Sixty Years Of The Exciting Wilson Pickett

Tiggerlion on The Exciting Wilson Pickett released August 1966

The character of the artist directly impacts their work. Grace Jones’s personality is imprinted on Nightclubbing. Laura Nyro’s love of soul music generates the joy of Gonna Take A Miracle and Joan Armatrading is as gorgeous as its creator. Lee Perry’s strange obsession with sound, kindled by collie weed, begat Super Ape. Robert Wyatt’s experience and his odd view of life provide the unique flavour of Rock Bottom. Exaggerations and caricatures also abound. The grotesque, sexually abandoned Hoodoo Man is personified by Junior Wells. The Stones made a pact with the devil. George Clinton embraced aliens. Tom Waits rummaged around in a junk yard.

Wilson Pickett, by most metrics, was not a pleasant man. He was volatile, distant, explosive, reckless with guns, drugs and driving under influence, violent towards women, crude, coarse and deeply arrogant. The fourth of eleven children, he was subjected to unrelenting abuse at the hands of his mother. She threw anything within reach at him, once breaking his arm. He ran off with his dog to hide in the woods regularly, on one occasion for a whole week. As a small child, there was already a rage within him and a fascination with guns, leading him to threaten his brother with a loaded shotgun. At the age of fourteen, he left Alabama to live with his father in Detroit in 1955. By then, his vocal prowess had been nurtured in a Southern Baptist church. In the big city, he sang on street corners in makeshift groups, until forming a gospel group, The Violinaires, who toured America and were very popular. However, when the money-making potential of a secular group came knocking, Pickett did not hesitate. Without a backward glance, he joined The Falcons which included Eddie Floyd and Sir Mack Rice. Pickett started writing songs himself. I Found A Love was his biggest success with the group in 1962 and enabled him to embark on a solo career.

He was a handsome man with lungs of leather. He sang from his gut with visceral power. He testified, grunted, groaned, shrieked. His “love” songs are the howls of an animal. There was nothing subtle or graceful about him. He was forceful in his demand for your attention, craving celebrity. He believed he was a flawless singer and performer, born to be a star. His skin colour, however, was significantly against him. Some Falcons worried he was too black. The prejudice he was subjected to, undoubtedly, fed into his combative stance against the world.

Pickett recorded a single for Lloyd Price’s Double-L label, If You Need Me, in 1963. He composed the song with Sonny Sanders and Robert Bateman, who had contributed to Please, Mr Postman. It’s a fantastic performance with meaty guitar and horn lines and a Gospel call and response chorus. It soon made a stir on local radio. Jerry Wexler had his ear to the local sounds and already had the publishing rights to Double-L material. He lifted it note-for-note for Solomon Burke and put Atlantic’s marketing might behind it. The two records went toe-to-toe but Burke’s version crossed into the national charts, thwarting Pickett’s first chance of success. Burke later claimed he was angry that Atlantic hadn’t signed Pickett and he went on radio shows to promote Pickett’s version. If Burke was riled, imagine how furious Pickett was.

He did swallow his pride and signed for Atlantic eventually. Wexler turned out to be an astute and thoughtful producer, who surrounded him with great musicians. He also had the experience and skill to sell the product, describing Pickett as having “matinee idol looks, flaming eyes, lustrous ebony skin…a sleek muscular torso” and his voice “a cyclone of conviction.” However, already known as Wicked Pickett, Wexler also christened him “the pistol”, fully aware of his love of guns, violent rages, gambling, sexual incontinence and general lawlessness. At first, he allocated him to record producer Bert Berns and well-known songwriters Barry Mann and Cynthia Weil but there was little chart action after twelve months. Pickett was getting impatient.

Atlantic had a deal with Stax in Memphis, Tennessee. In return for distribution, Stax would act as a production line for acts sent to them by Atlantic. In the small print was a clause giving the rights to all the master tapes to Atlantic but no-one noticed at the time. The home-grown talent, Otis Redding, had already benefited from the arrangement. In 1965, Stax and Atlantic were both thriving. Pickett was sent to Memphis, with his colossal superiority complex, to make records with Steve Cropper, Al Jackson, Duck Dunn, Isaac Hayes plus the Memphis Horns. The shy, reserved Stax boss, Jim Stewart, worried over his blood pressure. Pickett might have been bristling with indignation at being ejected from New York and having to mix with hicks but he soon struck up a fruitful writing partnership with Cropper, plus input from Floyd.

