otis redding

Today in history:

'Sittin' on the Dock of the Bay' is released.

Music City Miracle takes place.

George Washington delivers State of the Union.

Crazy Horse and his warriors are defeated.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

SUMMARY
In this very special holiday episode of Songcraft, we're taking it back to Christmas at Stax, featuring conversations with some of the luminaries of the storied Memphis label that dominated Southern soul music in the 1960s and 70s. You'll hear from Deanie Parker, William Bell, and Carla Thomas as we celebrate the season and close the book on another year at Songcraft. 

PART ONE
Paul and Scott reflect on 2023, talk Grammy nominations, and tease upcoming episodes for 2024.

PART TWO
Interview segments with Deanie Parker, William Bell, and Carla Thomas about their original holiday songs and what Christmas was like at Stax Records in the glory days. 

The tour bus delivers our travelers for two days in historic Memphis, Tennessee. The National Civil Rights Museum rests on the site of the Lorraine Motel, where Dr. Martin Luther King lost his life to an assassin's bullet while standing on the balcony with his trusted friends, Jesse Jackson, Ralph Abernathy, and Andrew Young. The Museum is housed in a comprehensive series of buildings that outlines the history of Slavery from 1619 to the present day. Exhibits feature the story of resistance and the champions of the Civil Rights Movement. Our tour explores the I AM A MAN Memorial Park and the Sanitation Worker's Strike of 1968 that brought Dr. King to Memphis. Then, we move on to the Burkle House, commonly known as the Slave Haven, a stop on the Underground Railroad. STAX RECORDS in Memphis launched American soul music, celebrated in the STAX Museum where careers were launched including Otis Redding, Isaac Hayes, the Staple Singers, Booker T. & the M.G.'s, and many others. Spoken word artist Rev. Jesse Jackson and comedians Moms Mabley and Richard Pryor got their start in the STAX studios. We end this edition of TRUTH QUEST on Beale Street, the home of B.B. King, Ida B. Wells, and The Memphis Blues. The grand boulevard became the inspiration for James Baldwin's fifth novel If Beale Street Could Talk. SHOW NOTES

In this episode, we happily introduce Sasha Lunginbuhl.

Meet our contributors.

Listen to the entire series - TRUTH QUEST: Exploring the History of Race in America - in their own words.

SUMMARY
Stax Records legend Deanie Parker talks about writing songs for Otis Redding, Albert King, William Bell, and Carla Thomas, dives deep on what made the Stax environment so special, and shines a light on the recently-released box sets of forgotten Stax songwriter demos. 

PART ONE
Scott and Paul discuss the wild story behind the monumental box set Written in Their Soul: The Stax Songwriter Demos.

PART TWO
Our in-depth interview with Deanie Parker

ABOUT DEANIE PARKER
While still in high school, Deanie Parker won a Memphis talent contest and an audition for Jim Stewart at Stax Records. He signed her and released her debut single, on the Volt label, in 1963. The self-penned “My Imaginary Guy” became a regional hit, but the life of a touring artist was not for Parker. She became the first Black employee at Stax’s Satellite Record Shop before joining the label staff as the company’s first publicist in 1964. Learning on the job while studying journalism at Memphis State, Parker eventually became the company’s Vice President of Public Affairs. One of the first female publicists in the music industry, she worked closely with Isaac Hayes, Booker T & the MG’s, Rufus and Carla Thomas, Johnnie Taylor, Albert King, and others. 

Wearing many hats at Stax, Deanie continued to write songs with colleagues such as Steve Cropper, Booker T. Jones, Eddie Floyd, Bettye Crutcher, Mack Rice, Mable John, and Homer Banks, with whom she penned the soul classic “Ain’t That a Lot of Love.” The list of Stax artists who recorded her songs includes Otis Redding, Carla Thomas, William Bell, Sam & Dave, The Staple Singers, and more. Her other writing skills were put to use penning liner notes for classic albums such as Sam & Dave’s Hold On, I’m Comin’, Albert King’s Born Under a Bad Sign, Otis Redding’s Live in Europe, and Shirley Brown’s Woman to Woman. 

