Elvis Presley - Good Times (1974/2015) [HDTracks]

No one could have known it at the time, but Elvis Presley had only a handful of studio albums left ahead of him when Good Times showed up in the late winter of 1974. Recorded in the summer and fall of the previous year at Stax Studios in Memphis, this ten-song album caught the artist near his late-career peak -- he still had better, greater records left to do, but there's nothing here that mars the image or the legend. Whether trading in rock & roll or soul sounds or accompanied by a full-blown gospel choir on "If That Isn't Love," he's in great voice, and with the likes of James Burton and Norbert Putnam playing with him, it's hard to find any fault with Good Times, except perhaps its brevity. It wasn't necessarily what longtime fans or potential listeners among younger audiences were looking for, but the album has more than stood the test of time, even if it isn't his best work of this period.