A Year of Blind Spots: Give It Up

I didn't listen to her big song. It wasn't on this album. Of course, I'm familiar with the big song. That one remains Raitt's biggest hit (topped at #5 on the Billboard Hot 100), but that wouldn't come till later. 1991, to be precise, on Luck of the Draw. Nine albums previous in her discography, we have Give It Up, which does not sound anything like the big song. As to whether this is a case of Bonnie Raitt still discovering who she was and what she wanted to sound like in 1972, only to solidify it 20 years later, OR if it's a case of Bonnie Raitt solidifying what her sound was in 1972, and then meeting the general populace in the middle 20 years later to make that motherfucking bank, I am not going to be the one to say. Suffice it to say—Give It Up is not the Bonnie Raitt you know if you only listen to adult easy listening radio.

Now, based on the big song, I would've guessed that Bonnie Raitt skewed more toward country music than anything else. That is not the case here. I hear Dr. John, I hear Carole King, I hear James Taylor, I hear John Denver, I hear blues in the tradition of Muddy Waters. The overall gestalt makes me think that Bonnie Raitt was one cocaine addiction away from getting an invitation to The Last Waltz. I definitely don't hear much country music, though. And I'm totally cool with that.

But I also don't necessarily hear anything worth getting excited about on Give It Up. The best albums I listen to for this column are the albums that make me go, "holy shit I can't believe I was missing this!" Give It Up is a very nice album, and Raitt is very competent at the early-'70s singer-songwriter thing, but that's faint praise, and I know I'm damning it by saying so. Oh well.

As always, we can probably at least partially blame it on context (as if you wanted to read even a single additional word written about the fact that I am being beat over the head with final homework assignments currently). Did I give Bonnie Raitt my full attention? I don't know. Maybe not. But I won't, um, give it up. Promise. Maybe if I actually give the big song some attention, it'll unlock something for me? Or maybe not.

Happy Saturday, everybody, I'll be here for the next 425 days in a row.