From 1987 through 1995, Deanie served as the Assistant Director of the Memphis in May International Festival. A tireless champion of the Stax legacy, she became the first President and CEO of Soulsville, the nonprofit organization established to build and manage the Stax Museum of American Soul Music, Stax Music Academy, and the Soulsville Charter School. She was appointed to the Tennessee Arts Commission in 2004 and, in 2009, was awarded two Emmy awards for the I Am a Man documentary short, for which she was an executive producer and the title song composer. 

The list of artists outside the Stax family who’ve covered Deanie Parker’s songs includes The Rolling Stones, Elvis Costello, Darlene Love, Taj Mahal, Three Dog Night, The Flying Burrito Brothers, The Band, New York Dolls, Simply Red, Hall & Oates, and many others. She is a co-producer and co-liner notes writer of the seven-CD collection Written in Their Soul: The Stax Songwriter Demos, and was recently announced as a 2023 inductee into the Memphis Music Hall of Fame. 

This week's episode continues with a compendium of excerpts from promotional interviews that Jarvis Leatherby has done with heavy metal journalists around the globe in support of Night Demon's forthcoming Outsider album release coming on March 17, 2023. You will hear unscripted reactions to the album from journalists in Japan, Germany and Norway.  The episode also compiles some of the most interesting bits from these interviews.  Included are Jarvis's thoughts on a wide range of topics, including comparisons of Outsider to the band's earlier discography, reasons for the musical changes exhibited on the album, Jarvis's favorite singers and albums, the more unusual merchandise items available this time around, reflections on the early days, perspectives on the Night Demon career path to date, and thoughts on old bands making new albums. 

Become a subscriber today at nightdemon.net/subscriber. This week, subscribers have access to the bonus content below:

Full interview with Ward Records (Japan) - streaming audio and video

Full interview with Way Up Magazine (Germany) - streaming audio and video

Full interview with Scream Magazine (Norway) - streaming audio and video 

LINKS:

Outsider preorders - https://nightdemon.bandcamp.com

Listen at nightdemon.net/podcast or anywhere you listen to podcasts!

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Introducing the Band:
Your hosts Scot Bertram (@ScotBertram) and Jeff Blehar (@EsotericCD) are joined by guest Andrew Fink. Andrew is a member of the Michigan House of Representative (District 35 -- Branch & Hillsdale Counties). Prior to that, he was the district director for Senate majority leader Mike Shirkey. Follow him on Twitter at @AndrewFinkMI.

Andrew’s Music Pick: Otis Redding
Ladies and gentlemens, we are so happy to be here with the Love Crowd tonight because we gotta gotta gotta gotta turn it loose about soul giant Otis Redding, a man whose recorded legacy looms large not just in the history of soul and R&B but in modern popular music as a whole. Redding is universally acknowledged as one of the greatest R&B vocalists of all time, and as a "soul giant," but what is far too less appreciated about him is that he was the first truly modern African-American popular musician, a man self-consciously carving out a sound, pushing sonic boundaries and the traditions of his genre, and working self-consciously to craft albums as complete statements at a time when absolutely no other black artist in the country outside of jazz was thinking along those lines.

Redding's early singles established him, simply on their own terms, as an early Sixties soul great. ("Pain In My Heart," "Mr. Pitiful," "That's How Strong My Love Is," "I've Been Loving You Long," and "Security" are the sorts of timeless Redding soul belters that went immediately into the working books of countless English R&B bands, notably including The Rolling Stones.) His mid-Sixties albums demonstrated that he, alone among all major soul/R&B artists of his era -- long before Stevie or Marvin moved for their artistic freedom -- had a sound and vision that belonged to something more than a series of singles. And the music he was making before he suddenly died (in a December 1967 plane crash while flying between shows) was mutating both into chart-topping contemplative folk-pop ("(Sittin' On) The Dock Of The Bay," his only #1 single) and forward-looking hard funk ("Hard To Handle"). Four albums of posthumous Redding material were released between 1968 and 1970. Much of it is great work. But one can only imagine where Otis would actually have been by 1970. He was growing so quickly as an artist.

Join us this week, as we open with a long discussion of Stax/Volt and the nature of its "sound," and then engage in a celebration of one of the greatest popular musical artists of the Sixties -- and perhaps the most heartbreaking loss of modern musical history, in terms of what we likely missed when that plane went down on a cold winter's day in December 1967. Hail to The King of Soul.

