In my Summer of Listening to CDs I’ve owned for years but haven’t listened to until now, The Best of the Spencer Davis Group from 1987 found its way into my listening rotation. The band was formed in 1963, struggled for awhile, but then hit it big with “Gimme Some Lovin'” which still sounds great today. The group had a few more hits like “I’m a Man” and “Keep On Running” before Steve Winwood left in 1967 to form Traffic. Do you remember The Spencer Davis Group? GRADE: B
TRACK LIST:
| 1 | Gimme Some Lovin’ | |
| 2 | Searchin’ | |
| 3 | Keep On Running | |
| 4 | I Can’t Stand It | |
| 5 | Strong Love | |
| 6 | Every Little Bit Hurts | |
| 7 | I’m A Man | |
| 8 | Back Into My Life Again | |
| 9 | Trampoline | |
| 10 | Somebody Help Me | |
| 11 | When I Come Home | |
| 12 | Stevie’s Blues | |
| 13 | The Hammer Song | |
| 14 | Waltz For Lumumba | |
| 15 | Goodbye Stevie |
I watched the documentary about the legendary Muscle Shoals recording studio when it came out in 2013 (you can watch it on YouTube, Google Play, Vudu, Apple TV and Sling TV), bought the soundtrack…and never listened to it until last week. Part of the reason I choose MUSCLE SHOALS: ORIGINAL MOTION PICTURE SOUNDTRACK was that the ending of the Broadway musical, Girl From the North Country, concludes with Bob Dylan’s “Pressing On.” “Pressing On,” sung beautifully by Alicia Keyes, concludes this album. The rest of the music on this disc sounds great, too! GRADE: A
TRACK LIST:
| 1 | Arthur Alexander– | You Better Move On Producer – Rick Hall Written-By – Arthur Alexander | 2:44 |
| 2 | Jimmy Hughes– | Steal Away Producer – Rick Hall Written-By – Jimmy Hughes | 2:27 |
| 3 | Percy Sledge– | When A Man Loves A Woman Producer – Marlin Greene, Quin IvyWritten-By – Andrew James Wright*, Calvin Houston Lewis | 2:55 |
| 4 | Aretha Franklin– | I Never Loved A Man (The Way I Love You)Producer – Jerry Wexler Written-By – Ronnie Shannon | 2:49 |
| 5 | Etta James– | Tell Mama Written-By – Clarence Carter, Marcus Daniel, Wilbur Terrell | 2:22 |
| 6 | Clarence Carter– | Patches Producer – Rick Hall Written-By – General N. Johnson*, Ronald Dunbar | 3:10 |
| 7 | Wilson Pickett– | Hey Jude Producer – Rick Hall Written-By – John Lennnon And Paul McCartney | 4:04 |
| 8 | Lynyrd Skynyrd– | Free Bird (Original Muscle Shoals Version) Written-By – Allen Collins, Ronnie Van Zant | 7:25 |
| 9 | The Staple Singers– | I’ll Take You There Producer – Al Bell Written-By – Alvertis Isbel | 3:13 |
| 10 | Jimmy Cliff– | Sitting In Limbo Written-By – Jimmy Cliff | 4:53 |
| 11 | Traffic– | (Sometimes I Feel So) Uninspired Written-By – Nicola James Capaldi*, Steve Winwood | 7:28 |
| 12 | Paul Simon– | Kodachrome Producer – Paul Simon Written-By – Paul Simon | 3:32 |
| 13 | Alicia Keys– | Pressing On Bass – David Hood Drums – Bryan Owings Electric Piano [Wurlitzer] – Spooner Oldham Guitar – Jimmy Johnson, Larry Byrom Producer – Alicia Keys Vocals, Piano – Alicia Keys Written-By – Bob Dylan | 5:29 |
I remember them. Mainly for Gimme Some Lovin and Keep on Running. A minor group in the British invasion. Not a big fan of Winwood’s voice. Liked him much better in Traffic, a much more inventive group. Seems like every other group did a version of I’m A Man back then.
Steve, you’re right about “I’m a Man.” Local rock bands in the 1960s played it for dances.
Seems like every other group did a version of I’m A Man back then.
Of course Chicago’s version is the best known, moved me to buy their first LPs.
Steve is my favourite musician – and writer and singer, have been to his concerts around a dozen times, but of course after his Traffic times …
I’ve probably written about these things before, but …
After my first wife died I even made a tour following him through Texas to GAFIA – Houston, Austin, Dallas, of course with detours to the Space Center, Galveston, the German Corner and the big forest in the East of Texas.
And then of course in the House of Blues (Orlando), several times in London and Germany.
The last concert we visited was open air in Munich on the Königsplatz – with Eric Clapton.
We were so lucky reading about it early enough to still get tickets and left our dog near Munich with my sister for the evening – fond memories.
But then we realized we were getting too old to stand two or more hours for a performance.
The Muscle Shoals Studio is/was also fantastic, almost all of the Greats in pop music recorded there – wiki has a nice entry on this.
Wolf, if you can access the Muscle Shoals film I’m sure you’ll love it.
