Sam & Dave: Hold On, I'm Comin' [RHINO]

Why you'll love it

Matthew Lutthans cut this 180g pressing from the original analog mono masters, and it was pressed at Fidelity Record Pressing in California. The album topped the Billboard R&B Albums chart, and the title track was a No. 1 R&B hit.

This edition

• 180g vinyl
• Mono
• Cut from the original analog mono masters

About the album

The title came from a bathroom. Isaac Hayes and David Porter were writing at Stax's converted movie theatre on East McLemore Avenue when Porter stepped out to the men's room, Hayes hollered for him to hurry, and Porter shouted back the words that became the song. They finished it within the hour.

That same tiled men's room doubled as the studio's echo chamber, which is part of why these records ring the way they do. Booker T. & the M.G.'s and the Mar-Key Horns play on everything, Sam Moore and Dave Prater trade lines like a revival meeting, and Hayes and Porter wrote most of the set, with Steve Cropper co-writing "If You Got The Loving" and, with Eddie Floyd and Al Bell, "I Got Everything I Need." "You Don't Know Like I Know" became the second R&B hit, "I Take What I Want" struts, and "Blame Me (Don't Blame My Heart)" closes on a plea.

Aretha Franklin, Tom Jones, Bruce Springsteen and Tina Turner all went on to cover the title track. We like to think the bathroom deserves a co-writing credit.

Also at Kops: more Sam & Dave on vinyl · browse Classic Soul

Tracklist

Listen

On Stax / Rhino (cat# RES1 708), a reissue of the 1966 album.