Louis Jordan’s big hits for Decca Records were massive in their day (1942-1951), when his infectious brand of good-humored jump blues and jive made him the top star in black music. (Just one Jordan hit sold more copies than the total career record sales of many artists in the Blues Hall of Fame.) ‘Saturday Night Fish Fry,’ ‘Caldonia’ and ‘Let the Good Times Roll’ were among those that remain in the repertoire of many blues and R&B artists to this day. B.B. King once recorded a whole album of Jordan songs.
Six of the selections were No. 1 Race or Rhythm & Blues records in Billboard from 1945 to 1950, some of them for runs of three or four months, and six also crossed over onto the pop charts. Only ‘Knock Me a Kiss’ failed to chart. Jordan had 12 other No. 1 hits that did not make it onto this album, although his works are now widely available on later compilations on MCA and other labels. This 1969 Decca compilation was the first Jordan album billed as a Greatest Hits collection, although most of the tracks had also appeared on a 1958 Decca LP with similar cover art, Let the Good Times Roll.
Tracks: Choo Choo Ch’ Boogie/Let The Good Times Roll/Ain’t Nobody Here But Us Chickens/Saturday Night Fish Fry/Beware/Caldonia/Knock Me A Kiss/Run Joe/School Days (When We Were Kids)/Blue Light Boogie/Don’t Let The Sun Catch You Cryin’.
Released on LP as Decca DL-75035 in 1969; reissued on MCA-274 in 1987.