{"id":4489,"date":"2013-12-10T09:58:01","date_gmt":"2013-12-10T14:58:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/funky16corners.com\/?p=4489"},"modified":"2017-06-17T19:34:50","modified_gmt":"2017-06-18T00:34:50","slug":"otis-redding-at-monterey-pop","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/funky16corners.com\/?p=4489","title":{"rendered":"Otis Redding at Monterey Pop"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Example\"<\/strong><\/p>\n

Otis Redding at the Monterey Pop Festival<\/strong><\/p>\n

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Listen\/Download – Otis Redding – Monterey Pop Set<\/strong><\/em><\/a><\/p>\n

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Set List”: Shake \u2013 Respect \u2013 I\u2019ve Been Loving You Too Long \u2013 (I Can\u2019t Get No) Satisfaction \u2013 Try a Little Tenderness<\/strong><\/p>\n

______________________________________________________________________________________<\/p>\n

Greetings all.<\/strong><\/p>\n

This is a repost of a piece I wrote back in 2008 about the sounds that first brought me to soul music, back when I was a kid.<\/strong><\/p>\n

I putting it up again because 46 years ago today, the mighty Otis Redding (the greatest soul singer that ever was) was taken from \u00a0us in a plane crash.<\/strong><\/p>\n

He was only 26 years old and one can only imagine what he could have accomplished had he lived.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Do yourself a favor – whether you’ve heard this or not – and sit down with your headphones on, give this performance your full attention, and realized what a master he was.<\/strong><\/p>\n

A gift to us all.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Dig it, and I’ll see you all on Friday.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Keep the Faith<\/strong><\/p>\n

Larry<\/strong><\/p>\n

______________________________________________________________________________________<\/p>\n

Originally posted 3\/27\/2008<\/strong><\/p>\n

>>I hope the end of the week \u2013 as it nears \u2013 finds you well.<\/p>\n

The \u201cselection\u201d I bring you today is something a little different than I ordinarily offer in this space, in that it is composed of an entire LP side, which is itself an entire live set* by one of the greatest soul artists of all time, the mighty Otis Redding<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

I\u2019ve mentioned several times in this space that my \u2018Road to Damascus\u2019 moment as a fan of soul music was the day I flipped over the Jimi Hendrix Experience<\/strong> \u2018Live at Monterey\u2019 LP and played the album side I have posted today.<\/p>\n

That day \u2013 sometime around 1976 or \u201977 \u2013 was a landmark in my musical growth because although I was aware of soul and funk music in as much as its existence was reflected in the playlists of Top 40 radio of the early 70s, I had never been an active consumer thereof, i.e. I let the soul come to me, but never went looking for it.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s likely that I wasn\u2019t paying close attention to the album, at least not at first, as I didn\u2019t have much of an idea who Otis Redding was, outside of \u2018Dock of the Bay\u2019. It was that day, as the sounds of one of the greatest live sets ever recorded by any artist poured from my Montgomery Ward console stereo (next to my bed, the biggest piece of furniture in my small room), that a fundamental part of how my mind processed music \u2013 in as much as it processed the effects of sound along with my heart and soul \u2013 was changed forever.<\/p>\n

I can\u2019t remember the first time I actually saw \u2018Monterey Pop\u2019 on TV, though it was probably either on the Late Show or on the local PBS station, but when I did it quickly became my favorite musical documentary, in large part because of the inclusion of an excerpt from this very set.<\/p>\n

It wasn\u2019t until last year, when my lovely wife bought me the Criterion Collection issue of \u2018Monterey Pop\u2019 – which included an entire disc of previously unissued performances, as well as the two mini-documentaries \u2018Jimi Plays Monterey!\u2019 and \u2018Shake! Otis at Monterey\u2019 that I finally saw the film of Redding\u2019s entire set from June 17th, 1967.<\/p>\n

It was the final set, of the second night of the Monterey Pop Festival, and as the story goes, the festival had gone past the agreed upon curfew by the time Otis reached the stage.<\/p>\n

Backed by Booker T & the MGs<\/strong> (who had just played a short set of their own), as well as the Mar-Keys<\/strong> (actually the Memphis Horns<\/strong> with the addition of Floyd Newman<\/strong>), and following an introduction by Tommy Smothers<\/strong>, Otis stormed the stage and ripped into Sam Cooke\u2019s<\/strong> \u2018Shake\u2019. Despite a solid, day-long line up of rock, pop and jazz acts, at that late hour the crowd could not have possibly been prepared for the power that Redding brought onto the stage.<\/p>\n

By the time Otis finished the tune he was gasping for breath, as he introduced his own \u2018Respect\u2019 – with a bit of understatement – as \u2018\u2026a song that a girl took away from me.\u2019 He takes the tune at a brisk pace with pounding support from the band.<\/p>\n

As he finishes \u2018Respect\u2019 he takes a moment to rap to what he refers to as \u2018The Love Crowd\u2019, before he launches into one of the single greatest soul performances ever recorded.<\/p>\n

