Man On The Inside

The only album from Texas-born Johnny Sayles isn’t particularly well known but it’s a strong album in the Chicago soul canon. Sayles has a hard, gritty voice, reminiscent of Wilson Pickett and the material here is generally up-tempo, hard-rocking soul and funk apart from ‘Voices From The Inside’ which is slow-paced, stalking, stark blues with added rainstorm sound effects. Produced by Chicago music luminary Willie Henderson, there’s something of a down-home Southern soul flavour to the tracks and overall its blend of Chi-soul orchestration and Southern Soul rawness works very well.