Rita Coolidge - Rita Coolidge/Nice Feelin' (Music CD)

This twofer neatly captures the beginning of Rita Coolidge's career by combining her first two albums, which both came out in 1971. Each one dented the bottom rungs of the charts, but Coolidge's star didn't really ascend until her third album. Nevertheless, this is an intriguing look at her beginnings, and a reminder of what a soulful singer she was, right from the start. While there's a bit of high-gloss pop here and there, the overwhelming feeling one comes away with is that of a straight-up R&B singer giving her all on everything from the Albert King blues classic "Born Under a Bad Sign" to Steve Young's "Seven Bridges Road."