'Christmas (Baby Please Come Home)'- Darlene Love

On Late Night With David Letterman, December 2006

'Tis the season

Ms. Darlene Love performing '(Christmas) Baby Please Come Home' on Late Night With David Letterman, 2003

Stax Anniversary

Some of the bits of culture I was exposed to during my formative years- the things that really influenced me- were Monty Python's Flying Circus and the music of the Stax Records stars. God or whomever bless PBS and the soul radio stations out of Chicago.

I can't imagine what my childhood would have been like without the Ministry Of Silly Walks, The Fish Slapping Dance, Booker T. and the MGs, Otis Redding and Carla Thomas.

It's nice to see Mr. Stewart and Ms. Axton's massively influential label in the news again.

The sound was never exactly polished, but it had plenty of soul, and the Memphis sound created at Stax Records has found its own special place in the history of American music.Some of pop's most cherished recordings came out of the Stax studio, including Sam & Dave's "Soul Man," Otis Redding's "(Sitting On) The Dock of the Bay," and Isaac Hayes' Oscar-winning "Theme from Shaft."

Now, 50 years after a white country-fiddle player started down the road that led him to open a recording studio in a predominantly black, inner-city neighborhood, the Stax label is trying to make a comeback.

Funk Brothers

I was expanding my classic soul collection via iTunes tonight, and remembered this review in the MEN. It's truly staggering how many hits this group worked on.

IF the singers of the Motown era were big, the songs were always bigger - a mighty body of work comprising more chart-toppers than the Beatles, Rolling Stones, Beach Boys and Elvis combined.

But Motown's house band, the Funk Brothers - knocking songs out with the same diligence as the workers on the production lines of Detroit's car factories - went almost forgotten.

When they talk about how the tamborine was so iconically Motown, can't you just hear the beginning to "I Heard It Through the Grapevine?"

Stax Records

This article is fantastic. It's always nice to find out that I don't know every bit of rock and roll trivia.

I hope this special airs on BBC America.

In the six years since former country-fiddle-playing bank clerk Jim Stewart and his sister Estelle Axton had renamed their tiny Memphis-based label, Satellite, Stax had come to epitomise Deep Soul. The tour was thus a defining moment for British fans - young mods, future stars, even the Beatles - turned out to hail the visiting emissaries.Some were surprised to discover that the blend of rolling organ, punchy horns, compulsively danceable bass and drums that defined the Stax sound was created by a mix of black (organist Booker T Jones and drummer Al Jackson) and white (writer, guitarist and A&R man Steve Cropper and bassist Donald "Duck" Dunn) musicians. Augmented by the Memphis Horns duo of Wayne Jackson and Andrew Love, Booker T and the MGs were the beating heart of the Stax studio - a disused cinema on McLemore Avenue, in the heart of Memphis's black ghetto. In the face of Southern supremacists battling civil rights activists, Stax's cross-cultural ethos was revolutionary - black and white musicians united behind an array of black stars.

And I LOVED this passage. Can't you just see it? (for you music non-junkies, Steve Cropper? Guitar player from The Blues Brothers, big white guy with the beard)

The extended Stax family was treated like visiting royalty by the UK press and public in 1967. Cropper was shocked to see crowds awaiting their plane at Heathrow.

The Beatles sent limos to meet them and broke from recording sessions to complete Sergeant Pepper to spend a night on the town with Otis. Upon meeting Cropper, all four Fabs reportedly stood in line and bowed from the waist in unison.

When I was in London for the History of British Rock and Roll study abroad program (God Bless Iowa State), I purchased a book about the concert tour where The Rolling Stones opened for Little Richard, Bo Diddley and The Ronettes. While I was aware of American music's impact on the British Invasion crew, it was incredible to see The Stones as young pups, clearly in awe of the company they were keeping.