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/ Rufus Thomas

September 25, 2023 By The Second Disc 2 Comments

Stax Christmas

'Tis the season to be soulful: This Friday, September 29, Craft Recordings and Stax Records will celebrate the holidays with the CD, LP, and digital release of A Stax Christmas.  This festive 12-track compilation features songs by the label's most beloved artists including two previously unreleased tracks from Carla Thomas and Otis Redding. The venerable Memphis label has had a long association with the music of Christmas.  House band Booker T. and The MG's 1966 album In the Christmas Spirit

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Categories: News Formats: CD, Digital Download, Digital Streaming, Vinyl Genre: Holiday, R&B/Soul Tags: Albert King, Carla Thomas, Isaac Hayes, Otis Redding, Rufus Thomas, The Emotions, The Rance Allen Group, The Staple Singers, Various Artists

April 27, 2023 By Mike Duquette Leave a Comment

Stax demos box

How do you follow up an essential document like this year's comprehensive Wattstax box set? If you're Craft Recordings, you plan a trip deep into the unheard history of the legendary Memphis label, through dozens of demos released for the first time anywhere. Written in Their Soul: The Stax Songwriter Demos is an impressive 7CD anthology including 146 demo versions of enduring Stax hits and fan favorites, songs written by label songwriters that ended up elsewhere as well as a number of songs

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Categories: News Formats: Box Sets, CD, Digital Download, Digital Streaming Genre: Pop, R&B/Soul Tags: Carla Thomas, Eddie Floyd, Rufus Thomas, Steve Cropper, The Newcomers, The Staple Singers, William Bell

December 12, 2022 By Mike Duquette 2 Comments

Wattstax

One of the greatest music festivals of the '70s is getting celebrated with an exhaustive array of reissues in 2023: Wattstax, the multi-dimensional Los Angeles celebration of soul, funk, blues and gospel courtesy of Stax Records. A half-century after the premiere of a Golden Globe-nominated documentary on the star-studded 1972 event, Craft Recordings, custodian of the Stax catalogue, will release the most definitive looks at Wattstax, most recently addressed in a 3CD box set in 2003 that took

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Categories: News Formats: Box Sets, CD, Digital Download, Digital Streaming, Vinyl Genre: Blues, Comedy, Funk, Gospel, Pop, R&B/Soul, Soundtracks Tags: Albert King, Carla Thomas, David Porter, Eddie Floyd, Isaac Hayes, Johnnie Taylor, Kim Weston, Mavis Staples, Richard Pryor, Rufus Thomas, The Bar-Kays, The Emotions, The Staple Singers, William Bell

October 29, 2020 By Joe Marchese 3 Comments

Barbara Lewis Dont Forget About Me

In recent weeks, Cherry Red's SoulMusic Records imprint has launched a series of mini-box sets drawn from the Atlantic vaults including titles available now from Solomon Burke, Esther Phillips, Barbara Lewis, and Carla Thomas.  Yesterday we explored the releases from Burke and Phillips, and today's spotlight is on Lewis and Thomas! If she had only recorded "Hello, Stranger" and "Baby I'm Yours," Barbara Lewis' place in the pop pantheon would have been assured.  But there's much more to her

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Categories: News Formats: Box Sets, CD Genre: Pop, R&B/Soul Tags: Barbara Lewis, Carla Thomas, Otis Redding, Rufus Thomas

October 29, 2018 By Joe Marchese 2 Comments

Stax 68 A Memphis Story

Otis Redding's "Sittin' on the Dock of the Bay," the first Stax single of 1968, should have been a new beginning for the artist and label.  Instead, the posthumous release ushered in a tumultuous year for the Memphis institution.  The death of Redding and members of The Bar-Kays on December 10, 1967 was a tremendous loss for Stax and popular culture, but no one could have predicted the upheaval that would affect Stax and the city of Memphis in the following twelve months.  That time has just

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Categories: Reviews Formats: Box Sets, CD Genre: R&B/Soul Tags: Albert King, Carla Thomas, Eddie Floyd, Isaac Hayes, Otis Redding, Rufus Thomas, Sam and Dave, The Staple Singers, Various Artists, William Bell

March 6, 2018 By Joe Marchese 1 Comment

Stax Singles 4 cover

Stax Records is rightfully renowned for its catalogue of deep southern soul straight from the heart of Memphis.  But, like its famous Detroit competitor Motown, the label founded by Jim Stewart and Estelle Axton released music in a variety of sounds and styles.  The Complete Stax-Volt Singles 1959-1968 (released in 1991 and reissued by Rhino in 2016 was the first major archival box to begin to address the Stax legacy in record-by-record fashion.  It was followed by The Complete Stax-Volt Soul

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Categories: News Formats: Box Sets, CD Genre: Country, Gospel, Pop, R&B/Soul Tags: Barbara Lewis, Big Star, Billy Eckstine, Carla Thomas, Delaney and Bonnie, Isaac Hayes, O.B. McClinton, Rufus Thomas, Various Artists

February 25, 2016 By Joe Marchese Leave a Comment

Other Side of the Trax

Bring on the B-sides! Despite its title, the massive, indispensable box set The Complete Stax/Volt Singles 1964-1968 concentrated on A-sides, presenting only a fraction of the labels' valuable flips.  The box left many worthy B-sides overlooked in the CD era, but Ace Records' Kent imprint has redressed that situation with the release of The Other Side of the Trax: Stax-Volt 45 RPM Rarities 1964-1968. All but one of the 24 tracks on this new compilation are all making their official CD

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Categories: News, Reviews Formats: CD Genre: R&B/Soul Tags: Carla Thomas, Dave Bartholomew, Isaac Hayes, Rufus Thomas, Various Artists, William Bell

May 16, 2013 By Mike Duquette Leave a Comment

third man sun

Though Jack White's Third Man Records imprint is known for doing some wacky pressings of things on wax - take, for example, the opulent-even-for-the-jazz-age gold and platinum pressings of the soundtrack to the new film version of The Great Gasby - their latest series, just recently announced, should appeal to a wide swath of rock fans. Third Man is licensing material from the Sun Records discography to repress on vinyl. Sam Phillips' Memphis label was, of course, a hotbed of activity for some

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Categories: News Tags: Rufus Thomas, The Prisonaires, Vinyl

September 22, 2011 By Joe Marchese Leave a Comment

stax logo

When Stax Records severed its distribution deal with Atlantic in 1968, it was time to rebuild from the ground up.  The entire back catalogue went to Atlantic, as did Sam and Dave’s contract.  Gone was the “Stax o’wax” label logo; in its place was a new, finger-snapping Stax.  The stewards of the Stax legacy at Concord Music Group have recently launched a series branded as Stax Remasters, and the three latest additions to the reissue program have arrived from Rufus Thomas, Shirley Brown and The

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Categories: News, Reviews Tags: Rufus Thomas, Shirley Brown, The Dramatics

August 5, 2011 By Joe Marchese Leave a Comment

stax remasters 1

While Berry Gordy was defining “The Sound of Young America” in Detroit, Jim Stewart, Estelle Axton and Al Bell were pioneering deep, gritty Southern soul in Memphis.  To many, Motown and Stax were two sides of the same coin, both offering powerhouse R&B sounds that spoke directly to the country’s youth.  Since acquiring Stax from Fantasy Records in 2004, Concord Music Group has relaunched Stax as an active concern with new artists and has introduced a number of healthy catalogue initiatives

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Categories: News Tags: Rufus Thomas, Shirley Brown, The Dramatics

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