An Answer Record: Five Great Live Soul Performances
Comments (4) 
Otis Redding Live at Monterey Pop
Listen/Download – Sam and Dave – Hold On I’m Comin’ (Live in Norway)
Listen/Download – Ike and Tina Turner Revue – Big TNT Show Medley
Listen/Download – Sly and the Family Stone – Woodstock Medley
Listen/Download – James Brown and the Famous Flames – Night Train (Live on the T.A.M.I. Show)
Greetings all.
This past week, my social media flow (sounds like something you ought to see a doctor about) was filled with links to a piece that the esteemed Peter Guralnick had penned for Okayplayer on his ‘Top 7 Moments of Live Soul’.
I clicked on the link with great anticipation. I hold Guralnick in very high regard indeed, as the preeminent soul historian of our time, and a guy that knows his stuff.
When I was done reading the article, I found myself both unsatisfied and puzzled.
While all of his examples were arguably great, all I could think of were the examples he did not include, some of the omissions being frankly mind-boggling.
I would never say that Mr Guralnick is “wrong”, since opinion is subjective and he certainly comes to his choices for a variety of good reasons, and with a lifetime of study to back them up.
However, the performances I would add to the list (or substitute as the case may be) came to me immediately. These weren’t things that I had to go back to the vault to find, they were all right there at the front of the line.
When you talk about what makes a great live performance, I am of the opinion that the performance itself does not exist in, and cannot fairly be evaluated in a vacuum, and that the connection with the audience must also be factored in.
In the introduction to his piece, Guralnick takes the time to mention that he does not consider Otis Redding (or Aretha Franklin, or Al Green) to have been “adequately captured in the full flowering of an unvarnished live performance”, and fairly allows that this may be considered heretical (and I think that – especially in the case of Otis – it is).
When making an alternate list (or in this case, an “answer record”) , I tried to look beyond whether a performance was of historical importance (which a few of these are) and was actually great on its own.
I’m also taking into consideration the visual impact of the performance, simply because as great as an audio performance is, we’re dealing with people who were able to captivate an audience with their show. Though I’m sure there was someone in the history of soul who was able to walk out on a stage and put on a great show standing still, I can’t think of one. Even someone like Ray Charles, by and large relegated to his piano bench by his blindness had a visual component to his performance (on his own, and with the Raelettes).
I say this too, since some of the performances I list were never (as far as I know) issued on vinyl, and as a result have only been appreciated by those that were able to see it in person, or watch it on film (which is perfectly acceptable).
One can only imagine also the countless amazing performances that were only ever witnessed with eyes and ears, out of the reach of cameras and recording equipment, their memory passed down by word of mouth (or written down) over the years.
None of these are performances that have grown on me over the years, their nuances revealed over time, but rather instances that knocked me back on my heels immediately and demanded that I return, again and again, ultimately just as satisfied as I was the first.
A few of these (Otis and Sly) have been written about in this space before, and I’ll make sure to link back to those pieces where applicable.
I’d like to begin with the performance that I can trace back to the very beginning of my love for soul music, Otis Redding at the Monterey Pop Festival.
His appearance at Monterey Pop has long been considered important as a moment when soul music – and Otis specifically – crossed over to a mainstream pop audience.
By the time he took the stage at Monterey, Otis had been burning up stages (for mostly black audiences) for half a decade. He had made incursions into the pop charts, but nothing of serious note until 1965 (‘Respect’) and no major crossover hit until 1968, after his death (‘Sitting On the Dock of the Bay’).
Otis Redding at Monterey Pop, backed by Booker T and the MGs and the Memphis Horns is a remarkable snapshot of a truly great performer (the one I consider the greatest soul singer of the classic era) really connecting with an audience.
The entire performance lasts less than 20 minutes, but it is a case study in dynamics, capturing Otis delivering heart-rending ballads and uptempo groovers with equal power.