In The Midnight Hour was written at their first meeting and recorded a few hours later on the 12th May 1965. It’s Pickett’s signature song. He is direct, in-your-face. He isn’t trying to seduce, he is making demands. The celebrated back-beat was created by Al Jackson attempting to impersonate a middle-aged white man, Jerry Wexler, dancing the jerk, a teen sensation at the time. Joe Hall sat in on piano. The bassline matches the raw sex swagger of Pickett’s aggressive vocal. The horns, played by Wayne Jackson, Andrew Love, Charles Axton and Floyd Newman, are sublime. Finally, Pickett had his hit, reaching 21 on the Billboard Hot 100, stalling outside the top twenty because of its overt sexual meaning. It made his career and defined Southern Soul as grittier and more raw than its northern equivalent.

The follow up, Don’t Fight It, again written by Cropper and Pickett, did decent business but didn’t capture the imagination quite as much. The B side, It’s All Over, is an attempt to cast Pickett as a tearful insomniac until he finds his true love. Patti Labelle and The Blue Belles soften his natural snarl effectively but this is a song that requires the nuance of, say, Otis Redding. Pickett neither does melancholy nor optimism but here he is on the cusp of something great sounding as though he is chewing a wasp.

When Pickett next came to Memphis, Cropper and Floyd met him at the Lorraine Motel, where Martin Luther King had been assassinated a few years later. They had two songs for him, the first having the title of a telephone number and the other an insistence on perfection. 634-5789 (Soulsville, U.S.A.) is a tribute to The Marvelletes’ Beechwood 4-5789, with, of course a Stax spin. Patti and The Blue Belles cast their magic spell, making Pickett seem reasonable, someone reliable to be called upon when in need of affectionate company. The whole song swings beautifully as though it wants to be cool, finger-snapping jazz. It was a bigger hit than In The Midnight Hour. Ninety-Nine And A Half (Won’t Do) has Pickett on his arrogant pedestal howling and shrieking for one hundred per cent commitment from his lover. Cropper’s guitar sounds an alarm. The Dunn/Jackson rhythm section, supplemented by the horns in their lower register, give the song a dark undertow, adding to a sense of threat. That threat is carried more overtly into its B side, Danger Zone. There is no pretending that Wilson Pickett is anything other than a bad man and no-one would want to bump into him on a dark night. It didn’t stop him from enjoying a run of hits. I’m Drifting is superficially jaunty and carefree. This time Pickett co-wrote with David Porter and Homer Banks and he’s looking for a party. Pickett’s idea of a party included cocaine, girls and pounding music.

After a handful of singles and enough for half an album, Jim Stewart and the Soulsville crew lost tolerance for Pickett’s abhorrent behaviour and banished him from their studio. Rather than bring him back to New York, Wexler shipped him off to Fame in Muscle Shoals. The Swampers took the place of the MGs: Spooner Oldham on keys, Roger Hawkins drums, Albert “Junior” Lowe bass, and Chips Moman, Jimmy Johnson and Tommy Cogbill on guitar. All of them are equally superlative musicians. The Memphis Horns followed him but he no longer had an empathetic songwriting partner. Instead, Wexler’s ear for obscure R&B records with the potential for mainstream charts now served Wilson Pickett well.

Chris Kenner turned the spiritual Children, Go Where I Send You, inside out to create Land Of A Thousand Dances, giving it a slinky New Orleans beat. In LA, Cannibal and The Headhunters learnt it from a Rufus Thomas album. One night, Cannibal forgot the words and improvised “Naah, na, nah, na naaah…” transforming a list song into an exhortation to get on the dancefloor. Pickett grunts and groans through his version but the Memphis Horns are having a ball and Hawkins’ drumming is relentless. Charlie Chalmers delivers an exhilarating sax solo. It outsold both of its predecessors, shifted a million copies and comfortably entered the top ten. They tried to repeat the trick with an earlier Kenner record from 1961, graced by Allain Toussant’s rolling piano. Something You Got is head-over-heels romantic. Pickett, a man who seemed to believe emoting equals belting it out as fiercely as possible, squeals in pain while The Swampers give the song a spring in its step with a side serving of some Southern bump ‘n’ grind. It is a song covered multiple times over the years, including by Alvin Robinson, the Ramsey Lewis Trio, Johnny Rivers, Chuck Jackson and Maxine Brown, Earl Grant, Fats Domino, Bobby Womack, the Moody Blues, the Searchers, the American Breed, Fairport Convention, Bruce Springsteen, Them, and Jimi Hendrix. It’s quite something for Pickett’s to remain the best known. Barefootin’ is another dance list song originating from New Orleans, this time without shoes. Robert Palmer (not that one) recorded and released his original just before Pickett covered it. It was such a big hit, top ten Billboard Hot 100, Pickett’s version remained tucked away as an album track.

