Ann Peebles: Part Time Love [FAT POSSUM]

Why you'll love it

This Fat Possum reissue comes with a download card. Its title song, her version of Little Johnny Taylor's 1963 hit, reached No. 7 on the R&B chart and No. 45 on the pop chart.

This edition

• Download card included

About the album

Ann Peebles grew up singing in her father's church choir in Missouri, and the family group opened for gospel stars like Mahalia Jackson and the Soul Stirrers. A night singing in a Memphis club with bandleader Gene Miller led her to Hi Records producer Willie Mitchell, who quickly offered her a contract.

Mitchell surrounded her with the Hi Rhythm Section and the Memphis Horns, the crew behind Al Green's run of hits, and the sound is lean and warm with plenty of bite. "Part Time Love" smoulders, "Give Me Some Credit" was one of her first R&B chart entries, she gives the Isley Brothers' "It's Your Thing" a fresh strut, and "Steal Away" and "I Still Love You" slow things down beautifully. Mitchell recorded and mixed it himself.

She married Hi songwriter Don Bryant in 1974, wrote some of her biggest records with him, and joined the Memphis Music Hall of Fame in 2014. Memphis soul has no shortage of great voices; this is the one we put on when the shop needs to sound like it knows what it's doing.

Also at Kops: more Ann Peebles on vinyl · browse Classic Soul

Tracklist

Listen

On Hi / Fat Possum (cat# FPH1177-1), a reissue of the 1971 album.