Ann Peebles: Straight From the Heart [FAT POSSUM]

Why you'll love it

This remastered Fat Possum reissue brings back a deep cut of early-70s Hi Records soul. AllMusic gave it 4.5 stars, and it became her first album on the Billboard 200.

This edition

• Remastered
• Download card included
• Stereo mix

About the album

Every Memphis soul fan knows Stax, but in the early 1970s the hottest room in town was across the way at Royal Recording Studios. That's where Willie Mitchell ran the Hi label, and where a young singer from St. Louis made her third album with the house band behind her.

The Hi Rhythm Section plays with that famous low, rolling patience, and Peebles cuts through it with a voice that's tough and tender in the same breath. George Jackson wrote the bouncing opener "Slipped, Tripped and Fell in Love," Don Bryant (whom she'd marry in 1974) co-wrote several tunes with her, and her version of Bobby Bland's "I Pity the Fool" made the Hot 100. "I Feel Like Breaking Up Somebody's Home Tonight" smoulders, and "99 Pounds" swings.

Hip hop fans will know the opening line of "Trouble, Heartaches & Sadness": RZA sampled it for Wu-Tang Clan's "Da Mystery of Chessboxin'." Robert Christgau gave it an A minus and suggested radio programmers be investigated for skipping it, which is about as stern as record reviews get without involving a lawyer.

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

Tracklist

Listen

On Hi / Fat Possum (cat# FPH1410-1-3-VMP), a reissue of the 1971 album.