Hoy el CIS publica el barómetro de septiembre, Pedro Sánchez interviene en un acto en Toledo y en Ucrania Vladimir Putin parece no dar marcha atrás a la invasión del país. Repasamos también la entrevista de anoche a Alberto Núñez-Feijóo en La Sexta, el debate de dos proyectos de ley en el Congreso, la subida de la luz prevista para este jueves y el aniversario de la publicación de uno de los discos más memorables de Otis Redding.

Edición · Jorge Quiroga

Realización · Susana León

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The Electric Flag was the brainchild of guitarist Mike Bloomfield, and Long Time Comin' was their debut studio album.  The core of the band was formed by Mike Bloomfield on guitar, Barry Goldberg on keyboards, and Buddy Miles (soon to be with Jimmy Hendrix's Band of Gypsies) on drums.  Additionally, Nick Gravenites would sing lead on several tracks.

With "Long Time Comin'" Bloomfield wanted to create a sound that would feature what he called "American music."  He would draw inspiration from many sources including traditional country, gospel, and R&B, and the result would be a fusion of rock, jazz, R&B, and an early use of a horn section.  The sound would be described as an "eclectic approach toward American musical."  Critics would complement the group's sound on this album, though it would be somewhat of a failure commercially on the charts.

The Electric Flag would put out two albums in 1968, but would break up shortly before their second album was released.  Drug use affected the group's ability to perform, and Bloomfield would later admit that heroin caused his playing to fall apart.

Wayne brings us this classic of southern rock.

Wine
The full name for this song is actually "Drinking Wine Spo-Dee-O-Dee," and is a traditional boogie-woogie blues song about a famous and not very good wine called Thunderbird ("the word is Thunderbird").  It was a creation of E & J Gallo Winery, made cheap with a high alcohol content.

Texas 
Buddy Miles sings lead on this blues track.  This sound would find traction with later groups like ZZ Top and Stevie Ray Vaughan. Bloomfield's playing was inspired by groups he heard in Chicago, and he would become known as one of the premier guitarists in rock music.  "I Wouldn't be an American, If it wasn't for Texas."

Killing Floor 
This is an updated take on the Howlin' Wolf blues classic.  It has a blues feel but with an upbeat tempo.  The Electric Flag would cover this long before Led Zeppelin would make it the basis for "The Lemon Song."  Jimmy Hendrix would play this at the 1967 Monterey Pop Festival.

Groovin' Is Easy 
This is the "hit single" from the album.  The sound is different from the other blues-based tracks, and is a bit more time stamped for the age.  "Groovin's so easy, baby, if you know how.  You don't have to keep yourself forever slavin' - go out an chase whatever you're cravin'."

ENTERTAINMENT TRACK:

main theme from the animated series “Speed Racer”
While it would become a staple of after school and Saturday morning cartoons in the United States, this animated series was crossing the finish line of its run in Japan in this month.  

STAFF PICKS:

Summertime Blues by Blue Cheer
Rob starts off our staff picks with a cover of Eddie Cochran's song from 1958.  Blue Cheer was a psychedelic band out of San Francisco, and considered a precursor to the heavy metal band.  Many consider this song to be the first heavy metal song to chart in the U.S.  They were considered the loudest group in concert at the time.

I Thank You by Sam & Dave 
Bruce takes a soulful turn with the final Sam & Dave release on Stax records, as Stax ended a distribution deal with Atlantic Records (from which Sam & Dave were on loan).  It hit number 3 on the Billboard Pop Singles chart.  ZZ Top would cover this song later on, and it would be their second top 40 hit after "Tush."

(Sittin' On) The Dock of the Bay  by Otis Redding 
Brian's staff pick is another song from Stax records, and the last single from Otis Redding.  Redding died in a plane crash 3 days after recording this song.  It was Redding's biggest hit, and the first posthumous release in the U.S.  It hit number 1 on the Billboard Hot 100.

Are You Gonna Be There (At the Love In) by The Chocolate Watchband
Wayne closes out the staff picks in fine hippie style with  this band out of Los Altos, California.  The Chocolate Watchband started in 1965 and would break up by 1970.  Supposedly Jerry Garcia plays guitar on this track. The story is that when the band's guitarist was too high to play, Garcia was in another studio in the same building, and sat in.

