Stax: The Soul of Hip-Hop

And the Stax obsession continues!! I just can't seem to get enough of that record label. My most recent Stax purchase is called Stax: The Soul of Hip-Hop and it features all of the Stax songs which have been sampled by various hip hop artists throughout the years. The album consists of several Stax all-stars such as Booker T. and the MGs, The Bar-Kays, Isaac Hayes, David Porter, etc. etc. This record is straight BEAST!!!! There is no other music, other than the Grateful Dead and Terry Cashman, that put me in as good a mood as the music of Stax Records and this record just makes me want to get up and Shake a tail feather! It's funny how I came to buy this record. My dear friend Jeff and I were at J&R Music in lower manhattan. J&R is a huge music and electronic store which actually sells records and is where I bought my first record, Jerry Jeff Walker's Contrary to Ordinary. Jeff and I used to go there for their 99 Cent Bins which have since become 29 Cent Bins and are filled with a lot of crap mainly because we bought the last of anything good that they had left (PakalaMeredith, I'm talking about you!). Anyway, we went there to shop for a microphone for our podcast "The 99 Cent Bin." We didn't find one as we are uncertain which mic we need so we ended up leaving but before we left, being the record junkies that we are, we went over to the "29 Cent Bins" just to see if there was anything worth picking up but unfortunately the bins were littered with the usual: Oak Ridge Boys, Barbara Mandrell, about 20 of the same Lee Greenwood records and of course it wouldn't be a "29 Cent Bin" without Sha-NaNa and the Legal Eagles soundtrack. Jeff and I actually did manage to find some decent records i.e., an obscure Van Morrison LP, Priscilla Coolidge Jones, Waylon Jennings but then we ventured from the "29 Cent Bin" to the "29 Dollar Bin." We didn't expect to buy anything expensive, just browse, but when I found this Stax record and noticed that it was under 15 bucks, well lets just say I told Van, Rita and Waylon that it was nice knowing ya, no hard feelings, but Booker T, William Bell and I have a date with The Emotions! (I actually didn't say that to those records but instead I didn't even bother taking them back to the 29 Cent Bin. I just left them in the Expensive bin. Sorry).

I just finished listening to this record and there are several Wu Tang samples on it. Now while I love Wu Tang and always will, fuck you guys for touching this music. I mean I get it, you clearly love it as much as I do but come up with your own beats and let Stax be Stax. I mean seriously! Shame on a Nigga!