Two years before Monterey, Redding and Jerry Butler<\/strong> sat down in a Buffalo, NY hotel room and composed what would become (later that year) one of Redding\u2019s biggest hits, \u2018I\u2019ve Been Loving You Too Long\u2019. Redding\u2019s reading of the tune is an absolute masterpiece of dynamics, building and release of tension and pure soul. It\u2019s not hard to deduce from his demeanor that by this point in the set that Otis knew that he had the crowd in the palm of his hand.<\/p>\n

He delivers his greatest song as a high-wire act balancing tasteful restraint with roof-raising soul pleading.<\/p>\n

Whenever I listen to this (a performance that never fails to bring a tear to my eye) I wonder if Otis and Butler knew when they were writing this song how perfect a showstopper it would become. The verses open with those classic, slow-dance, R&B guitar triplets, moving to an explosion each time the second part of the verse begins.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s a version of \u2018I\u2019ve Been Loving You Too Long\u2019 on the \u2018Otis Redding Live In Europe\u2019 LP where, if you listen very closely, you can hear Redding \u2013 as an aside, almost completely off mike \u2013 say \u2018Oh my God!\u2019 just before he launches into the line \u2018There were times\u2026 It\u2019s almost as if he had to muster every bit of power in his voice to deliver the line, rocketing the level of emotion in the performance to a point that few performers could ever dream of approaching and the truly amazing thing is that he\u2019s able to do it over, and over again until the final section of the song where he\u2019s rolling out the<\/p>\n

\u2018GOOD GOD ALMIGHTY\u2019s<\/strong>
\n
\n<\/strong>and the \u2018I CAN\u2019T STOP NOW\u2019s<\/strong><\/p>\n

and \u2018I\u2019M DOWN ON MY KNEES\u2019<\/strong><\/p>\n


\n<\/strong>and \u2018I LOVE YOU WITH ALL MY HEART\u2019<\/strong><\/p>\n

and the band is vamping under him with the horns growing in intensity, and before you know it \u2013 because you almost expect, or at least wish that he would go on all night \u2013 the song is over and the band tears into \u2018Satisfaction\u2019, and the audience, still dizzy from the previous number rides along with them until Otis takes the tempo down, and you can hear the audience clapping along, and then the band picks up speed again almost crashing at the end of the song.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s at this point that Otis Redding proves once and for all (as if there were any doubts left) how much of a master performer he was. Taking a song written and first performed in 1932, Redding builds \u2018Try a Little Tenderness\u2019 into a soulful tour de force. The tempo of the tune building almost imperceptibly at first, with the band laying down the sparest of backings, but before you know it the whole shebang is bearing down like a freight train and Otis is wailing about<\/p>\n

\u2018GOTTA GOTTA GOTTA NOW NOW NOW TENDERNESS A LITTLE TENDERNESS YEAH YEAH TENDERNESS YOU GOTTA GOTTA TENDERNESS!!!\u2019<\/strong><\/p>\n


\n<\/strong>and Steve Cropper<\/strong> is weaving in and out of the mix and you can sense Otis whipping the audience around like a sweaty handkerchief while he loses himself in the ecstasy of the performance.<\/p>\n

This is true greatness, on a level that very, very few performers, in any kind of music were ever able to achieve, and as the few remaining documents will attest to, it was greatness that Otis Redding was able to deliver on a regular basis.<\/p>\n

The Monterey Pop Festival was filled with monumental, career making performances, but no one, not Janis Joplin, Jimi Hendrix, the Who,<\/strong> NO ONE, came within 100 miles of delivering the way Otis Redding delivered that night.<\/p>\n

He wouldn\u2019t have many opportunities to do it again, because a few days short of six months later, Otis Redding was dead.<<<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

\"Example\"<\/strong><\/strong><\/strong> \u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n

*Believe it or not, this entire – legendary<\/em> – set lasts less that 20 minutes!<\/strong><\/strong>
\n___________________________________________________________________________________________<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Also, the brand new Funky16Corners ‘Keep Calm and Stay Funky’ stickers have arrived!<\/strong> The stickers are 4″ x 3″ and printed on high quality, glossy stock.<\/strong> They are $2.00 each, with free shipping in the US ($2.00 per order shipping outside of the US).<\/strong> Click here to go to the ordering page.<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

Also, make sure that you check out the links below to the Be The Match Foundation and POAC (click on the logos for more info).<\/strong><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

\"Example\"<\/strong><\/a> \"Example\"<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n

PS Head over to Iron Leg too.<\/strong><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Otis Redding at the Monterey Pop Festival   Listen\/Download – Otis Redding – Monterey Pop Set   Set List”: Shake \u2013 Respect \u2013 I\u2019ve Been Loving You Too Long \u2013 (I Can\u2019t Get No) Satisfaction \u2013 Try a Little Tenderness ______________________________________________________________________________________ Greetings all. This is a repost of a piece I wrote back in 2008 […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[14,67,88,12],"tags":[166,182,164],"class_list":["post-4489","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-funky16corners","category-obituary","category-otis-redding","category-soul","tag-funky16corners","tag-otis-redding","tag-soul"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pMKgo-1ap","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/funky16corners.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4489","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/funky16corners.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/funky16corners.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/funky16corners.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/funky16corners.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4489"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/funky16corners.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4489\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7198,"href":"https:\/\/funky16corners.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4489\/revisions\/7198"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/funky16corners.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4489"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/funky16corners.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4489"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/funky16corners.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4489"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}