Ricky Nelson - Mighty Good
Imperial 5614 (1959)
As mighty good as it felt to Ricky, it sounds mighty good to the rest of us. Ooh wee. Ricky Nelson always had a crack band behind him and together with his easy-on-the-ear vocals and great songwriters, his singles nearly always hit the spot. Even by his high standards, Mighty Good features pretty high on the Rickster Scale. Amazingly, the song was cut fifty years ago today at Master Recorders in Hollywood with Jimmy Haskell producing.
The band was the usual suspects James Burton (guitar), James Kirkland (bass), Gene Garf (piano), Richie Frost (drums) and Billy Strange also on guitar. Kirkland and garth were soon to be replaced by Joe Osborne and Ray Johnson, but that’s irrelevant. The other song cut on the date was I Wanna Be Loved but it was the top side of Imperial 5614 that floats my boat.
Mighty Good was written by regular Ricky Nelson tunesmith Baker Knight and was a typical Nelson rocker in that James Burton picks his ass off throughout. The female backing vocals round out the sound and compliment Ricky’s controlled performance. As well as underpinning the beat, Jimmy B gives another in his long line of wonderful solos. At a time was rock ‘n’ roll was making way for the Bobby Soft era, Mighty Good showed that Ricky was a genuine rocker.
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