Otis Redding – Otis Blue- Otis Redding Sings Soul

Memphis in the summer of 1965

Otis Blue captures Otis Redding bringing his musical identity into focus across a complete album. Following Pain In My Heart and The Great Otis Redding Sings Soul Ballads, it was his third LP. Most of the programme was recorded in July 1965 at the Stax studio in Memphis, a converted cinema on East McLemore Avenue. Released in September on Stax's sister label Volt, its full title was Otis Blue/Otis Redding Sings Soul. Eleven selections connect Redding's own songs with material drawn from other performers' repertoires, brought together within the setting of his voice and the studio musicians around him.

Those musicians included Booker T. Jones, Steve Cropper, Donald “Duck” Dunn and Al Jackson Jr., alongside Isaac Hayes and horn players Wayne Jackson, Gene “Bowlegs” Miller, Andrew Love and Floyd Newman. Their involvement varies by track, but the names establish the musical community from which the album emerged. Jim Stewart is credited with supervision and Tom Dowd with engineering. The recording took place in a studio whose house musicians helped define many Stax and Volt releases. Redding worked within that environment, where a singer's statement and the supporting parts developed through the contributions of a distinctive group of players.

Three connections to Sam Cooke

Sam Cooke had died in December 1964. Three songs associated with him appear on Otis Blue: “Change Gonna Come”, “Shake” and “Wonderful World”. Their inclusion makes Cooke's place in Redding's musical world tangible. It also gives the connection several dimensions, moving between different kinds of song rather than relying on a single tribute performance. Redding approaches an important influence through more than one aspect of his repertoire and places those selections among his own compositions. The resulting album reveals something about the music he valued as well as the songs he was creating himself.

“Ole Man Trouble” and “Respect” are Redding compositions. “I've Been Loving You Too Long” was written with Jerry Butler. Elsewhere, the programme takes in “My Girl”, “Rock Me Baby” and “Satisfaction”, reaching across several song catalogues. William Bell's “You Don't Miss Your Water” brings the closing selection back towards the Stax community. Following those different origins can be an engaging way through the record. Each song has a prior life, but Redding's selection and performance give them a new relationship. Heard together, they become an album with a coherent identity sustained by the singer and the musicians sharing the session.

The stereo album has its own history

On Otis Blue, mono and stereo involve more than different placement of the same performances. “Ole Man Trouble”, “Respect” and “I've Been Loving You Too Long” use different recordings on the stereo album. The earlier single version of “I've Been Loving You Too Long” had initially been recorded only in mono; another performance was made for stereo presentation. Comparing editions can therefore reveal differences in the singing and playing themselves. This double-LP release presents the stereo version, making it a particular musical form of the album as well as a specific format for its reproduction.

The songs' subsequent lives were equally varied. Aretha Franklin made “Respect” central to her own career in 1967. The Rolling Stones recorded “I've Been Loving You Too Long”, while Redding included “Satisfaction” here. Those exchanges show how closely connected the period's music could be through artists listening to and reinterpreting one another. Otis Blue gathers several of those relationships at one moment in Redding's development. It became his first number-one album on the American R&B album chart. Its continuing interest lies partly in this meeting of original songs, tribute and borrowed repertoire within a compact and purposeful eleven-track programme.

The Atlantic 75 double-LP release

This Analogue Productions edition is part of the Atlantic 75 Series, presenting the stereo album on two 180-gram LPs playing at 45 rpm. Kevin Gray handled the remastering at Cohearent Audio, with the publisher identifying original analog tapes as the source. All eleven album tracks are retained. “Ole Man Trouble”, “Respect” and “Change Gonna Come” share the first side, while “Rock Me Baby”, “Satisfaction” and “You Don't Miss Your Water” occupy the fourth. The four-side layout is a feature of this edition and creates different turning points from those of the original single-LP presentation.

Stoughton Printing supplies an old-style tip-on gatefold jacket with two record pockets. Series specifications identify Quality Record Pressings for the first 2,000 numbered copies, with later pressings potentially made at QRP or RTI. The release carries Kevin Gray's mastering into the Atlantic 75 programme. For collectors, the stereo performances and the 45 rpm format are central identifying details. At the heart of the edition remains Redding's 1965 album: eleven selections recorded with musicians from his Memphis circle, connecting his own writing with the work of Sam Cooke, William Bell, the Temptations and the Rolling Stones.

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Also on SACD: Otis Blue / Otis Redding Sings Soul

More by Otis Redding: The Soul Album · The Dock Of The Bay

Customer questions: Atlantic 75: which titles are worth buying? · Buying Analogue Productions records in Europe

Series: Atlantic 75 Series – all 75 albums, time journey and the people behind Atlantic

Musicians

Participants and documented credit status. Track references correspond to the tracklist.

Assignments refer to the stereo version. Isaac Hayes’s participation on B2 is disputed and is not asserted here.