this song would get me off the dock of the bay. toute de suite.
happy monday! what? you’re not feeling the love this morning? here. i’ll give you some in the guise of the late, great otis redding. everyone and their dog is familiar with the classic (sitting on the) dock of the bay. and anyone who has ever sat through pretty in pink will never forget jon cryer’s amazing  lip synch to otis’s try a little tenderness:
but not a lot of people know the happy song, and that’s a shame. it’s hard to stay grumpy with this one on. yeah, i know it’s titled like something out of romper room; but i promise. romper room would be so lucky to have such a soulful moment. (and while we’re talking romper room, i’m not still bitter that the teacher never saw me in her magic mirror. no, not much.)
then again, i don’t think she called otis’s name, either.
anyway, the happy song came off the immortal otis redding, an album recorded in a three-week span of time just before his untimely death in 1967. (nothing happy or immortal about that.) there’s such a wonderful quality to redding’s voice, especially in this song. it always feels like he is speaking directly to me (or you); it has craggy warmth and realness that so many these days lack. (and no auto-tune.) and backed by the best of the best — the stax crew, people like steve cropper and duck dunn and booker T and isaac hayes, for cryin’ out loud. that crew could have recorded the freaking phone book and it would have been the funkiest, coolest white pages experience ever.
in a world where music seems to have lost a certain level of authenticity, it is so wonderful to remember that there are people out there who have got the goods. they can sing, even without augmentation. they can play instruments with gentle power and great skill. they can create musical moments which easily translate and morph into your personal musical memories. and i’m sure there are people out there in the world, still, who can do all that. maybe they aren’t getting the industry attention or backing, but i know they are out there. i hear it in otis’s voice, and it brings me back to that wonderful realization. and hope.
and that makes me very, very happy.