THE BRANCHES OF SOUL

05 — MOTOWN: SOUL GOES POP

While Southern musicians were developing rawer forms of Soul, something very different was happening in Detroit.

Berry Gordy had created Motown Records. His idea was simple but revolutionary.

Make great records. Make them accessible. Deliver them to the world.

Motown developed an extraordinary production system.

The Songwriters wrote the hits, the Producers shaped the arrangements, and artists such as The Supremes, The Temptations, Four Tops, Marvin Gaye, Martha & The Vandellas, Stevie Wonder and Smokey Robinson became the faces of the label.

The Motown sound was polished, precise, and melodic. But underneath the strings, tambourines, vocal harmonies and pop hooks was an incredibly sophisticated rhythm section.

The basslines were melodic, the drums were tight, the percussion was infectious, and the songs were built to move.

Listen to "Dancing in the Street", "Nowhere to Run", "My Girl", or "I Heard It Through the Grapevine".

The records sounded like Pop, but the foundation was Soul.

Motown had figured out how to take Black musical traditions and put them onto the biggest possible stage, and Soul had become mainstream.

But another version of Soul was developing elsewhere.

And it sounded very different.

06 — MEMPHIS: SOUL GETS DIRTY

If Motown polished Soul, Stax Records in Memphis left the dirt on it.

Motown had its first big hit in 1960 with the Miracles' "Shop Around", while Carla Thomas released "Gee Whiz" the same year on a small label called Satellite records, founded in Brunswick,Tennessee by Jim Stewart and his sister, Estelle Axton.

The following year, Satellite Records would become Stax Records after relocating to Memphis.  

Fun fact: They came up with the name Stax by combining the first two letters of their last names (STewart and AXton).

Stax developed a sound that was rawer, heavier and more connected to the groove.

At the centre of that sound were a group of musicians who formed the Stax house band and would soon become legendary.

Booker T. & the M.G.'s.

Booker T. Jones, Steve Cropper, Donald "Duck" Dunn and Al Jackson Jr.

Fun Fact: So the story goes, the M.G’s name was inspired by the British sports car brand MG, after seeing the car parked outside the studio. However following an unfavourable response from the car manufacturer, they decided to keep the name and claim MG stood for the Memphis Group.

These musicians didn't simply accompany the singers. They crafted the sound for them.

Delivering the driving force for artists such as Otis Redding, Sam & Dave, Carla Thomas, Rufus Thomas, Wilson Pickett and Isaac Hayes..

The Stax records sounded different. There was more space, more grit. more rhythm and more blues. The music felt raw, powerful, physical and on the edge.

One record in particular demonstrates the importance of this approach.

"Green Onions."

No great vocal performance. Just an organ, guitar, bass and drums locked into a groove.

This instrumental became the hook, and that idea would become incredibly important. Because the further Soul developed, the more musicians began discovering that sometimes the most powerful part of a record wasn't the singer. It was the band.

And eventually, the rhythm section would become the star.

07 — SOUTHERN SOUL ADDS GRIT

Memphis wasn't alone.

Across the American South, Soul was developing its own language.

At Muscle Shoals, Alabama, another group of extraordinary studio musicians known as The Muscle Shoals Rhythm Section or (The Swampers), were creating records that would become some of the most influential recordings in American music.

The Muscle Shoals sound was different again.

The Swampers (Barry Beckett, Roger Hawkins, David Hood and Jimmy Johnson) originally formed in the 1960s working as session musicians at Rick Hall’s FAME Studios in Alabama, before becoming the first session musicians to own and operate their own studio. The Muscle Shoals Sound Studio

They understood Blues, they understood Gospel, they understood Country, and they understood the groove. With artists such as Wilson Pickett, Percy Sledge and Aretha Franklin recording some of their finest work with them.

Aretha Franklin grew up surrounded by Gospel. Her father, Reverend C. L. Franklin was a famous preacher, so she would sing at his church and she understood Gospel instinctively.

When she moved to Atlantic Records, Jerry Wexler helped create the environment where her voice could become something extraordinary.

In January 1967, Jerry brought Aretha to Rick Hall's FAME Studios in Muscle Shoals where she recorded "I Never Loved a Man (The Way I Love You)" and began "Do Right Woman, Do Right Man" together with the famous Muscle Shoals rhythm section.

The session famously fell apart after an argument involving Aretha's husband and Rick Hall and she never recorded at FAME again. 

Wexler did however bring the Muscle Shoals rhythm section to the Atlantic Studio in New York to continue recording with Aretha and 2 years later they would open their own studio at 3614 Jackson Highway with the support of Wexler, who provided start-up funding for the move.

Back to Aretha, she could take a song and make it feel like a personal declaration. Her voice contained Gospel, Blues, Jazz and R&B. Heartache, joy, power and vulnerability.

Then came "Respect". Originally written and recorded by Otis Redding, Aretha transformed it. The song became an anthem of female empowerment and the changing social landscape of America.

