Otis Blue/Otis Redding Sings Soul (1965)

Otis Blue/Otis Redding Sings Soul (often referred to simply as Otis Blue) is the third studio album by the American soul singer and songwriter Otis Redding. It was first released on September 15, 1965, as an LP record through the Stax Records subsidiary label Volt.

Otis Blue is composed mainly of cover versions of contemporary R&B hits, exploring themes from the blues and love ballads, among others. Three of the LP's eleven songs were written by Redding, and three others were written by fellow soul singer Sam Cooke, who had died several months before the album was made. Except for one track, Otis Blue was recorded in less than 24 hours (22 studio hours in two sessions which spanned 28 hours from July 9 to 10, 1965), at the Stax recording studio in Memphis, Tennessee. As with Redding's previous records, he was backed by the Stax house band Booker T. & the M.G.'s, a horn section featuring members of the Mar-Keys and the Memphis Horns, and pianist Isaac Hayes, providing a rhythmic Southern soul accompaniment for the singer's exuberant and forceful performances.

Otis Blue was a crossover success for Redding and proved one of his best-selling LPs with more than 250,000 copies sold. It was his first to top the US R&B LPs chart and also reached number 6 on the UK Albums Chart, while three of its singles became top 40 hits: the Redding original "I've Been Loving You Too Long", the Rolling Stones cover "Satisfaction", and "Respect" (later repopularized by Aretha Franklin). Released at the beginning of the album era, Otis Blue is considered by critics to be Redding's first fully realized LP and the definitive soul album of its period. It ranks frequently and highly on professional listings of the best albums, including Rolling Stone magazine's "500 Greatest Albums of All Time" (at number 178) and Time magazine's "All-Time 100 Greatest Albums" (at number 92). A two-disc collector's edition of Otis Blue was released in 2008 by Rhino Records.

Background

Stax Records president Jim Stewart had released Otis Redding's "These Arms of Mine" as a single after hearing him sing it at an audition in 1962. When it charted, he signed Redding to the label. The moderately successful LP albums Pain in My Heart (1964) and The Great Otis Redding Sings Soul Ballads (1965) followed, with both performing well on the newly established R&B LPs chart (published by Billboard), although not on its pop counterpart. Preparations for a third album followed soon after, which would also serve as Redding's second to be released through Volt Records, a subsidiary label of Stax.

Recording

Redding recorded the album with the Stax house band, Booker T. & the M.G.'s (keyboardist/bandleader Booker T. Jones, guitarist Steve Cropper, bassist Donald "Duck" Dunn, drummer Al Jackson Jr.); Isaac Hayes on piano; and a horn section consisting of members of the Mar-Keys and the Memphis Horns. Apart from one track, the album was recorded in under 24 hours in two sessions within a 28 hour period between 10 am on July 9 (a Saturday) and 2 pm on July 10, 1965, with a break from 8 pm Saturday to 2 am on Sunday to allow the house band to play local gigs.

As with Redding's previous album, engineer Tom Dowd came to the studio to assist the recording, considering Redding to be a "genius" alongside the likes of Bobby Darin and Ray Charles. "Ole Man Trouble", placed as the opening track on the LP, was finished in sessions earlier than the other songs and later released as a B-side of "Respect". The album's fifth track, "I've Been Loving You Too Long", had been previously recorded in April in mono with Booker T. Jones on piano. It was released as a single that month and became a number-two hit on Billboard's R&B chart; it was re-recorded in stereo for the album.

Music and lyrics

The majority of the tracks on Otis Blue are cover versions, including three songs originally by fellow soul singer Sam Cooke, who had been shot dead in December 1964. According to Jason Mendelsohn of PopMatters, the album is a "set of soul standards, blues and rock covers, Motown hits, and original material". The album opens with the "mournfully harried" "Ole Man Trouble", described by fellow PopMatters writer Claudrena N. Harold as one of Redding's most phantasmagoric tunes. The lyrics deal with a man, who is "unable to escape the brutal realities of the blues", and has been compared with Paul Robeson's "Ole Man River".