INSTRUMENTAL TRACK:

(Sittin' On) The Dock of the Bay by King Curtis & the Kingmakers
"Dock of the Bay" was so popular that it featured both Redding and this instrumental version on the charts.

Thanks for listening to “What the Riff?!?” 

NOTE: To adjust the loudness of the music or voices, you may adjust the balance on your device. VOICES are stronger in the LEFT channel, and MUSIC is stronger on the RIGHT channel.

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**NOTE: What the Riff?!? does not own the rights to any of these songs and we neither sell, nor profit from them. We share them so you can learn about them and purchase them for your own collections.

The tour bus delivers our travelers for two days in historic Memphis, Tennessee. The National Civil Rights Museum rests on the site of the Lorraine Motel, where Dr. Martin Luther King lost his life to an assassin's bullet while standing on the balcony with his trusted friends, Jesse Jackson, Ralph Abernathy, and Andrew Young. The Museum is housed in a comprehensive series of buildings that outlines the history of Slavery from 1619 to the present day. Exhibits feature the story of resistance and the champions of the Civil Rights Movement. Our tour explores the I AM A MAN Memorial Park and the Sanitation Worker's Strike of 1968 that brought Dr. King to Memphis. Then, we move on to the Burkle House, commonly known as the Slave Haven, a stop on the Underground Railroad. STAX RECORDS in Memphis launched American soul music, celebrated in the STAX Museum where careers were launched including Otis Redding, Isaac Hayes, the Staple Singers, Booker T. & the M.G.'s, and many others. Spoken word artist Rev. Jesse Jackson and comedians Moms Mabley and Richard Pryor got their start in the STAX studios. We end this edition of TRUTH QUEST on Beale Street, the home of B.B. King, Ida B. Wells, and The Memphis Blues. The grand boulevard became the inspiration for James Baldwin's fifth novel If Beale Street Could Talk. SHOW NOTES

In this episode, we happily introduce Sasha Lunginbuhl.

Meet our contributors.

Listen to the entire series - TRUTH QUEST: Exploring the History of Race in America - in their own words.

In this weeks show the boys discuss who should be submitted into the Never Loved Elvis Hall of Fame. Contenders are Oasis, Offspring, Otis Redding, and Orbital. Get your klaxons at the ready!

If you disagree with our choices feel free to let us know through the following social media channels:
 
Follow us at:

Instagram @neverlovedelvis
Facebook @neverlovedelvispod
Twitter @neverlovedelvi2
Email @neverlovedelvispod@gmail.com
YouTube - Never Loved Elvis

 This week we feature Johnny Swift from Seahouse records. Have a listen and check out the links below.

https://www.seahouserecords.com/
https://www.instagram.com/swift.jonny/?hl=en
https://open.spotify.com/artist/4L1yV2c3zFENbMIufecIRM

There is also some correspondence from  listeners.

You can  become a "Roadie" of the show by submitting a five star review and leaving some positive feedback - Any support you can give the show is much appreciated,

Never Loved Elvis:  A truly perfect marriage of knowledge, ignorance and humour.

On this day in 1967, Aretha Franklin's hit song "Respect" was released as a single on the Atlantic Records label.

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Join Meredith Hepner Chapman for the season premiere of The Diary of a Name Dropper Podcast.

Meredith's first guest is her favourite and often most used name drop. Singer, songwriter,  all round lovely person and a bit of a secret footballer- Jack Savoretti.

Jack chats all things music, from his humble beginnings to number 1 albums. From performing in Cafe Nero to performing with Kylie Minogue.  You will will also find out about Jack's love of football, his award winning Portofino Gin and his plans for 2022 and beyond.

Links from this episode:
Jack Savoretti Website  
Jack Savoretti YouTube
Andra Tutto Bene
Portofino Gin

Don't forget to follow Diary of a Name Dropper on Instagram @diaryofanamedropper for podcast updates and exclusive content

Keep In Touch
Don't forget to follow Diary of a Name Dropper on Instagram for podcast updates and exclusive content.


Diary of a Name Dropper is produced by Your Voice Here. Need a Podcast? You need Your Voice Here

On this week's show, we wrap up the merry month of Debts-cember (and the year in general) with...

