shadows is a journey through the after‑hours corners of soul, jazz, and blues where intimacy and unease share the same space. Across four discs I’ve traced a lineage of voices and players who understood that the night is both sanctuary and reckoning. This isn’t music for the spotlight, it’s music for the people who move in silence, who speak in gestures and live in grooves. It’s music for the long walk home, for the quiet reckoning, for the slow burn.

CD1 begins with Gil Scott‑Heron’s Pieces of a Man, a reminder that social truth can be whispered as easily as shouted. From Luther Ingram’s wounded ballad to Nina Simone’s sly provocation, the disc balances confession with confrontation. Esther Phillips’ Home Is Where the Hatred Is anchors the mood, her phrasing turning Gil’s words into a smoky lament carved from midnight air. Rarities like Bobby Parker’s Blues Get Off My Shoulder and Leon Thomas’ Echoes remind us that the shadows often hide treasures overlooked by the daylight.

CD2 moves into darker hues, where Charles Bradley’s fire meets Nick Cave’s whispered menace. Barry Adamson’s noir funk and Marvin Gaye’s cinematic Trouble Man sketch urban landscapes lit by neon and shadow. Tricky, Timber Timbre, and Mark Lanegan extend the reach into modern gothic soul, proving Velvet Shadows isn’t bound by era but by atmosphere. Here, the lineage stretches from Little Willie John’s Fever (1956) to Curtis Harding’s With You (2021), nearly seven decades of nocturnal testimony.

CD3 is the most introspective, a disc of ballads and meditations. Mal Waldron and Jackie McLean’s Left Alone sets the tone, while Cassandra Wilson’s version of Strange Fruit and Morphine’s The Night deepen the reflection. Andy Bey, Moses Sumney, and José James carry the shadows inward, voices that ache with fragility and resilience. Doug Carn’s Infant Eyes and Gary Bartz’s Celestial Blues stand as spiritual jazz landmarks, rarities that collectors know but casual listeners rarely encounter.

CD4 closes with pure jazz immersion. Pharoah Sanders, Miles Davis, Mingus, and Donald Byrd remind us that shadows can be spiritual, modal, and transcendent. From Ellington’s sly swing to Axelrod’s cinematic sweep, the disc ends with Byrd’s Cristo Redentor, a benediction for the journey, a hymn carved in brass and silence.

Taken together, Velvet Shadows spans nearly eighty years of recordings, from Buddy Johnson’s wartime swing to Olw Rave’s contemporary fusion. It is collector‑grade, yes, but more than that it is a curated map of nocturnal moods: torch songs, blues confessionals, and jazz meditations sequenced to feel like one long night. Some records whisper. These ones smolder. It is velvet music, smooth yet heavy, soft yet unyielding. Shadows that comfort, shadows that confront. An invitation to linger in the velvet dark. 

Curated with care. Sequenced for immersion. Made for those who know that the deepest truths are often whispered. Pour something dark. Dim the lights. Let the velvet shadows in. (B)

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Track list

CD1

01 Gil Scott-Heron - Pieces of a Man 4:54 1971

02 Luther Ingram - (If Loving You is Wrong) I Don't Want to Be Right 3:35 1972

03 Melody Gardot - Who Will Comfort Me 4:57 2009

04 Bobby Parker - Blues Get Off My Shoulder 2:48 1957

05 Nina Simone - Do I Move You? 2:48 1967

06 Hannah Williams & The Affirmations - Late Nights & Heartbreak 4:15 2016

07 Little Jimmy Scott - Nothing Compares 2 U 6:17 1998

08 Etta Jones - Don't Go to Strangers 3:56 1960

09 Mose Allison - Your Mind is on Vacation 2:37 1976

10 Cassandra Wilson - Time After Time 4:06 1999

11 Lou Donaldson - Ode to Billy Joe (Bobbie Gentry) 6:26 1967

12 Taj Mahal - Leaving Trunk 6:26 1968

13 Lou Rawls - Dead End Street Monologue Dead End Street 3:47 1967

14 Betty Carter - Open The Door 3:14 1964

15 Patrice Rushen - Settle for My Love 5:17 1979

16 Leon Thomas - Echoes 5:38 1969

17 Roberta Flack - Early Ev'ry Midnight 5:54 1975

18 Shirley Horn - Here's to Life 5:37 1992

19 Esther Phillips - Home is Where The Hatred Is 3:25 1971

20 Mark Murphy - Stolen Moments 5:46 1978

21 Abbey Lincoln; Stan Getz - Bird Alone 8:34 1991

CD2

01 Charles Bradley - The World (Is Going Up in Flames) 3:22 2010

02 Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds - Lime Tree Arbour 2:56 1997

