Timing is, as the cliché goes, everything. That Mavis Staples would make solo records was an inevitability. She was after all the main vocalist on many of the records cut by the family group known universally in the ‘60s as ‘Gospel’s First Family.’ With father Roebuck (always known as ‘Pops’), sister Cleotha and brother Pervis, Mavis could be heard prominently on the group’s Epic recordings in the mid-‘60s and on the albums the Staple Singers recorded for Stax Records, starting in 1968. It was likely Stax head Al Bell who had signed the group to the label who first came up with the idea of having Mavis record solo and in an interesting twist of fate, she enjoyed a chart single on Stax (with “I Have Learned To Do Without You”) in the fall of 1970, months before the family group did.

But timing, as we noted, is everything. Mavis began her Stax solo sessions in February 1969 in Memphis with guitarist Steve Cropper producing the date which featured fellow MGs Duck Dunn on bass and Al Jackson Jr. on drums along with Marvell Thomas (son of Rufus and brother of Carla) on piano. A month later, she was in Muscle Shoals, Alabama where such artists as (childhood gospel fellow road traveler) Aretha Franklin, Etta James, Wilson Pickett and Clarence Carter had already recorded their share of hits in the preceding years. Cropper, who had been assigned to work with The Staple Singers for their first album for the label, “Soul Folk In Action,”
was once again at the production helm working with the members of the Muscle Shoals rhythm section (Barry Beckett, Ed Hinton, David Hood and Roger Hawkins) augmented by Marvell Thomas and none other than Isaac Hayes on organ.

That first LP was completed in April 1969 at the Stax studios in Memphis and it consisted mostly of cover tunes including a pair of Otis Redding remakes, “Security” and “Good To Me,” Joe Simon’s “The Choking Kind,” covers of the late ’68 Dusty Springfield hit “Son Of A Preacher Man,” Marvin Gaye’s “Chained,” the Carla Thomas ’68 charted single, “Pick Up The Pieces” and Sam Cooke’s “You Send Me.” The album’s standouts: the original tune “You’re Driving Me (To The Arms Of A Stranger)” and a soulful long-before-Luther-Vandross-remake of “A House Is Not A Home,” the Bacharach-David song that had started life as the Brook Benton-sung theme for the Shelley Winters movie of the same name about a brothel and became mostly associated with Dionne Warwick who recorded it after Benton in 1964.

Bereft of a hit single, the “Mavis Staples” LP saw no chart or significant sales action; in September 1969, Mavis returned to recording, this time cutting tracks at United Studios in Detroit with produce Don Davis, who had already given longtime Stax soul man Johnnie Taylor his first million-seller with “Who’s Making Love” in 1968. With Horace Ott (a New York arranger known for working with R&B and soul artists) providing great string parts and Davis’ resident rhythm section working behind her, Mavis was in top form. The song choices were perfect for the gospel-reared soulstress: she delivered a blistering version of the ‘40s standard “Since I Fell For You” (with an ad-libbed reference to sax man Eli Fountain in the emotive vamp, “Eli’s a comin’ now” Mavis wails), giving new life to Brook Benton’s “Endlessly” and laying down heart-wrenching vocals on the brilliant “I Have Learned To Do Without You,” “What Happened To The Real Me,” “Don’t Change Me Now” and Homer Banks’ “It Makes Me Wanna Cry.”

“Only For The Lonely” (not a song itself but an album title meant to give an indicator of the LP’s emotional mood) achieved far more recognition than its predecessor, racking up close to three months on the R&B charts following its fall 1970 release. That it didn’t become a massive best-seller along with the breakthrough success The Staple Singers experienced with “Respect Yourself” and “I’ll Take You There” in 1971 and 1972 are likely reasons that Mavis’ solo aspirations were temporarily put on hold, revived at the end of the ‘70s when she recorded with Jerry Wexler for Warner Brothers.

Today, Mavis Staples has become more of a presence on the contemporary music scene, recognized as the ‘voice’ of The Staple Singers but also as a solo performer in her own right. These two early Stax albums – available on one Concord/Stax CD (with the bonus track of a duet she cut in 1969 with Johnnie Taylor) – represent an important chapter in her career and timing being what is, they never received their due when first issued. Listening now, the exquisite soulfulness that is inherently Mavis shines through most especially on “Only For The Lonely.” In my book, thirty-nine years after she cut it, her “Since I Fell For You” may be the most intensely passionate reading ever laid down and worth the price of the entire CD! Just a matter of timing, y’all…

David Nathan
a/k/a “The British Ambassador Of Soul”
Owner, www.soulmusic.com, www.soulmusicstore.com, www.soulmusicglobal.com