Passport photo of Ernest Hemingway, 1923
Come and Get Me is the second in a planned three-part series by Ace Records, covering all the singles released by Jackie DeShannon on Liberty and Imperial Records (I wrote about the first collection, You Won't Forget Me here.) As I get to know DeShannon's career, I'm left with the distinct impression that she was an impressive songwriting and singing talent who was doing her best to share her gift in a record industry that wasn't too good at helping her put her best foot forward. DeShannon's best ideas were shot down by her record label - early in her career, her label refused to let her record an LP of songs by a then-unknown writer called Bob Dylan, and a couple years later, they wouldn't let her release a folk-rock album that would have been ahead of its time. Instead, DeShannon's label saw albums as a way to cash in on bundling together sets of previously released songs - their focus was on finding a say to get DeShannon a smash hit single.
As a result, her singles collections (and Come and Get Me, which covers her '64-'67 singles, in particular) are scattershot, genre-hopping exercises. They had her record and release a single of Buddy Holly covers to appeal to fans of the Beatles when DeShannon was on tour with them. When that didn't work, they had her write a pair of songs with an obscure young writer named Randy Newman. Then they had her record a glossy Christian pop song ("He's Got the Whole World in His Hands") with Jack Nitzsche and, after a jaunt in England working with guitarist Jimmy Page that failed to spawn a hit, they had her record a schmaltzy "message" ballad by Bacharach/David - that song, "What the World Needs Now Is Love", was the DeShannon hit the label had been looking for, and they steered her toward doing more material of that kind. But she continued to experiment with different sounds, having some success with Motown-ish R&B/pop with songs like "Find Me Love".
This may make it sound like Come and Get Me is a hopeless muddle, but the twist is that DeShannon pulls off almost everything she tries (which makes it that much more frustrating that she had trouble breaking through). And she ended up working with a dazzling array of contemporary talents, particularly in the "guitarist" department. This collection includes songs recorded with Glenn Campbell ("It's Love Baby (24 Hours a Day)"), Jimmy Page ("Don't Turn Your Back on Me"), and the Byrds ("Splendor in the Grass") - how cool is that? And DeShannon's voice melds itself to the contours of a rockabilly song, a smoky ballad, or a bouncy slice of folk-pop with equal dexterity. It's just unfortunate that, during this period, she didn't get a chance to record cohesive LPs that presented her vision for pop music in a bigger way.
"Don't Turn Your Back on Me" by Jackie DeShannon
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