• the most honorable of mentions
• the runners-up that fill our cup
• the best of the rest of 2021 

All this & much, much less! 

Debts No Honest Man Can Pay is over 2 rock-solid hours of musical eclectica & other noodle stories. The show started in 2003 at WHFR-FM (Dearborn, MI), moved to WGWG-FM (Boiling Springs, NC) in 2006 & Plaza Midwood Community Radio (Charlotte, NC) in 2012, with a brief pit-stop at WLFM-FM (Appleton, WI) in 2004.

It's a thrilling episode of Hall of Songs, in which Tim and Chris discuss the results of the latest round of voting. One song definitely gets into the Hall, and that makes one of us very happy. Any more songs? You'll have to listen to find out. 

Listen, then visit our website at hallofsongs.com. Then come back for our 1971 episode and, after that, vote for the songs that you think should make our hall of fame.

Host: Timothy Malcolm
Host: Christopher Jones
Music commentary and music history

Website: http://www.hallofsongs.com
Social: http://www.twitter.com/hallofsongs

Please rate and review us on Apple Podcasts!
https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/hall-of-songs/id1550546067

It's time to induct new songs into the Hall of Songs, bringing the total to 36. Is it finally time for the Temptations' "My Girl"? Did the Beatles or Elvis Presley get a third song in? What about Otis Redding or Aretha Franklin? Maybe The Jackson 5? Join Tim (and only Tim) for this results show. That's right, Chris isn't around for this one. We'll talk about it. 

So listen, then visit our website at hallofsongs.com. Make sure to come back for our 1970 episode, then vote for the songs you think should be in our song hall of fame.

Host: Timothy Malcolm
Host: Christopher Jones
Music commentary and music history

Website: http://www.hallofsongs.com
Social: http://www.twitter.com/hallofsongs

Please rate and review us on Apple Podcasts!
https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/hall-of-songs/id1550546067

On this week's show, we...

• spin fresh tracks from Idles, Big Thief & Neil Young & Crazy Horse
• blast live cuts from The Replacements & Bruce Springsteen & The E Street Band
• spend quality time with superlative new records from Jason Isbell & The 400 Unit and Jeremy Porter & The Tucos 

All this & much, much less!

Debts No Honest Man Can Pay is over 2 rock-solid hours of musical eclectica & other noodle stories. The show started in 2003 at WHFR-FM (Dearborn, MI), moved to WGWG-FM (Boiling Springs, NC) in 2006 & Plaza Midwood Community Radio (Charlotte, NC) in 2012, with a brief pit-stop at WLFM-FM (Appleton, WI) in 2004.

Recently, and for the first time, Tim opted not to reward the Doors' "Light My Fire" with entrance into the Hall of Songs via the Golden Vote. "Prove me wrong," he told listeners, who were tasked with another election including songs from 1968, '67, '66, and '65. So ... did the listeners prove Tim wrong? Tim and Chris talk about the Hall of Songs election results and bid adieu to several tunes. 

Listen! And go to hallofsongs.com for more information and a chance to vote!

Host: Timothy Malcolm
Host: Christopher Jones
Music commentary and music history

Website: http://www.hallofsongs.com
Social: http://www.twitter.com/hallofsongs

Please rate and review us on Apple Podcasts!
https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/hall-of-songs/id1550546067

Have you ever seen those videos online where someone hears a song, and they’re instantly transported back to a moment? It could be someone with Alzheimers or Dementia, or with a brain injury or trauma that language can’t reach, but music can. Maybe you’ve known someone with autism, who is non verbal but can communicate with song.

It’s called music therapy, and the science behind it, is incredible. Usually the Take 5 is with a muso, or person in the public eye. But I wanted to step into another realm, and get inside the brain of a registered music therapist. Chanelle Henderson is just that. She works with a really broad array of people too, from elderly clients to little kids and preterm babies and their parents. And across five songs, she invites you into this world and tells you the stories of some incredible breakthroughs. From three chord simplicity, to bonding with babies, and the music that takes us back instantly as a sensory memory, this is a beautiful conversation about the scientific and emotional power of song.

You Are My Sunshine - Johnny Cash

Stop - Spice Girls

Raining on the Rock - Warren H Williams

Song for Sammy - Missy Higgins

Sitting On The Dock of the Bay – Otis Redding