Reviews
Included in Q Magazine's "Best Soul Albums of All Time", 5 stars out of 5 -- "The album opens with a stolid blues, 'Ole Man Trouble,' but then explodes wide open with Redding's own 'Respect'...", "Otis Blue Marked the Beginning of Increased Visibility for Redding....Consistently Gripping...", "He Lends a Passionate Intensity to Every Song...", 5 stars out of 5 -- "Amid R&B-gig standards like the Temptations' 'My Girl,' the melodic invention in Redding's songs and the emotional investment in his performances mark the point at which he stopped merely singing soul music. He now created his own...", 5 Stars - Indispensable - "...the isolated constituent parts of OTIS BLUE come together with a beautiful precision which borders on a kind of Southern soul sorcery...arguably the hottest and strongest half-hour in soul...", Ranked #74 in Rolling Stone's "500 Greatest Albums of All Time", 5 stars out of 5 -- "Beautifully grained, gospel-rich performances....The band, Cropper's stinging guitar and the atonal Memphis horns, are phenomenal throughout -- this is as much their album as Redding's.", 4 stars out of 5 -- "This is widely regarded as Southern soul's crowning glory. The almost perfect crystallisation of Stax's gritty house sound, there's no filler...", 5 stars out of 5 -- "So spare, so strong, not a note wasted, defining the very spirit of 60s soul and never sounding better. And riding it all, that amazing voice, that unique fusion of pain and pride, of yearning and percussive drive.", 5 stars out of 5 - "...Redding's true dictionary of soul, a stunning journey through the past and future vocabulary of R&B....documenting a masterful artist rising to...the immense challenge of his times.", Ranked #35 in Nme's List of the `Greatest Albums of All Time.'
