Skip to playerSkip to main contentSkip to footer
  • 5/22/2025
In a tiny Alabama town with the curious name of Muscle Shoals, something miraculous sprang from the mud of the Tennessee | dG1fNVlkY3lzMHZpUEU
Transcript
00:01What is it about Muscle Shoals?
00:03It's just a little village on the Alabama border.
00:06Why does that music come out of that?
00:09Each time a person went to Muscle Shoals,
00:12they came out of there with a hit.
00:14Record making like that doesn't happen often.
00:17It usually takes somebody like Rick Hall
00:20with the drive to do it.
00:22I was going to kick some ass and take some names.
00:24I wanted to be somebody.
00:26Rick Hall had a rhythm section of exceptional players.
00:36Those guys would sit there in that studio
00:38and just fire the group, you know?
00:40And I'd be right there with them, singing along,
00:43and we'd all work it out together.
00:45Rick Hall, he's stuck there every minute.
00:47You gotta have a name, and Swampers is a good nickname.
00:50You just didn't expect them to be as funky
00:53or as greasy as they were.
00:55R-E-S-B-E-C-T
00:57Find out what it means to me
00:59Paul Simon called Stax Records, talked to Al Bell,
01:04and said,
01:05Hey, man, I want those same black players
01:07that played on I'll Take You There.
01:09He said, that can happen, but these guys are mighty pale.
01:13Let me take you there!
01:15I'll take you there!
01:17We started to explode.
01:19The world was coming to Muscle Shoals.
01:21When I think back on all the crap I learned in high school.
01:27You thought you hadn't found a good girl.
01:30I love the old man, sweetheart!
01:33Being there does inspire you to do it differently.
01:36It's like when they're coming out.
01:37You'll stop, boom!
01:38It was being funky, you know.
01:40That was the whole idea of it.
01:46I began to tell them of this great new deal we'd made with Capital.
01:50One of the guys stopped me and said,
01:52We've already made a deal with Jerry.
01:54We'll be leaving here.
01:55It was war.
02:02You're gonna hear some of the greatest voices that ever were.
02:10There are certain places where there is a field of energy.
02:15You're in rock and roll heaven, man.
02:31You're in rock and roll heaven, man!

Recommended