Redding devotes the last five minutes of the show to ‘Try a Little Tenderness’. When he introduces the song he seems both overwhelmed by the audience response, and out of breath, yet he manages to recover through the slower opening of the song, eventually building to an explosive climax that is at least to my ears one of the greatest of all time, in any genre.
Sam Moore
The second performance on the list is one that only saw official release in 2007 on the DVD release ‘Stax/Volt Revue Live in Norway 1967’.
Like any kid that came of age in the 70s, I was always aware of Sam and Dave via their hits, especially after the Blues Brothers took their cover of ‘Soul Man’ into the charts in 1979. As I got older, and listened to more (and read about) soul music, I repeatedly encountered mentions of the extraordinary power of Sam and Dave as live performers.
The Stax/Volt Revue (Otis Redding, Sam and Dave, Eddie Floyd, Booker T and the MGs, the Mar-Keys, Arthur Conley) toured Europe in the Spring of 1967, stopping in Oslo, Norway near the end of the trip.
The entire Revue was captured on film, and while they are all worth watching, the performance by Sam and Dave is absolutely stunning.
The pair, backed by almost the exact same band as Otis was at Monterey, comes out to ‘You Don’t Know Like I Know’, moves on into their cover of the Sims Twins ‘Soothe Me’ and then into the ballad ‘When Something Is Wrong With My Baby’ (on the DVD but omitted from the YouTube clip).
By the time the band kicks off ‘Hold On I’m Comin’’ the duo have shed their jackets and are dancing all over the stage, trading lines and dripping sweat.
Watching this performance it is immediately apparent why they were given the nickname ‘Double Dynamite’. They interact in ways that seem casual, yet must have been honed to razor sharpness, night after night on the road, and by the time they’re three minutes into the song, they drop down into a cross between a revival meeting and near riot.
With the MGs vamping in the background, Sam Moore moves to the front of the stage and starts preaching. The band gradually picks up steam, as Sam and Dave turn from the crowd and face each other trading lines.
This is where the real fun begins. They start to tease the crowd, leaving the stage, only to return and start unleashing some fancy footwork, then leaving yet again (at one point facing each other and casually shaking hands before they exit).
The way they whip the previously staid audience into a frenzy, first bringing them to their feet time and time again, then causing them to swarm the stage (having to be restrained by what looks like the Norwegian army, who look a little scared) as Sam leaps down off of the stage into the crowd is something to behold.
The first time I watched this I was reduced to tears. I’ve been to some great shows in my life, but not a one that came within a thousand miles of what that lucky audience in Norway were treated to that night in 1967.
Ike and Tina Turner
I came to a deeper appreciation of Ike and Tina Turner rather late in the game. I was well aware of their late 60s hits, but only really understood the greatness of their early-to-mid 60s material fairly recently.
Ike and Tina were hopping from label to label during these years, and getting a handle on the material from this era can be difficult unless you spend some time (and money) digging for the original records.
Fortunately, the Ike and Tina Turner Revue were included in the line-up of ‘The Big TNT Show’ a sequel to ‘The TAMI Show’ that was filmed in Los Angeles in November of 1965.
Their set in the film is a testament to the greatness of the group during this period, when they were crossing over from R&B into pure soul, and one of the hottest acts in the land.
Opening their (extended medley) set with Sam Cooke’s ‘Shake’, Tina and the Ikettes take full command of the stage, and the band is like rolling thunder behind them (it’s all about the rhythm guitar flowing like lava out of those big Fender amps). They quickly segue into ‘A Fool In Love’, ‘I Think It’s Gonna Work Out Fine’, ‘Please Please Please’, and then ‘Goodbye So Long’ which is like a juggernaut, especially with Ike and Tina sharing the mic for the “OOHWAH’s” (the pair look like they’re actually having fun), and then Tina and the Ikettes start whipping out the synchronized dance moves and the whole thing goes off like nitro.
The show comes to a conclusion as Revue member Jimmy Thomas takes the stage and Tina dances off.
It should be noted, that as good as their 1964/1965 live albums are, they were never captured as well as they were on ‘The Big TNT Show’. Tina proves here that she was one of the truly great soul singers of the classic era (even with that crazy hat on her head).
