Someday

Someday includes all but one of the songs on the seven singles released between 1966-72 by the obscure Philly soul vocalist (somehow the 1970 cut "Didn't We" went missing), padded with ten previously unreleased tunes. Walker was a solid falsetto singer, and his work on these sides is all the more impressive considering he was still of high school age when he made his first 45. It's also impressive that he wrote or co-wrote most of the tracks on the CD, yet in the end it's just good journeyman Philadelphia soul. That's a good thing, not a mediocre thing, but you can't really say that any of the numbers were so outstanding that they should have demanded national attention. Walker did vary the program to include up-tempo sweet soul as well as ballads. But it was the slow and sad tunes on which he was at his best, particularly the local 1967 hit "Really, Really Love You" and "I'm Saying Goodbye," which have that sad, late-night smoochy vibe so peculiar to Philadelphia soul of the era. On the later sides, he got into a slightly slicker, more groove-oriented direction that could strongly echo Motown; it's easy to imagine Smokey Robinson doing some of this as album filler, for instance, and "Now That You're Gone" sounds like a late-'60s Supremes cut with a high-pitched male singer. This review might be making the disc sound less attractive than it is; although Walker's not a standout, this is certainly above average by the standards of little-known soul from the time being excavated for the collector's market.