Live in Europe

Released

Put him in a Memphis recording studio and Otis Redding would capture every facet of what makes Southern soul great, but put him on a stage anywhere in the world and he’d amplify that greatness to the heavens. Recorded during a March 21, 1967 set at Paris’s Olympia theater and backed by Booker T. & the MG’s, Otis is just relentless in this ten song set: busting out of the gate with a rousing “Respect” that he was still the sole owner of pre-Aretha, his litany of classics (a piston-pumping, sweat-spraying “Can’t Turn You Loose”; the most intensely yearning renditions of “I’ve Been Loving You Too Long (To Stop Now)” and “Try A Little Tenderness” available) is bolstered by a couple covers that cut his British Invasion contemporaries to the quick; his “Day Tripper” and “Satisfaction” would make James Brown tug his collar, let alone the Beatles and Stones. Otis has the audience in the palm of his hand from the first letter of the compere’s spelled-out announcement, but the way he feeds off their energy and reflects it back to them tenfold is the big pull here; by the mid-set call-and-response-provoking apex of Sam Cooke’s “Shake,” he sounds like he’s singlehandedly shouting down a hurricane — and winning.

Nate Patrin