Maps of Music

The Soul Album (1966)

Where the lyrics of The Soul Album take you, and where it was really made.

The cover model, Fleurette Carter, reappeared on the 1968 Booker T. & the M.G.'s album Soul Limbo.

Place unknown

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The Soul Album is the fourth studio album by American soul singer-songwriter Otis Redding
Released in 1966
Redding performs songs he co-wrote alongside cover versions
Covered songs come from Sam Cooke, Eddie Floyd, Roy Head and Smokey Robinson
Steve Cropper plays guitar and is credited as co-author of three tracks
Follows the album Otis Blue in Redding's catalogue

Mixes soul classics with original songs by Redding and other Stax artists, including Cropper
Ballads alternate with livelier rhythm and blues tracks
It's Growing is a cover of a Temptations hit from 1965
Nobody Knows You When You're Down and Out is a blues standard popularized by Bessie Smith
Treat Her Right was a recent hit for Roy Head
Chain Gang is a Sam Cooke song

Designed by Loring Eutemey of Atlantic Records
Photograph by Peter Levy
Shows model Fleurette Carter Townsend in a full-color portrait
Author Jonathan Gould says the cover contrasts with the racial obfuscation of Otis Blue

1	Just One More Day	3:32
2	It’s Growing	2:47
3	Cigarettes and Coffee	3:54
4	Chain Gang	3:05
5	Nobody Knows You (When You’re Down and Out)	3:11
6	Good to Me	3:51
7	Scratch My Back	2:43
8	Treat Her Right	2:11
9	Everybody Makes a Mistake	3:23
10	Any Ole Way	2:34
11	634–5789	2:50

Otis Ray Redding Jr. was born September 9, 1941 in Dawson, Georgia, and raised in Macon.
He left school at 15 to support his family, performing in local talent contests and at Macon's Douglass Theatre.
In 1958 he joined Johnny Jenkins' band, the Pinetoppers, touring the Southern states as singer and driver.
A Stax Records session in 1962 led to a contract and his first hit, "These Arms of Mine".

His debut album Pain in My Heart was released by Stax in 1964; he later reached a wider pop audience.
He performed at Whisky a Go Go in Los Angeles, toured Europe, and played the Monterey Pop Festival in June 1967.
"(Sittin' On) The Dock of the Bay" was recorded shortly before his death and released January 1968, becoming his only Billboard Hot 100 number one.
He died in a plane crash on December 10, 1967 in Lake Monona, near Madison, Wisconsin.
He is known as the "King of Soul" and was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1989.

Bruce Eder of AllMusic gave the album a positive review
Eder wrote that the album shows Redding moving from strength to strength in a string of high-energy, sweaty soul performances
Eder said the covers work as reinterpretations in Redding's own style
Eder called the track Cigarettes and Coffee the jewel of this undervalued collection

Spent 28 weeks on the US R&B albums chart, peaking at number 3
Reached number 58 on the US pop and rock charts
Reached number 22 on the UK album chart, according to the Japanese article
Sales exceeded those of Otis Blue, with more than 80,000 copies in the six months after release, according to the French article

Fleurette Carter, the model on the cover, later appeared on the cover of Soul Limbo by Booker T. & the M.G.'s in 1968.
Booker T. Jones and Isaac Hayes both played keyboards on the album.
The album covers songs by Sam Cooke, Eddie Floyd, Roy Head and Smokey Robinson, all reworked in Redding's style.
Several tracks were Stax-circle songs, including ones co-written by Steve Cropper.