Archive - March, 2008
Saturday, March 29th, 2008
The TSU Toronadoes
“My Thing is a Moving Thing” released November 1969
“Play the Music Toronadoes” released July 1970
Frazier-McKay Productions
Walk long enough through a record label catalog the size of Stax Records’ and you can begin to categorize different artist types. Of course, you’ll find the well-known artists whose hit records brought lots of money and recognition to the label and to themselves. You’ll discover the “behind the scenes” artists who wrote, arranged, recorded, produced or performed on hit records that made other people famous. Almost every catalog includes artists who recorded one or maybe two sessions for that label. John Lee Hooker, for example, is one such Stax “one off” - his album That’s Where It’s At was released because Stax purchased session tapes recorded for but never released on another label. Hooker never recorded in a Stax studio or even signed a Stax contract.
The TSU Toronadoes were another Stax “one off.” In the mid-1960s, Nelson Mills (trumpet), Leroy Lewis (saxophone), Will Thomas (guitar), Calvin Harper (trumpet), Cal Thomas (vocals), Tanny Busby (bass) and Dwight Burns (drums) came together as the The TSU Toronadoes in and around Texas State University. Soon they were mentored and shepherded into the music business by Houston DJ Skipper Lee Frazier.
You’ve most likely heard the TSU Toronadoes before even if you didn’t know it: They drove the smokin’ instrumental backup behind “Tighten Up,” the ‘68 hit single for Archie Bell and the Drells that broke nationwide. “Tighten Up” was released on Atlantic Records, and through Atlantic’s distribution deal with Stax, the Toronadoes signed to the Stax subsidiary Volt, which released these two singles.
“My Thing is a Moving Thing” rocks a hard-driving instrumental but has vocals too. This funk stomp follows the parade of instruments pattern of Sly Stone’s “Dance to the Music,” with Cal Thomas’ falsetto calling out drums, bass (which responds with the melody from “Mary Had a Little Lamb”), guitar and horns, even down to the vocal “boom-boom” vamp to close. “My Thing” sounds recorded live the studio, raw cut and hot.
Similarly, “Play the Music Toronadoes” bumps and grinds very much like the Bar-Kays’ instrumental hit for Stax “Soul Finger,” a catchy instrumental riff paired with a female vocal that breathlessly urges, “Play the music, Toronadoes.”
With these two Volt singles, The TSU Toronadoes’ recorded road pretty much reached its end. Both singles are available on The Complete Stax/Volt Soul Singles Volume 2, where Rob Bowman’s notes call the Toronadoes “one of the great frat bands of all time.” You can also find “My Thing” on the ‘97 compilation Stax Funx.
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Monday, March 24th, 2008
During the final verse of his Sam Cooke-inspired 1967 hit “Sweet Soul Music,” the late Arthur Conley (a protégé of Otis Redding’s) referred to his mentor as ‘the King of them all, y’all’ and in the royal court of rhythm and blues, Conley was pretty much right on target. Time has a strange way of causing us to sometimes forget musical pioneers whose impact reaches beyond generations. I recently played an Otis Redding track on my weekly UK Solar radio show, “Dedicated To Soul” (which airs on Sundays,10-midnight GMT, 5pm-7pm EST and 2pm-4pm PST at www.solarradio.com) and as I listened, I marveled at Redding’s ability to interpret a song with such soulful feeling. The particular song I featured was “I’ve Got Dreams To Remember,” a tune he co-wrote with wife Zelma that was reissued posthumously after his tragic death in 1967. It’s plaintive, honest and delivered with such emotion that you can truly feel Redding’s mix of angst and passion.
That track is one of the thirteen that legendary Stax guitarist Steve Cropper chose to include on the 2006 “Stax Profiles” set. Cropper was present and played on Redding’s memorable Memphis sessions: in his accompanying liner notes, he states, “We all looked up to Otis, and when we were in the studio he was in total control of his surroundings. We couldn’t wait to see what he was going to come up with next… We literally had a blast recording Otis.”