Chicago’s version of I’m A Man is far from the best known. The Yardbirds cover was far better known. And much better. Chicago was about as bluesy as The Carpenters.
I remember the SDG, indeed.
Muscle Shoals, the Wrecking Crew, the various house bands and common orchestras…
One of my favorite Muscle Shoals recordings that might not be thought of first:
https://youtu.be/w9LA1kSN6s0
Todd, thanks for the link!
I remember them, and a couple of their songs, with the help of your memory jogger above. Without it they’d probably never have entered my mind again.
Michael, I have a few hundred more “memory joggers” still stilling on my shelves waiting to be listened to.
I saw SDG (sans Winwood) sometime in the late-1980s at a small venue in L.A. The main thing I remember about the show was that John and one of his friends were talking (ragging) about how Winwood went on to worldwide acclaim while Davis was stuck doing gigs at pokey little places on the L.A. outskirts and later in the show Davis introduced his daughter—and she’d been sitting right in front of us! It’s one of our favorite cautionary tales: be careful when you drag someone, you don’t know whose sitting nearby.
I know almost all of the songs on the Muscle Shoals CD. Probably my favorite on there is “Tell Mama”, but I also love the Aretha, Paul Simon, and Staples Singers songs.
Deb, that is a cautionary story, indeed! My mother told us, “If you can’ say something nice, don’t say anything at all.” The Rolling Stones went to Alabama and recorded three songs that evoked the country, blues and R&B sound of the region. Over three days – from Dec. 2-4, 1969 – they put down the basic tracks and live vocals on “Brown Sugar,” “Wild Horses,” and “You Gotta Move” at Muscle Shoals Sound Studio in Sheffield, Ala. Bob Dylan and Elton John also recorded there.
Read More: When the Rolling Stones Went to Muscle Shoals | https://ultimateclassicrock.com/rolling-stones-muscle-shoals/?utm_source=tsmclip&utm_medium=referral
Deb, that reminds me of my totally unexpected meeting with Spencer Davis in the 80s or 90s!
I was on one of my shopping trips (Science Fiction books of course) to London and had been invited to stay with my friend in East London so I took the Eastern route to Blackwall Tunnel – and saw a sign at the bar “The Tunnel” that SDG would perform on Saturday, the day that I was supposed to travel back via the ferry to the continent.
So in the afternoon of my last shopping day I drove there, got a ticket, had a beer and then listened to them performing – really enjoyed it!
During the break I went up to Spencer and told him I was German and so happy to see him perform and we talked about Rock and the story of his band …
And after the concert I went on to Dover to get the ferry.
Fond memories!
One of my favorite memories of this group is the use of Gimme Some Lovin in The Big Chill.
Although I enjoy their music, I was never moved to get one of their albums. In my CD library, they only appear in compilations.
I could see my Mom nodding your head over the Spencer Davis daughter story, Deb. Hold your insights, like your applause, until the end and you won’t embarrass yourself.
To my surprise, I knew all the music on the Muscle Shoals CD. I’ll have to look into that one.
Gimme Some Lovin’ was also performed by the Blues Brothers – but the country&Western fans didn’t like it. A really funny scene from the movie:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RTXszRHc0qs
Beth, a ton of hits were recorded at the Muscle Shoals studio. It had a unique sound and some fabulous musicians!
Great story, Wolf. It’s great when you can tell someone that you like their work. I try to do that with mystery writers at Bouchercons.
Of course I remember them. We saw Winwood open for someone – Santana, I think, at Jones Beach some years ago. He only got time to do six songs, including Gimme Some Lovin’, I’m a Man, and a few of his solo hits. No Traffic, sadly. When we got tickets for Steely Dan two years ago, he was supposed to be the opening act, but two years went by before the concert happened, with another opening act.
I saw the Muscle Shoals documentary. They made some great music there. Love Mavis Staples.
Jeff, Mavis Staples is very underrated.
I think you are conflating “underrated” with too-little-discussed here, George…nobody sane underrayes her!
Todd, by “underrated” I’m including “underheard”–no radio stations around here are playing Mavis Staple’s music. I hear The Staple Singers once in a while on Sirius/XM Radio.
Or even underrates her!
Particularly in her youth, she was strikingly physically beautiful…I can see on several counts why Bob Dylan was sheepishly enamored of her, and amused the hell out of “Pops”/Roebuck Staples by asking for her hand in marriage…leading that worthy to gently inquire as to whether young Zimmerman had cleared this with Mavis as yet…a detail that had escaped the eventual composer of such non-classics as “Just Like a Woman”…
Todd, I had forgotten that Mavis Staples and Bob Dylan had a “thing.”
Since Traffic is one of my favorite bands, I also bought some SDG. My favorite of the non-hits is Waltz for Lumumba.
Jeff, I’ll have to dig out some of my TRAFFIC discs for future listening. Meanwhile, the traffic here–especially air traffic–was terrible over the Fourth of July. Katie’s flight on United was cancelled so we benefited from an extra day with our visiting daughter. She did manage to get a JetBlue flight to Boston yesterday. Patrick, on the other hand, decided to travel from Buffalo to NYC on the train.