03 Barry Adamson - Jazz Devil 5:06 1998

04 Nick Waterhouse - Katchi 3:40 2016

05 Curtis Harding - With You 3:42 2021

06 Danger Mouse & Daniele Luppi (feat. Norah Jones) - Black 3:31 2011

07 Heavy - Short Change Hero 4:00 2009

08 Khruangbin - August 10 4:25 2018

09 Menahan Street Band - Make The Road By Walking 3:04 2008

10 Black Pumas - Fire 4:04 2019

11 Leonard Cohen - You Want it Darker 4:44 2016

12 Marvin Gaye - Trouble Man 3:58 1972

13 Tricky feat. Martina Topley-Bird - Hell is Round the Corner 3:47 1995

14 Valerie June - Twined & Twisted 3:15 2013

15 Timber Timbre - Run From Me 4:16 2014

16 El Michels Affair - C.R.E.A.M. 2:52 2006

17 Little Willie John - Fever 2:41 1956

18 Tom Waits - Goin' Out West 3:20 1992

19 Budos Band - Up From The South 3:27 2005

20 Adrian Younge - Turn Down the Sound 3:12 2011

21 Mark Lanegan Band - The Gravediggers Song 3:46 2011

CD3

01 Mal Waldron and Jackie McLean - Left Alone 8:23 1959

02 Jimmy Witherspoon - In the Evenin' 3:40 1957

03 Cassandra Wilson - Strange Fruit 5:36 1996

04 Chris Connor - All About Ronnie 2:59 1953

05 Andy Bey - Midnight Blue 5:48 1998

06 Big Maybelle - Candy 2:40 1956

07 Cinematic Orchestra - To Build a Home 6:11 2007

08 Helen Merrill - Don't Explain 5:14 1955

09 Moses Sumney - Doomed 4:21 2017

10 Champion Jack Dupree - You Can Make It 4:38 1968

11 El Michels Affair - Tearz feat. Lee Fields & The Shacks 2:31 2017

12 Morphine - The Night 4:47 2000

13 Doug Carn - Infant Eyes 10:09 1971

14 Esther Phillips - Disposable Society 5:21 1975

15 Otis Taylor - They Wore Blue 3:32 2008

16 Mark Lanegan Band - Bleeding Muddy Water 6:20 2012

17 Jos  James - Take Me Home 4:06 2010

18 Gary NTU Troop Bartz - Celestial Blues 7:33 1971

19 Me'Shell Ndeg ocello - Outside Your Door 5:08 1999

20 Max Richter - This Bitter Earth, on The Nature of Daylight (with Dinah Washington) 6:12 2010

21 Donald Fagen - Maxine 3:49 1982

CD4

01 Pharoah Sanders - Astral Traveling 5:45 1971

02 Nyctophiliac - Midnight Radio 3:20 2016

03 Miles Davis - Generique 2:50 1957

04 Buddy Johnson & His Orchestra - Far Cry 3:22 1944

05 Warren Barker - Caper at The Coffee House 2:07 1959

06 Yusef Lateef - Love Theme From Spartacus 4:16 1961

07 Lee Morgan - I Remeber Clifford 7:08 1957

08 Duke Ellington - Flirtibird 2:13 1959

09 Quincy Jones - The Midnight Sun Will Never Set 4:57 1964

10 Keith Jarrett - One Day I'll Fly Away 4:19 2008

11 Olw Rave - Wellness at One Eyed Jacks 6:51 2020

12 52 Emil Brandqvist Trio - Emil Brandqvist Trio - While We Are Here 5:06 2018

13 Booker Ervin - Gichi 7:29 1968

14 Frankie Ortega and Sy Oliver - Lady in Distress 2:29 1958

15 Stanley Turrentine - In Memory Of 7:00 1964

16 Harold Land - Dark Mood 8:51 1958

17 David Axelrod - Song of Innocence 4:32 1968

18 Michael Brecker - Midnight Mood 6:23 1998

19 Charles Mingus - Goodbye Pork Pie Hat 4:49 1959

20 Miles Devils Quartet - Norma's Coffee 3:30 2015

21 Donald Byrd - Cristo Redentor 5:45 1963

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Music weaves itself into the fabric of our emotions, dances through the corridors of memory, and whispers to the soul of who we are. Sharing these stories deepens the connection, turning the experience into something timeless and profound.

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