The admiration and enjoyment that Cropper, other members of the MGs (Duck Dunn on bass, Al Jackson Jr. on drums and Booker T. Jones on keyboards) and the magnificent horn players (inevitably members of The Mar-Keys) is evident on all of Redding’s recordings. The “Stax Profiles” set mixes studio recordings with some live material from Otis’ performances at the Los Angeles Whiskey A Go Go (in April 1966) and his famous appearances in London as part of the Stax/Volt Revue (in March ’67, which I had the pleasure to witness). In either environment – live or in the studio – Redding brought realness to his work. As I listen to his version of Jackie Wilson’s bluesy “A Woman, A Lover, A Friend,” I marvel at his interpretative skills. Like other soul greats – such as Aretha Franklin – he could literally anyone else’s songs and make them his own: other examples on this fine 13-track set include Sam Cooke’s “A Change Is Gonna Come” and The Stones’ fast’n’furious “Satisfaction,” two tunes Franklin herself reinvented in ’67.
However it is Redding’s originals that enduringly stay in my memory: as I listen to the fervor of “My Lover’s Prayer” or the understated “Champagne And Wine,” I appreciate the distinctive uniqueness of Redding’s vocalizing. He is singular, one of a kind, his own man – and even when he’s celebrating – as he does with “Happy Song (Dum Dum),” you can feel the joy. It’s no surprise that Cropper picked some brilliant examples of Otis Redding’s power and presence for this CD. There’s not much else to say but listen and marvel at the artistry of one of soul music’s greatest!
David Nathan
a/k/a “The British Ambassador Of Soul”
Owner, www.soulmusic.com, www.soulmusicstore.com, www.soulmusicglobal.com
Secretary, The Rhythm & Blues Foundation (www.rhythm-n-blues.org)
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Saturday, March 22nd, 2008
The Soul Children did some mighty huffin’ and puffin’ with the original material recorded during the sessions covered by Hold On, I’m Coming, and we’ve seen how much of this music copped Top 20 R&B single status. But the best music to come out of these sessions was three tunes made famous by other artists yet enlivened by these new and different Stax treatments.
Its title track was the most important and successful, and also unusual because it featured the writers and producers of the original song rearranging that material and serving as producers for the cover version too. Isaac Hayes was more sure than anyone, including co-composer and production partner David Porter and male Children vocalists Norman West and J. Blackfoot, that they could back off the throttle of Sam & Dave’s original houserocker yet lose no power by cutting the groove down into a more slow-burning and funky stomp. Hayes’ vision proved correct, especially when executed in Blackfoot’s hot, torrential singing voice like the end of the first verse. This funky update made it to #48 R&B single.
Blackfoot’s voice also dominates “Love Is A Hurtin’ Thing,” a hit for Lou Rawls in 1966, especially through powerful opening lines that burn as hard and hot as any Otis Redding vocal. “I want to talk about love right now,” he begins; then as if lost for new words to express his testimony, Blackfoot repeats the phrase “right now” over and over, hammering down riveting soul. Produced by Jim Stewart and Al Jackson, Jr., “Love is a Hurtin’ Thing” might have deserved better than its #59 R&B singles chart placement.
Stewart and Jackson also produced the Children’s version of “Signed, Sealed, Delivered I’m Yours,” a group vocal led by the female Children and the last cut on Hold On, I’m Coming drawn from these foundational 1970 - ‘73 sessions. Its strikingly rearranged tempo, slowed down to the sweet thick taste of country molasses, lets you hear Stevie Wonder’s familiar classic in a whole new way.
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Saturday, March 15th, 2008
The Soul Children: Hold On, I’m Coming
By 1971, Isaac Hayes was so popular and obligated as a solo artist that he had no time left to invest in other Stax artists, including the group that was partly his creation, The Soul Children. Jim Stewart and Al Jackson Jr. took over producing the group.
Rob Bowman suggests in his booklet notes for The Complete Stax-Volt Soul Singles Volume 2 that, “The Soul Children’s work in this period probably encompasses the most underrated recordings issued by Stax.” The studio version of “Hearsay” that climbed to #5 on the R&B singles chart after its February ‘72 release is represented on Hold On by the concert version recorded during the Children’s performance at Wattstax.
Blackfoot and Bennett split the lead vocal on the soulfully homespun “Don’t Take My Kindness for Weakness,” which made it up to #14 R&B after its June ‘72 single release. Released in Janaury ‘73, “It Ain’t Always What You Do (It’s Who You Let You See Do It)” ascended to #11 R&B single. Its message is both cheerful and moral, and one wonders how such a warm sweet slice of folksy country soul, led by a female voice, never made it to the Staples Singers for Mavis to sing. Stewart and Jackson produced all three of these singles.
Even so, the Soul Children, like many other Stax artists, also made some great music using other peoples’ tunes. In fact, for my money, the three best tunes on Hold On, I’m Coming are cover versions of other artists. Next time, those barnburners.
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