Soul Dressing

"Soul Dressing" is everything that "Green Onions" (the album) was not. Whereas the lads' first album showed clear signs of having been rapidly put together to capitalise on a hot single - the most telling evidence being the fact that only one of its tracks (apart from both sides of the single), was written by the boys. On this one however, all bar one of the tracks has, in the writer's credits, the names, Jones, Cropper, Jackson, Steinberg, i.e. Booker T and the MG's. In addition this album consists almost completely of singles plus B-sides. For the album Stax reverted to the old fashioned method of producing an album which was to stick all the most recent singles on it and then anything else that happened to be around (and only if absolutely necessary, record something). It was a very crude method but did take maximum advantage of all the thought and effort that went into single production which was still very much where the main emphasis was in popular and particularly R&B, music, in the mid `60's.

As a consequence, this album contained four tracks which had been released (A and B sides) and plenty more which were intended for release. Track 1, "Soul Dressing", slow-to-medium pace has Booker stating the theme then Cropper comes in with dirty smears across the middle eight. This track sets the tone; medium tempo, Booker taking the lead and Cropper cutting across with smears and slurs which are even nastier than those on "Green Onions" (the single, that is). Sometimes Cropper produces a fierce backbeat and we get plenty of those short choppy riffs that he excels at. Most extreme is probably "Plum Nellie" with great slabs of organ and a whacking great electric sound. Almost all the songs are basic twelve bar blues but performed with much more apparent passion than much of the previous album. These numbers are in the great tradition of rock'n'roll and R&B instrumentals, loads of energy, aggression and an underlying menace. In actuality they were very deliberately trying to create another "Onions" - "Jelly Bread" sounds like "that riff" in reverse - but that's not such a bad thing.

Chinese Checkers provides some contrast with Booker conjuring vaguely Chinese sounds from an electric piano plus riffing from the Memphis horns. There are a couple of slower (well a bit) blues - "Night Owl Walk" is more in the laid back Jimmy Smith style but "Home Grown" retains the low down and dirty ambiance.

The only possible downside I can think of on this set is that there's not a lot of variation but that don't bother me. We should treasure this stuff. Booker and the boys were never to sound this consistently nasty ever again. They do have an ingrained tastefulness which they were pushing very hard on the sessions which produced these tracks - I'm loath to say this album, because I'm sure that's not what they were aiming at.