The producer Jack Bruce considered an all-time genius: “It gave it a new life”
When you think of Atlantic Records, you think of some of the greatest soul songs and singers ever recorded. You think of Aretha Franklin and Wilson Pickett. You think of Sam and Dave and of Arthur Conley, and you think of Ray Charles and Solomon Burke, Carla Thomas and Esther Phillips, of Eddie Floyd, Clarence Carter and Otis Redding. You think of ‘Sweet Soul Music’ and ‘Soul Man’, and you think of ‘Respect’ and ‘Spanish Harlem’.
You don’t often think of the producer credits, though, but you certainly notice the production. There is a warmth and depth to the rhythm and blues and soul recordings from this era that are hard to find anywhere else. There is a celebration of the soul of the singer and of the song, an overflowing of the human spirit which warms and enriches the recordings, but peel back that top layer and you’ll find the darker side of the human condition is never far away from the experience in the songs.
A lot of the recordings mentioned above may now sit under the banner of ‘Atlantic Soul’, having originally been recorded by affiliate, satellite or sister labels, but they are all recognisable for the studio, band and producers that worked on them.
When it comes to all great soul music, you know right away whether you’re listening to something that was recorded in Motown and produced by Berry Gordy—the drums usually give it away, as do the tight rhythms and prominent bass lines from players like James Jamerson and Bob Babbitt—or if you’re listening to something that was recorded in Muscle Shoals and produced by the great Rick Hall, or else by the legendary Jerry Wexler. Their recordings are far funkier, grittier, and more of the earth than those of their Motor City counterparts. Their Southern Soul is a lot swampier.
You can also tell when you’re listening to something recorded at Stax in Memphis and produced by co-founder Jim Stewart by the healthy dose of brass supplied by The Memphis Horns or from the tight, sparse, but essential rhythms provided by the various members of house band Booker T. and the MG’s. To some people, the best soul producer in Memphis was Chips Moman, working across the city at American Sound Studios.
As far as Cream bassist and lead vocalist Jack Bruce was concerned, though, the pre-eminent producer was working at Atlantic Records proper. Having previously worked with such luminous and legendary figures as Ray Charles, the Drifters and the Coasters, The Spinners, Ruth Brown and Bobby Darin, John Coltrane, Ornette Coleman, Thelonious Monk and even Charlie Parker, Tom Dowd had a contact book and a CV which was worth its weight in gold discs.
It’s no wonder, then, that with that experience behind him, he left such an impression on the Scottish singer when he was brought on board to produce and engineer Cream’s second album, Disraeli Gears.
“The philosophy at Atlantic Studios was not, ‘let’s have this really great song or, let’s have this riff’”, Jack Bruce has said. “It was, ‘let’s make a record’. Tom Dowd was one of the all-time geniuses of recording and that’s what you had to do, you had to convince him that what you had was a proper record.”
“When we played ‘Sunshine Of Your Love’ live, before we went in the studio, it was much more of a straight-ahead rock feel,” Bruce expanded. “But Tom Dowd came up with an idea. He said, ‘Why don’t you play it like in those westerns where the Indians’ drums go, ‘Boom boom boom’?’. So Ginger [Baker, Cream drummer] tried that. Then it gave it a new life.”
