Crawl Into Bed With A Rattlesnake

Bop Till You Drop was Ry Cooder's most commercially successful album without exhibiting any particular concessions to popular taste. It was an r 'n' b based album and made particular use of the backing voices of Bobby King and co. King actually sings lead beautifully on the closing track I Can't Win. Chaka Khan also makes a couple of guest vocal appearances and there are deluxe LA session men like Jim Keltner and David Lindley enhancing the production values and making the feel slightly less down home than on the earlier releases. It retains the quirkiness for which Cooder's records were renowned however and there is an element of acting out the lyrics which enhances songs like Down In Hollywood and Trouble You Can't Fool Me. But the heart of the album perhaps lies in the opening three tracks; the almost hit Little Sister, the aching Go Home Girl and the brooding The Very Thing That Makes You Rich. Cooder and the band toured the album to death and he has subsequently said that he wasn't comfortable with this phase of his career but anyone who caught the live shows would be hard pressed to think that he wasn't having a ball.