Connections 8 : Muscle Shoals (Fame and Muscle Shoals Sound Studio)

The Muscle Shoals Story has now been told a few times.  Most recently in a documentary movie that I finally saw tonight.  I will be honest I was very nearly put off by the fact that Bono is interviewed thoughout - WTF why does he have to appear on any music documentary!!

If you get a chance try and watch it because apart from the Bono blight it is an excellent story of a critical place in and piece of music history.

Muscle Shoals Alabama is a place that has been in my music collection right from the start. The first LP I ever owned was partly recorded in a place called Muscle Shoals Sound Studio.  It was Paul Simon's There Goes Rhymin' Simon and I got it for my 13th birthday (disappointingly the Music Centre in the Wainui Mall had at the time run out of copies of David Bowie's Alladin Sane).

Two small studios, Fame and the Muscle Shoals Sound Studio, in two nondescript buildings in a small town of some 10,000 people on the banks of the Tennessee River over about a ten to 15 year period created some of the best popular music ever recorded.  The backing band from Fame, established under Rick Hall at Fame left to build their own studio and eventually became the go to studio band for singers and bands from around the world. The singers that started it all, Percy Sledge and Arthur Alexander, were local guys almost off the street and the mix of black singers and white musicians was unusual (other than at Stax in Memphis) and created a distinctive funky sound.

Initially I found that I was frequently picking up albums that had the same musicians on them - David Hood, Roger Hawkins, Barry Beckett, Spooner Oldham, Jimmy Johnson, Barry Beckett, Eddie Hinton and David Briggs.   Along with the Stax team that were contemporaries up the road in Memphis they have the ability to make almost any music not only listenable but attention grabbing.  There is a magic there that does not come often. I frequently buy albums just because they have some or all of these people on them or were recorded in the Shoals.   I have not counted but I would guess I have 30-40 albums that have a direct link to the Shoals.

Both studios are still open and also have museums attached where some of the original band take tours.  One day soon I will get there.

The list of bands, people and music that can be traced to Muscle Shoals is impressive.

• Arthur Alexander who had songs covered by the Beatles and Stones
• Percy Sledge
• Wilson Picket recorded all his hits
• Lynyrd Skynryd  - the original Freebird was recorded at Fame
• Rod Stewarts Atlantic Crossing
• Bobby Gentry
• Leon Russell
• The Allman Brothers Band
• Bob Seger
• Traffic
• Dan Penn - check out his Fame Studios Demos
• Candi Staton
• The Staples : Be Altitude (Respect Yourself)
• Aretha Franklin recorded her breakthrough single there
• The Rolling Stones recorded Wild Horses and Brown Sugar there
• Boz Scaggs
• Cher recorded her first solo album there