Clash Music

Founded by brother and sister duo Jim Stewart (St) and Estelle Axton (Ax), Stax was the original label that could, growing from its humble Memphis base to a corporate headquarters in LA, million dollar contracts and its very own festival, the ‘black Woodstock’ that was Wattstax. It brought us Booker T and the MGs, Rufus and Carla Thomas, Sam and Dave, Otis Redding, Isaac Hayes and an astounding number of what are by now classic Soul songs. Drawing on the rich musical heritage of Memphis and its people, Stax was instrumental in the creation of the famed ‘Southern soul’ sound with a mix of country and gospel sounds and is the sonic representation of the city’s laidback citizenship.

Started as Satellite Records, the turning point for the fledgling label’s fortunes can be pinpointed to a move to an old movie theatre on McLemore Avenue. Located in one of Memphis’ poorer neighbourhoods it placed them in the midst of their potential audience and, rather fortuitously, a rich pool of raw talent. They quickly set about converting the huge space into a working studio, installing the control-room on the old stage and hanging massive curtains to create a suitable live area, all of Stax’s recording being cut live in the studio until well into the late Sixties. The theatre’s sloping floor was left as is, albeit with the seats removed, and is credited with creating the signature sound that all sessions recorded at McLemore Avenue boast. Another of those lucky accidents which mark the Stax story.
While Stewart was busying himself in the studio, Estelle Axton’s keen business sense soon had the concession stand in the lobby turned into the Satellite record store which, as well as bringing in much needed cash flow in the early days, allowed the label to test its fresh-from-the-studio recordings out on the neighbourhood kids who increasingly hung out there.

The label found early success with local radio DJ and Memphis personality Rufus Thomas and his daughter Carla’s duet ‘Cause I Love You’, a local hit which attracted the attention of Jerry Wexler and Atlantic Records who struck a deal to distribute future Stax releases and marked the start of a close relationship between the two labels. The other notable early release was ‘Last Night’ by The Mar-Keys, a group featuring Axton’s son Packy but more importantly featuring future members of the legendary Stax studio band Booker T and the MGs. This was the first break for the former high school band that had gravitated to the studio run by Packy’s mother and allowed one of the key characters of the Stax story to make his first forays into a studio environment. Steve Cropper attended the local high school like many of the future Stax alumni and was a talented guitar player with a keen interest in the recording studio. He grew to become a lynchpin of the label, writing, playing on and recording the majority of the classic Stax early releases including ‘Green Onions’, ‘In The Midnight Hour’, ‘Knock On Wood’ and ‘Sittin’ On The Dock Of The Bay’.

Cropper’s most productive writing partner was the first, and perhaps the brightest, star of the Stax story, Otis Redding. Redding had been active in the local Southern music scene in a number of vocal groups when he found himself at McLemore Avenue and the welcome recipient of some end-of-session studio time. The song he cut, ‘These Arms Of Mine’, became the first of many classics penned by Redding and featured his trademark 12/8 time signature and impassioned, gritty vocals. He quickly established himself as Stax’s biggest act, although his records were released on the Volt subsidiary, with his popularity even crossing over to the white ‘Rock’ crowd.
This was best illustrated on the Stax/Volt 4-week tour of Europe in March of 1967 and later in June when he performed at the Monterey Pop Festival backed by Booker T and the MGs and was deemed one of the highlights of the whole weekend. His charisma and smile won over an audience of hippies waiting for the pyrotechnics of The Who and Hendrix and sealed his reputation as a showman extraordinaire.

The tour of Europe too was a revelation for the artists who had made the trip and found themselves unable to comprehend how popular their music had become with these students and hippies. This popularity was helped by the exposure the label gained from The Rolling Stones’ cover of Rufus Thomas’ ‘Walking The Dog’ and everyone from The Beatles down proclaiming their love of the Stax sound. There is even a story, though it may not be entirely true, that illustrates the awe with which the acts and their output was held by the Swinging Sixties set. The story goes that John Lennon and Paul McCartney bowed upon meeting Booker T and the MGs’ Steve Cropper when The Beatles met up with the tour in England.

As successful as the tour was, some commentators credit the adoration received during those four weeks and those newly discovered egos as the beginning of the end for Stax’s happy family. Things took an even darker turn for the label with the death of Otis Redding and four fifths of the Bar-Keys group in a plane crash in December 1967. Otis and his backing band had been flying between gigs when the small aircraft crashed into the freezing waters of Lake Monona, leaving only one survivor of the seven passengers. The death of Redding was a tragedy, personally and professionally, for all at Stax and left a huge hole in this close-knit label that took a substantial time to fill.
Not long after, Memphis itself was the location of further tragedy, this time on the political stage, when Dr Martin Luther King was assassinated at the Lorraine Motel in April 1968. Dr King’s message of peaceful integration was being lived out there in Memphis at Stax records with its multiracial personnel and musicians and his death was felt very deeply at McLemore Avenue. Booker T and the MGs’ Donald ‘Duck’ Dunn tells the story of standing outside the studio having finished a session in the days after Dr King’s death. A police car pulled up and asked if he was alright, his confusion only clearing when he realised he was the only white person in the group, a fact that had never registered to any of the musicians present, such was the easy integration at Stax.

Indeed, by mid-1969, with Stax executive and minimum shareholder Al Bell buying out founder Estelle Axton, Stax became an integrated enterprise on all levels, from the studio floor to the boardroom itself.
Here began the second phase of the Stax story with Bell, having already turned the ‘local’ label into a competitive record company upon his appointment in 1965, now ready to take Stax nationwide by any means necessary.
Outside of the boardroom, Stax’s second phase marked the ascendance of Isaac Hayes as a recording artist. Hayes had been a writer for Stax almost since its inception with partner David Porter but come ’69 he was ready to step into the spotlight with the revolutionary ‘Hot Buttered Soul’ album. With its eighteen minute take on Jimmy Webb’s ‘By The Time I Get To Phoenix’, it was a revelation from the expectedly tight and crisp Stax stable and was a huge success. Hayes went onto further triumph and succeeded in taking the label into films with his Oscar winning soundtrack to the blaxploitation movie ‘Shaft’.

Riding the wave of Hayes’ success, Stax organised what it conceived as a black Woodstock festival, ‘WattStax’. Held in LA’s deprived Watts area, ticket prices were kept at a token $1 to allow locals to attend and it proved to be a triumphant celebration of black achievement featuring Hayes, Rufus Thomas, Eddie Floyd, the Soul Children, Albert King and the Bar-Keys. Notable was the compere role of the Reverend Jesse Jackson who recited his ‘I am somebody’ poem and did much to lend the event cultural gravitas.

Unfortunately, by this stage, not everyone was enamoured by Al Bell’s transformation of the label into a corporate business model, a move that alienated many of the back room staff and old timers. By 1971 Booker T Jones and Steve Cropper had ceased to have any involvement with the label, a telling sign given the core nature of Booker T and the MGs to the Stax story. Despite these developments, Hayes continued to have hit after hit with such grandiose releases as the double ‘Black Moses’ release with a crucifix shaped fold-out sleeve and four sides of extended compositions.

A disastrous deal with Columbia and Bell’s over reaching ambition, starting a sister comedy label and signing white rock acts, finally did the label in despite founder Jim Stewart ploughing much of his own finances into keeping it afloat.

Although the back catalogue has been maintained and available since those glory days, it is only now that Stax is being re-activated as a record label with some exciting new releases. They have re-signed Isaac Hayes as well as neo soul goddess Angie Stone, Soulive and Leon Ware. With such a rich legacy, can it live up to what went before?

Who knows, but finding out will make for enjoyable listening.

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