Little Feat - Sailin' Shoes (2LP, 45 tours)
Little Feat [click here to see more vinyl featuring Little Feat]
Lowell George - guitar, lead (all but "Cat Fever") and backing vocals, harmonica, baritone saxophone, drum machine [click here to see more vinyl featuring Lowell George]
Bill Payne - Hammond organ, backing and lead vocals ("Cat Fever"), Wurlitzer electric piano, piano, accordion
Roy Estrada - bass, backing vocals
Richie Hayward - drums, backing vocals, percussion
Milt Holland - percussion on "Easy to Slip" and "Trouble"
Sneaky Pete Kleinow - pedal steel guitar on "Willin'" and "Texas Rose Café"
Debbie Lindsey - backing vocals on "Cold Cold Cold" and "Sailin' Shoes"
Ron Elliott - rhythm guitar on "A Apolitical Blues"
2 LPs, gatefold jacket
Original analog Master tape : YES
Heavy Press : 180g
Record color : black
Speed : 45RPM
Size : 12”
Stereo
Studio
Record Press : Quality Record Pressings
Label : Analogue Productions - Acoustic Sounds 40 Series
Original Label : Warner Bros
Recorded late 1971 in Los Angeles at Amigo Sounds, Sunset Sound and TTG Studios
Engineered by Donn Landee
Produced by Ted Templeman
Mastered by Matthew Lutthans at The Mastering Lab
Originally released in 1972
Reissued in 2026
Tracks:
Side A :
- Easy To Slip
- Cold, Cold, Cold
- Trouble
Side B :
- Tripe Face Boogie
- Willin'
- A Apolitical Blues
Side C :
- Sailin' Shoes
- Teenage Nervous Breakdown
- Got No Shadow
Side D :
- Cat Fever
- Texas Rose Cafe
Reviews :
"Little Feat's debut may have been a great album but it sold so poorly, they had to either broaden their audience or, in all likelihood, they'd be dropped from Warner. So, Sailin' Shoes is a consciously different record from its predecessor - less raw and bluesy, blessed with a varied production and catchier songs. That still doesn't make it a pop record, since Little Feat, particularly in its first incarnation, was simply too idiosyncratic, earthy and strange for that. It is, however, an utterly thrilling, individual blend of pop, rock, blues and country, due in no small part to a stellar set of songs from Lowell George. If anything, his quirks are all the more apparent here than they were on the debut, since Ted Templeman's production lends each song its own character, plus his pen was getting sharper. George truly finds his voice on this record, with each of his contributions sparkling with off-kilter humor, friendly surreal imagery and humanity, and he demonstrates he can authoritatively write anything from full-throttle rock & roll ("Teenage Nervous Breakdown"), sweet ballads ("Trouble," a sublimely reworked "Willin'"), skewered folk ("Sailin' Shoes"), paranoid rock ("Cold, Cold, Cold") and blues ("A Apolitical Blues") and, yes, even hooky mainstream rock ("Easy to Slip," which should have been the hit the band intended it to be). That's not to discount the contributions of the other members, particularly Bill Payne and Richie Hayward's "Tripe Face Boogie," which is justifiably one of the band's standards, but the thing that truly stuns on Sailin' Shoes is George's songwriting and how the band brings it to a full, colorful life. Nobody could master the twists and turns within George's songs better than Little Feat, and both the songwriter and his band are in prime form here." AllMusic Review by Stephen Thomas Erlewine
Ratings :
AllMusic : 5 / 5 , Discogs : 4,76 / 5