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The Complete Stax/Volt Soul Singles Volume 2: 1968-1971

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Various Artists - Fantasy / Stax

 
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The Complete Stax/Volt Soul Singles Volume 2: 1968-1971
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Avg: 4.0 (51 ratings)

An absolutely essential collection for any soul music fan.

  • We Say...

    An absolutely essential collection for any soul music fan, The Complete Stax Volt Singles Vol 2, 1968-1971 offers ample proof of Stax’s continued musical excellence in the years immediately following Otis Redding’s death. If you’re just looking to dip your toe into this vast body of music, Disc 8 is a great place to start: Not only does it offer a number of major R&B hits from late ’71 and early ’72 (including the Dramatics “Whatcha See Is Whatcha Get,” Johnnie Taylor’s “Hijackin’ Love” and the Emotions’ “Show Me How”), but it’s also overflowing with wonderful obscurities like Lee Sain’s salacious “Them Hot Pants,” the Newcomers’ Jackson 5 knock-off “Pin the Tail on the Donkey,” and Melvin Van Peebles’s groovy cinematic instro, “Sweetback’s Theme.”

  • They Say...

    The first Stax-Volt box was a monolith, standing as the definitive document of the labels and, therefore, gritty Southern soul. Its sequel, The Complete Stax-Volt Soul Singles, Vol. 2: 1968-1971 is considerably more problematic. Covering only four years compared to its predecessor, which showcased nine years, Vol. 2 contains 216 tracks, including all of the A- and B-sides released during that era. Most critics consider these four years to be substantially less interesting than Stax's earlier years, and in a sense, they're right. There's no Otis Redding or Sam & Dave, and the music doesn't have the same innovative, kinetic spark of the early years. There's still a lot of great, great music here, but it's difficult to sort it out among these nine discs. About three or four discs' worth of material is truly essential, and it might have been better to boil this era down to a smaller box set, since that would have made for a necessary purchase. As it stands, it's too sprawling and comprehensive to be an essential purchase for anyone other than soul fetishists and hardcore collectors, but those listeners should find much of this fascinating.

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