There are many sides to soul music. There is the pop-soul style of Motown, the sweet soul of Philadelphia, and the streetwise sound of New York City. But if you prefer a little more grit, a little more growl, a little more funk in your soul, then I have a record for you. This week’s featured record is a classic Wilson Pickett side from his golden era with Atlantic Records in the mid-late ’60s. I’ve wanted to feature Pickett, and this record in particular for quite some time and this seems like a good week to do it.
You know the story of the “Wicked” Wilson Pickett by now. You know that he first hit it with the Falcons, a group which also included the luminaries Eddie Floyd and Sir Mack Rice, and how they got some attention with “I Found A Love,” a song co-written by Pickett. It was a minor hit for the Falcons, but a bigger one when Pickett re-recorded it on his own some time later.
Soon Pickett went solo, and sent a demo of a song he had written to Jerry Wexler at Atlantic Records. Wexler gave “If You Need Me” to Atlantic artist Solomon Burke who had a big hit with it. Pickett was not happy that the song had been given away, but solo success was not far off for him. He was recording for Double L Records when “It’s Too Late” became a big R&B hit in 1963, so big in fact that it convinced Wexler to buy Pickett’s contract from Double L and sign him to Atlantic.
Pickett’s massive breakthrough came with his third single for Atlantic. “In the Midnight Hour,” recorded with the legendary Stax Records house band that included Steve Cropper, Duck Dunn, and Al Jackson (Booker T Jones didn’t play on any Pickett records), was released in 1965 and reached #1 on the R&B chart, and #21 on the pop chart.
The hits kept coming. In the next couple of year they included “Don’t Fight It,” “634-5789,” and “Ninety-Nine and a Half (Won’t Do)”. The chugging “Ninety-Nine and Half (Won’t Do)” was, like many of his hits, co-written by Pickett. It wasn’t his biggest success, making it to #53 on the pop chart and #13 R&B, but it was just as soulful and insistent as any of Pickett’s hits of that era. From: https://popdose.com/soul-serenade-wilson-pickett-ninety-nine-and-a-half-wont-do/