Sly Stone
Sly and the Family Stone were by any measure one of the great acts of the late 60s/early 70s.
I should preface this section by mentioning that the performance that really needs to be seen is what I think is a 1968 set from the Ohio State Fair (it may very well have been a battle of the bands). I saw the set years ago and was amazed, but sadly it appears that the clip has been pulled from Youtube.
That said, the band’s performance at Woodstock in the summer of 1969, arguably the only real ‘soul’ group on the bill, is just as remarkable.
The one piece of context that needs to be laid out at the very beginning, is that this explosive performance took place between 3:30AM and 4:20AM!?!
Opening with ‘Dance to the Music’ and moving into ‘Music Lover’ (a great tune that as far as I can tell was never recorded outside the confines of a medley) and then ‘I Want To Take You Higher’, the medley is a textbook example of a band at the peak of their powers. I don’t know about you, and I’m sure there were all kinds of stimulants involved, I can’t imagine being able to muster this kind of performance in the middle of the night, and the amazing thing is, as hyped up as the band is, the audience is right there with them.
You have to listen closely to the way Sly runs the show, and especially to the pulse of the rhythm guitar and the way Greg Errico’s snare shoots through the mix over and over again.
It kind of blows my mind that a band this good never released a live album (at least until their entire Woodstock set was reissued in a package with the ‘Stand’ LP as ‘The Woodstock Experience’ in 2009 (you can get the live set by itself on iTunes).
James Brown and the Famous Flames
Where Guralnick chose a James Brown cut from the ‘Live at the Apollo’LP (one of the greatest live recordings ever), I’d refer you instead to James and the Famous Flames set from the 1964 ‘T.A.M.I. Show’.
Following a little light comedy from Jan and Dean, James and the Flames launch into one of the most intense performances ever captured on film.
There’s a lot of James Brown footage out there (make sure to check out the recent HBO doc), but there’s something special about the ‘T.A.M.I. Show’.
Like Otis at Monterey, we’re witnessing an artist who had been almost exclusively performing for black audiences being whipped on a white crowd that had no idea what was coming.
The 18 minute set runs from ‘Out of Sight’, through ‘Prisoner of Love’,’Please Please Please’ (during which James does the cape routine) which is stretched out into an epic performance. Naturally, you’d expect any sane person to say goodnight, but this is where James Brown takes a hard left turn, dialing up the intensity several notches with ‘Night Train’.
Taking the sleepy old strippers standard and laying on the gas pedal, the band is firing at 100MPH, and James and the Famous Flames are all over the stage (look at Bobby Byrd doing the Monkey!). Brown uses the song’s starts and stops to pour even more fuel on the fire, getting faster, and heavier with each and every break.
These kids have NEVER seen anything like this, and even their adolescent hysteria over longhairs like the Stones pales in comparison to their awe at James Brown, who measurably has no equal in the history of stage performance, in ANY genre.
He is tireless, driving (and driven by) one of the tightest bands ever assembled, dropping to his knees, falling in splits and then crossing the floor on one heel like some kind of dervish.
Make sure to watch to the very end where an exhausted Brown sits down on the bandstand to take a breath and the Blossoms collectively wave him back out onto the floor, where in a final flourish he whips off his tie, makes like he’s going to throw it into the crowd, but then tucks it into his vest with a sly grin and marches offstage.
It is every bit as thrilling to watch as it was the first time I saw it, on Beta more than 30 years ago.
I’d love to hear what you would add to (or delete from) the list, so make sure to drop some knowledge in the comments.
So dig it, and I’ll see you all on Wednesday.
Keep the faith
Larry
_________________________________________________________________________________________
Also, the brand new Funky16Corners ‘Keep Calm and Stay Funky’ stickers have arrived! The stickers are 4″ x 3″ and printed on high quality, glossy stock. They are $2.00 each, with free shipping in the US ($2.00 per order shipping outside of the US). Click here to go to the ordering page.
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).
Themocracy