How Stax Records forever changed the music industry

In the 1960s and 70s, Stax Records, also known as Soulsville, USA, was delivering some of the biggest hits in North America. 

Based in Memphis, Tennessee, Stax signed legendary artists like Isaac Hayes, Sam & Dave, Carla Thomas and Otis Redding and changed the music industry forever. 

Now, there's a four part series out on HBO Max about how the iconic record label became a quintessential part of the soundtrack of the civil rights movement. 

Journalism professor Ericka Blount, musicologist Rob Bowman and freelance journalist TJ Armour join host Elamin Abdelmahmoud on Commotion to reflect on Stax Records' historic legacy and how the label helped shape their music tastes.

We've included some highlights below, edited for length and clarity. For the full discussion, listen and follow the Commotion with Elamin Abdelmahmoud podcast on your favourite podcast player.

LISTEN | Today's episode on YouTube:

Elamin: Ericka, I'm going to start with you. You grew up loving this music. Can you describe a moment that really stays with you when you first heard a Stax song?

Ericka: One of my favourite songs is Hyperbolicsyllabicsesquedalymistic. My Dad was a DJ and I remember sitting with him in front of his record collection and listening to records all the time. I remember this song because it's just so funky.  

Elamin: Rob, what was it for you? How did you get into Stax? 

Rob: When I was seven, the Beatles changed my life. When I was eight, it was the Rolling Stones. Nine, Bob Dylan. But the Stones covered That's How Strong My Love Is, which they learned from Otis Redding, who learned it from another Memphis singer O.V. Wright. I adored that song. I remember Mick Jagger talking in an interview about Otis Redding. So I went to my local store and I asked for That's How Strong My Love Is. They didn't have it, but they did have Otis's new single. I was ten years old. It was Try a Little Tenderness. I took that record home and suddenly a whole new sonic world opened up. It was magical.

Elamin: TJ, let's go to you. What was the song for you?  

TJ: I think the song that first drew my attention was Sam & Dave's Hold On, I'm Coming. I remember hearing it a lot and I remember how catchy it was. I was probably about seven, like Rob at the time and digging through my parents record collection like Ericka. And then later on, as I got older, I would go back and do more research on the label and find out some of the other artists and great songs.

Elamin: Rob, what was Stax doing that nobody else was doing at the time?

Rob: Stax was doing a ton of things that no one else was doing. But probably the initial exceptional thing about it was: here's a white owned company that later became Black and white co-owned; later totally Black owned. 

1960 Memphis was a totally segregated city where Doctor King got killed eight years later. It's an integrated company. It was an oasis of racial sanity in an incredibly insane world. And it was Black music. There's no way anybody can suggest it's not. But there were also white influences coming in through people like Steve Cropper and Duck Dunn. It was a very interesting hybrid. Black centred, but it had some unique twists.

You can listen to the full discussion from today's show on CBC Listen or on our podcast, Commotion with Elamin Abdelmahmoud, available wherever you get your podcasts.

Panel produced by Ryan Chung