October 1962
Otis Redding records "These Arms of Mine"
Johnny Jenkins was a sparsely recorded blues musician who
played left handed and was said to be an early influence on Jimi Hendrix.
Jenkins had a group called the Pinetoppers, which sometime included the
extraordinary Wayne Cochran playing bass guitar.
 |
| Wayne Cochran, yesterday. |
Coming out of Macon, Georgia,
the Pinetoppers had a moderate hit with an instrumental called "Love Twist"
and had acquired a new manager, Phil Walden, who suggested that the group
record a follow up at the Stax studios in Memphis accompanied by the session
musicians that comprised Booker T and the MGs. As Jenkins could not drive, he used
a chauffeur to drive him to the session.
Steve Cropper, the guitarist with the MGs,
later recalled how he noticed the big guy who was driving Jenkins, get out from
behind the wheel and go to the back of the truck and start unloading equipment.
The Pinetoppers' session proceded in an unremarkable fashion and finished some
forty minutes early. At this point, the big guy driving the truck asked if he
could sing a song. The keyboard player for the MGs had already left the
session, so Cropper sat down at the piano, which he normally only played for
purposes of composition. He asked what should he play and the truck driver said
"Just those church things". Cropper then established that he meant
triplets. "What key?" said Cropper. "It don't matter" came
the response. The truck driver then took a breath, opened his mouth and began.
According to Cropper "man, my hair stood on end. Jim
[Stewart, co-owner of Stax] came running out and said, 'That's it! That's it!
Where is everybody? We gotta get this on tape!' So I grabbed all the musicians
who hadn't left already for their night gigs, and we recorded it right there.
When you hear something that's better than anything you ever heard, you know
it, and it was unanimous. We almost wore out the tape playing it afterwards."
The truck driver was Otis Ray Redding and those first few
notes sung unaccompanied are the birth of modern soul music. The sound of the
Georgia pines let loose and untrammelled. Years later, in the duet
"Tramp", Carla Thomas would tell Redding that "you straight from
the Georgia woods", to which he would answer "that's good". Although
Ray Charles and Solomon Burke had a strong early influence on singing that was
affected and emotional, that made use of call and response, repetition and
exultations to generate an impact, Redding's singing here was a new style of
intimacy, of fragility that teetered on the brink of emotional instability,
that could shatter into a breakdown, yet was also controlled. Far from the
"sock it to me" shouter he later became, Redding's style here is
nearer to the close-miked intimacy of Bing Crosby. However, Redding was not a smooth
technician in the style of Sam Cooke. The feeling is conveyed almost entirely
through the sound of the vocal rather than the meaning of the words.
The image of the burly truck driver stepping forward to
deliver a seminal recording finds its modern counterpart in the You Got Talent
showcase of a shambolic looking imbecile delivering a blistering vocal
performance while Simon Cowell stares open mouthed. With accompanying You Tube
video strapline of the "They thought he was an idiot but you will not
believe it when he starts to sing" variety. These modern myrmidons of mellifuousness
are sometimes desribed as giving a soulful performance but their belting
over-vocalisations lack the balance, subtlety and control of Redding's
performance.
Typically, of course, the story of Redding's recording
here is only partially true. Redding had already made records in the belting
Little Richard style such as "Shout Bamalama" and was, in fact, the
featured vocalist with the Pinetoppers. although they were primarily an
instrumental group. He had won talent contests (another parallel with the world
of You Got Talent) and even replaced Little Richard for a period when that
latter singer got one of his periodic doses of religion.
 |
| Jenkins, Redding and the Pinetoppers |
"These Arms of Mine" was not even the first
song recorded at that session. They had already recorded "Hey Hey
Baby", a more typical Little Richard impersonation with Redding stretching
a rasping vocal to emulate that earlier stylist. Nevertheless, it is impressive
that Redding was able to transition into the more sympatico style of the
ballad. In fact, his exertions on the previous song add to the slightly
breathless, almost rubbing quality of his vocal sound.
Further, "These Arms of Mine", has an
arrangement, albeit simple in structure. They cannot have launched straight
into the song. Probably, Redding ran through the song and a head arrangement
was sketched out before they began recording. Additionally, although Cropper
claims he played piano other accounts state that Jenkins played piano. After
the first verse, a guitar appears that sounds very much like Cropper's style of
playing. It is possible he overdubbed this, of course, but why bother if
Jenkins could play piano.
The song itself is a near perfect example of a soul
ballad in that it is built around those classic soul elements of tension and
release. The acapella intro walks the notes from fifth to first typical of
country music songs (as exemplified by Johnny Cash's "I Walk the
Line") only slowing it way down to make the listener wait for that resolution
which one knows is coming in the commencement of the instruments at the word
"mine". After this rising melody, Redding makes the melody descend on
the word "yearning" before it rises again. Yearning is the key theme
of the song and the musical structure reflects this. The way Redding lets the
note fall away at the end of words, his choice of phrasing is impeccable and
unique in how he selects which words to emphasise and which to elongate. It is
both natural and highly contrived - the model of the soul style. The
introduction of the staccato guitar lines emphasise the tension as does the
frequent repetition of key phrases and words, chiefly the title of the song. Tension
and release, rise and fall, these would become the very building blocks of the
soul ballad.
Phil Walden ditched the Pinetoppers and took over
managing Redding who would record many other classic ballads, accompanied by
Booker T and the MGs. Some 18 months after recording "These Arms of
Mine", he recorded "Come to Me" during which he sings the phrase
"Days are getting so lonely, nights are getting so blue" and he
elongates the second "so" to make the greatest rising note in the
history of sound. Seriously. Now that's soul.
Hear Otis yearning here.
