Sweet Soul Music - Dan Penn, Donnie Fritts, Eddie Hinton, Muscle Shoals sound in general, etc - C or C?

RIP

The social media posts coming from the Stax Museum have been moving, particularly their retelling of his first public appearance there, when he donated his fiddle and surviving members of the Stax label (artists and staff alike) paid tribute. He really was a good guy who got into the business for the right reasons, and it sucks that Atlantic and then CBS screwed him and Stax over.

Bob Mehr's obit is really good:

https://www.commercialappeal.com/story/entertainment/music/2022/12/06/jim-stewart-obituary-stax-records-rock-n-roll-hall-of-fame-memphis-music-history/69702156007/

(Also speaking of Atlantic, apparently Ahmet Ertegun is being investigated for sexual assault against two different women.

Speaking of Stax, did yall see this? Posted by unperson on Rolling Reissues:

Stax Records and Craft Recordings are proud to announce the release of multiple new titles paying homage to the iconic Wattstax Benefit Concert which took place at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum on August 20th, 1972. Soul’d Out: The Complete Wattstax Collection, Wattstax: The Complete Concert, and The Best of Wattstax, plus 2-LP reissues of the original soundtrack albums Wattstax: The Living Word and The Living Word: Wattstax 2 will all be released on February 24 and are available for pre-order today.
In celebration of the 1973 Columbia Pictures music documentary, Sony Pictures will re-release Wattstax at participating Alamo Drafthouse locations throughout the U.S. from February 24.

Created in conjunction with the annual Watts Summer Festival to commemorate the seventh anniversary of the Watts uprising in Los Angeles, the Wattstax benefit concert was attended by more than 100,000 people. It featured performances from Stax Records’ most popular artists of the time, including, but not limited to, Isaac Hayes, The Staple Singers, Rufus Thomas, Carla Thomas and The Bar-Kays. These releases are the first complete audio collections of what Wattstax creator and then-President of Stax Records, Al Bell calls the “most jubilant celebration of African American music, culture, and values in American history.”

Soul’d Out: The Complete Wattstax Collection is a 12-CD box set featuring the complete 1972 L.A. Memorial Coliseum concert plus recordings from the Summit Club, including 31 previously unreleased tracks across the collection. These recordings are housed in a folio with a 76-page, full-color book featuring an introduction by Wattstax creator Al Bell, and new essays by Rob Bowman and A. Scott Galloway. A previously unreleased version of the iconic soul funk anthem “Theme From Shaft” by the legendary Isaac Hayes from his headline set at Wattstax is available to stream and download here today.

Wattstax: The Complete Concert includes the full L.A. Memorial Coliseum concert and is available on both 6-CD and 10-LP formats. In addition to musical performances, it features all the speeches and other stage banter from the event, including event MC, the Rev. Jesse Jackson’s often referenced “I Am Somebody” speech. Both formats of this collection include the full-color book with introduction by Wattstax creator Al Bell, and essays by Rob Bowman and A. Scott Galloway that is also included in Soul’d Out: The Complete Wattstax Collection.

A 1-CD title, The Best of Wattstax, brings together a handpicked selection of twenty of the best musical performances from the Wattstax concert. Including performances by Isaac Hayes, The Staple Singers, The Bar-Kays, Kim Weston, Rufus Thomas, Carla Thomas, Albert King, Eddie Floyd and more, and serves as a great introduction to the event and the many iconic artists that it featured.

Newly cut from the original analog tapes, reissues of the two original soundtrack albums Wattstax: The Living Wordand The Living Word: Wattstax 2—which feature highlights from the concert and subsequent documentary film—will also each be reissued on 2-LP formats on the same date.

Just now saw this, in xgau's freed-up 2022 reviews, on his site:

Dusty Springfield: Dusty Sings Soul (Ace) Still in her twenties with a vast if less than consistently canonical African-American songbook hers to convey to a wide-open '60s U.K. youth market, she applies her considerable heart, enthusiasm, IQ, and let us not forget voice to its array ("Can I Get a Witness," "Nothing," "Oh No Not My Baby," "All Cried Out") **

more from him:

Ann Peebles: Greatest Hits (Hi '15) Beyond the towering Aretha Franklin--plus Etta James and Mavis Staples and if you insist Diana Ross via their respective side doors--soul music was short on heroines. I mean, the outspoken Millie Jackson and after that who? Sure I could pull a few more out of my memory book, as maybe you could yours. But this lean, clean, tough, sweet, lucid St. Louis woman, married 48 years to Memphis native and Hi Records songwriting stalwart Don Bryant though a stroke ended her performing career in 2012, was and remains more memorable than that. Beyond the towering Al Green, she was the most distinctive singer ever to hook up with Hi Rhythm, regarded by many who should know as the equal of the Stax-Volt and Muscle Shoals bands and by more than one as the class of the field. "Part Time Love" was her 1970 breakout. Her 1972 "Breaking Up Somebody's Home" was covered by guess who on her Divine Miss M follow-up. "I Can't Stand the Rain" was her indelible 1973 classic. Too cool to be forgotten. A MINUS

Ann Peebles & the Hi Rhythm Section: Live in Memphis (Memphis International) It's 1992, she's 45, Howard Grimes lives, and she wants us to know that "Just because I say I feel like breakin' it up don't necessarily mean that I'm gonna go out there and do it" ("I Feel Like Breaking Up Somebody's Home," "I Didn't Take Your Man") **

https://www.nodepression.com/album-reviews/album-review-stax-songwriter-demos-showcase-the-stars-behind-the-big-names/?utm_source=No+Depression+Newsletter&utm_campaign=877f72af22-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_3_24_23_COPY_01&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_659325596f-877f72af22-226384157&mc_cid=877f72af22&mc_eid=b850f832a1 Several videos in there too.

https://www.memphisflyer.com/summit-of-the-scribes-a-gathering-of-stax-legends?fbclid=IwAR3pRLeeSgeJ-jtziema0AC0DHSAZ1W5iqUIvXVwqdIqf4aXfZqan2Ex33w_aem_AQtNmt_rve377MyK9KzJanI-PdRqyP0LLoJxsXWmBuU5Svx3hT9f3xU3Z_NRKUOcOLo&mibextid=Zxz2cZ

Learning about Henderson Thigpen who wrote for Stax in late years including Shirley Brown “Woman to Woman”

Maybe should have put that on Memphis music thread that includes Stax

There's a Memphis thread? Memphis posts are pretty standard on here too, it's cool.
that xpost Dusty Sings Soul comp isn't on any streams that I've come across, although Spotify has a playlist from whatever sources, might be okay. Meanwhile I just checked hot excerpts of all 24 tracks via label site: https://acerecords.co.uk/sings-sou

Was thinking of 100 Great Records from Memphis thread

100 great records from Memphis

This is cool: https://www.discogs.com/release/4364232-The-Meadows-The-Meadows

I've been mildly obsessed with Wilson Meadows the past few years for his later southern soul stuff (check out Transformation) and never realized he did an album in muscle shoals back in 1981 with his brothers.

My Love Was Sleeping
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QP2fBxLCbeg

Nice song there. Not familiar with Meadows brothers. Will have to dig in