"We always rehearse as a quartet, and that's what's on the album. So there's a lot more singing," said Cray. "Tunes like 'Tell The Landlord' we did in just one take, just to keep it loose and funky. And on some stuff I went back and resang the songs. It was a lot of work, and a lot of fun." Cray produced the entire set of eight original and two cover tracks with the trimmed-down group. It's the first album ever that the band has recorded without horns.

The opening "Moan" sets a powerful groove with an upbeat minor-key feel. Then like any great concert, the set begins to build, as the Cray Band weaves modern love stories in with humorous, retro nods to hurtin' and healin' songs of the '50s and '60s. You can taste that good-time humor in a rare Cray Band cover, "Steppin' Out," originally recorded by Syl Johnson. "Tell The Landlord," from which the title Some Rainy Morning is taken, is a gritty, tongue-in-cheek, not-gonna-take-it-anymore tune. It's followed by the oh-so-blue "Little Boy Big, which Cray wrote from ideas collected on scraps of paper while touring behind his last Mercury release, Shame + A Sin. It's the kind of song that lets Cray showcase his love for '60s Southern soul balladeers like O.V. Wright and Bobby "Blue" Bland. But as an artist of the '90s Robert brings a contemporary sophistication to his delivery. In fact he sounds downright jazzy as he soars through the plaintive story of "Little Boy Big."

By the time Some Rainy Morning reaches "Enough For Me," the dance floor is full of couples swinging hard. Then "Jealous Love," a Bobby Womack tune originally covered by "The Wicked" Wilson Pickett, goes for the hard soul sound that opened the gates for rock'n'roll. On the Latin-tinged "Will You Think Of Me," Cray lets his voice loose, then devastates with the closing, emotion soaked guitar solo on "Holdin' On." It's the perfect ending to the set of modern music that is Some Rainy Morning.

The Robert Cray Band was born in the misty Northwest in 1974, a group of young men so dedicated to playing that they would hitchhike from Eugene to Portland in the pouring rain just to rehearse. The band's leader was a born listener, and he had several generations of music to draw from. There was the gospel, jazz, soul and blues in his mom and dad's record collection. Then the Beatles arrived in Seattle, just down the road from the young man's school in Lakewood, Washington, and Young Bob began to rock. "I was in the fifth grade when the Beatles were on their way to Seattle," Cray remembers with a chuckle. "Our teacher let us listen to the radio, and KJR (a legendary rock station of the era) was describing the Beatles' arrival. That's when the guitar became real popular and I got a guitar."

In the early '80s, the Cray Band branched out from Portland and Eugene to Seattle and the San Francisco Bay Area with their sizzling update of blues and soul. The young guitarist and singer, who was so shy he'd sometimes have his back to the audience, soon caught the ears and hearts of the blues establishment. Early on, the band toured with the "Master of the Telecaster" Albert Collins. In 1983, the band's first national tour found them sharing a stage with the "King of the Boogie" John Lee Hooker and Willie Dixon, during which Robert became not only a musical favorite but a longtime friend of these blues art. The legendary Chicago guitarist Muddy Waters took the Cray Band under his wing as an opening act, calling Robert his "adopted son," and giving him one of the greatest thrills of his life. "We did six dates with Muddy a couple of years before he died," Cray recalls. "I would sit backstage before the show, drinking Muddy's champagne, and listen to him talk about 'Young Muddy Waters."'

Once the group's debut record, Who's Been Talkin', was- released in 1 980, Cray's sound began to spread from the clubs to radio and home stereos. By the time Bad Influence (1 983) and False Accusations (1 985) came out, the band's audience had widened with the latter making Newsweek's Top 10 LP picks and reigning as the #1 LP on the U.S. and U.K. indie charts. 1 985 also saw the release of the trio record of the decade, Showdown!, which featured Cray playing with guitar stingers Johnny Clyde Copeland and Albert Collins. The disc yielded each of the three principals his very first Grammy and set Robert Cray on a roll. All five following Cray Band releases were either Grammy winners or nominees. The 1986 breakthrough Mercury debut, Strong Persuader, took the Cray Band to AOR radio and platinum sales, and the ensuing success put Robert's face on a score of magazine covers including Rolling Stone.

In the meantime, rock artists like Keith Richards and Eric Clapton embraced the rising star's fresh approach to classic styles and established musical friendships that continue with topnotch collaborations today. In 1 986 Richards chose Cray to perform in "Hail! Hail! Rock'n'Roll," the concert and film tribute to Chuck Berry. (They would next work together in 1991 as featured guitarists at the worldwide televised Guitar Legends concerts in Seville, Spain, and most recently with Cray's guest appearance on the '94 Rolling Stones' Hoodoo U Voodoo pay-per-view broadcast.) In 1987 Clapton covered Cray's "Bad lnfluence" on August, then asked him to play on Journeyman and 24 Nights. Together Cray and Clapton co-wrote "Old Love," which was one of the high points of the British blues rocker's Grammy-winning 1992 Unplugged disc. It was during the explosive period of the late '80s that Robert also appeared in Tina Turner's "Break Every Rule" international television special and home video which yielded two duet tracks on her Grammy-winning 1988 Live in Europe.

With the overwhelming success of Strong Persuader and its gold-selling follow-up, Don't Be Afraid Of The Dark (1 988), Cray came into the '90s a well-respected artist with impressive credentials. His next three releases -- Midnight Stroll (1 990), 1 Was Warned (1 992), and Shame + A Sin (1 993) -- showed considerable artistic growth as Cray began to let his voice go for the soul he felt inside. Just as his work with some of rock's top names has continued, he has grown in his musical collaborations with some of his earliest mentors and influences, appearing on John Lee Hooker's hit releases The Healer (1 989), Mr. Lucky (1 99 1), and Boom Boom (1 992), and B.B. King's Blues Summit (1 993). And for 1993's Shame + A Sin, Cray invited Albert Collins to be the, first guest guitarist to appear on a Cray Band project. As each of these projects went on to become Grammy winners or nominees, Cray's stature on his own or alongside the legends of our time could not be denied.