This was Soul at its most powerful.

The music could make you dance. But it could also make you think.

The Muscle Shoals Sound Studio also recorded some of the best music produced by Cher, The Stones, Jimmy Cliff, Ry Cooder, Paul Simon, J.J. Cale and Candi Staton. 

And let's not forget Herbie Mann’s Muscle Shoals Nitty Gritty featuring Roy Ayers.

Finally in Southern Souls bag of goodies there was Hi Records in Memphis featuring Al Green and Ann Peebles with recordings coming out of Willie Mitchell's Royal Studios in Memphis. Other artists to record here included Bobby Bland, Chuck Berry, Ike & Tina, and Tom Jones.

Fun Fact: 

Although Stax had the history and name, Hi Records had become a genuine rival with Al Green's run of commercially successful hits. It’s said that during his years with Hi, Green would sell more than 20 million records, more than the combined career sales of three of Stax's biggest acts, Otis Redding, Sam & Dave and Booker T. & the M.G.'s. However this came directly from the folks at Hi, so take it as you like…

The Memphis sound became slower, deeper and more spacious.

The bass had room to breathe, the drums didn't need to fill every gap and the guitar could answer the vocal rather than compete with it.

The music had a pocket, and the pocket would become one of the most important concepts in the history of Funk. Because Funk wasn't about playing as many notes as possible. It was about playing the right note at exactly the right moment.

And Soul was teaching musicians that lesson and a perfect example to explain this in detail on wax can be found if you listen to Memphis Soul Sew by King Curtis.

08 — PHILLY SOUL GETS SOPHISTICATED

Philadelphia brought another dimension to the Soul story.

If Detroit provided the Pop and the American South provided the grit. Philadelphia would go on to develop a sound that was more polished, orchestrated and increasingly sophisticated.

The foundations were still the same, but Philadelphia added strings, layered harmonies and an almost cinematic approach to production.

Songwriters and producers such as Kenny Gamble, Leon Huff and Thom Bell became central figures in the development of the Philadelphia sound.

Thom Bell helped shape the sound through his work with artists including The Delfonics, The Stylistics and The Spinners.

Gamble and Huff would later establish Philadelphia International Records, creating a home for some of the most influential Soul music of the 1970s.

At the centre of the Philadelphia sound was Sigma Sound Studios, where a remarkable group of session musicians developed the rhythmic foundation behind countless recordings.

Many of these musicians would become known collectively as MFSB — Mother Father Sister Brother.

The music was sophisticated, but it still had a groove.

The basslines were deep and melodic.

The drums were tight.

The strings could soar above the rhythm section.

And the arrangements could build from a quiet verse into huge, emotional choruses.

Artists such as The O'Jays, Harold Melvin & the Blue Notes, The Three Degrees, The Stylistics, The Delfonics and The Spinners became important parts of this developing sound.

Then something important happened. The Soul record was becoming a mainstream dance record.

Records such as Harold Melvin & the Blue Notes' "The Love I Lost", The O'Jays' "Love Train" and MFSB's "Love Is the Message" pushed Soul increasingly towards the dancefloor.

The four-on-the-floor rhythm, orchestration and sophisticated production would become fundamental ingredients in the emergence of Disco..

But Philly Soul wasn't simply a stepping stone towards Disco. It was hugely influential in its own right. And decades later, another generation of musicians would go digging through those Philadelphia records.

09 — SOUL BECOMES A MOVEMENT

By the late 1960s, Soul music was becoming inseparable from the social changes happening around it.

The music was no longer simply about romance. Artists were talking about identity and social topics impacting their community.

Marvin Gaye would eventually ask: "What's Going On?" and Curtis Mayfield had already been writing socially conscious lyrics with The Impressions.

Songs such as "People Get Ready" and "We're a Winner" demonstrated how Soul could carry a political message without losing its musical power.

Then there was James Brown with "Say It Loud – I'm Black and I'm Proud." The title alone tells you how dramatically the culture was changing.

Soul had become a vehicle for self-expression.

The music was saying we’re here, we have something to say, we have a history, we have power, and we are proud of who we are.

This was one of the reasons Soul became so important.

It wasn't just music. It was part of a cultural conversation.

On the flip side: 

Soul was still evolving with bags of potential and the Rock scene of the late 60’s was becoming more experimental, Psychedelia was influencing popular culture and Soul musicians were paying attention.

Enter Sly & The Family Stone who pushed the boundaries even further.

Sly Stone brought together Soul, Funk, Rock and Psychedelia.

"Thank You (Falettinme Be Mice Elf Agin)."

"Family Affair."

"Stand!"

"Everyday People."

Indeed the boundaries were disappearing.

Black and white musicians played together. Men and women shared the stage.

Rock musicians took inspiration from Soul musicians and Soul musicians felt the power of Rock. Jazz musicians listened to everybody, and somewhere inside this musical collision, Funk was waiting.