Two songs tap into Pickett’s origins in Gospel. You’re So Fine was a national hit for The Falcons before Pickett joined the group. He sings it as softly and smoothly as his voice is capable of. The Swampers make it swing. Don Covay’s Mercy, Mercy pleads with his partner as if asking forgiveness from God. It’s guitar driven with no horns, rather unusual for a Soul record in 1964. Jimi Hendrix, no less, made his recording debut, contributing a nice lick. The lead guitarist then was Jimmy Johnson, now covering it again for Pickett in Muscle Shoals.

The final song points to Pickett’s future. It’s specifically written for him by Bobby Womack, who became Pickett’s comrade-in-arms for all things ugly and debauched. The move from Memphis to Muscle Shoals did nothing to curb his behaviour. In fact, hooking up with Womack confounded the problem, both as wild as each other. Womack has since expressed regret for introducing him to cocaine. She’s So Good To Me has a funky groove. It appears to be in awe of a wonderful woman who walks in and takes control but pretty soon Pickett’s eye is wandering. “The thing about the party that I really enjoy…there’ll be plenty of other girls and I’m the only boy.” His rasp clearly spells out his lascivious intentions.

Of The Exciting Wilson Pickett’s twelve tracks, six were recorded at Stax and six at Fame. Five of the six are on one side of vinyl, side one for Fame and side two for Stax. The Memphis Horns are the the glue that holds the album together. You could view it as a battle of the bands, The Swampers versus The MGs. If you were blind testing, you’d struggle to tell which is which. The most remarkable thing is that Steve Cropper needs no less than three Fame guitarists to replace him.

The main difference is the material. At Stax, the songs were written with Pickett or with him specifically in mind. This adds an edge, a sense of danger to the performances that match his character. The Exciting Wilson Pickett would not be as exciting if he wasn’t such an unpleasant individual and he would not be such a rivetting singer if not for his personal foibles, just as Michelangio Merisi da Caravaggio’s paintings express the darkness and horror in his life, Christopher Marlowe’s plays are no less dramatic and extreme than he actually experienced himself or Gian Lorenzo Bernini dug out his own black heart from his beloved marble. Of course, the talents of the musicians, writers and producers from both studios add substance and undoubted quality to the album but it’s Wilson Pickett’s rough aggression and lack of self doubt that makes it a defining album of Southern Soul. Atlantic promoted him as The Wicked Pickett, the bad man of Soul. They did it in order to increase sales and it worked. Otis Blue is often held up as the best album to emerge from Stax. It, too, has its roots in the dusty earth of the fields and the rapture of Baptist sufferance but Redding takes them in a different direction with a greater emotional range and a softer touch that took him beyond the genre. Pickett’s base instincts are closer to the essence of Southern Soul, a genre that is at heart, gritty dance music, maximising meagre resources with an abundance of talent.

He had further hits for Atlantic. Mack Rice wrote Mustang Sally specifically for him. In late 1967, a version of Dyke & the Blazers’ Funky Broadway was his biggest cross over. By then, the people at Muscle Shoals had tired of his erratic behaviour. He teamed up with Bobby Womack at American Studios in Memphis in 1968 for The Midnight Mover album. The title track was another top ten R&B hit. Back at Fame in 1969, Greg Allman hung around the car park to the studio to play for him and ended up delivering an acclaimed solo on Hey Jude. His last big hit record was in 1972 Fire and Water. His final record for Atlantic was the top thirty R&B hit International Playboy. Characteristically, he left the label in a dispute over money. Pickett’s career fell into decline after the advent of disco. Moving to RCA in 1975, he courted commercial success by moving towards Pop, but it neither suited his voice, his performing style nor his character. Three RCA albums and a handful of singles achieved only moderate returns. 1975 saw the inception of Pickett’s own Wicked label, which had minimal sales. A move to Erva Records was equally fuitless. Later for a short period he worked alongside Joe Tex, Don Covay, Ben E King and Solomon Burke in a revamped Soul Clan, a promising project that failed to attract much attention.

He was married in 1959 to Bonnie Covington and divorced in 1986. They had two boys and two girls. All have remained tight lipped about life with Wicked Pickett except for daughter, Veda, also a singer and recording artist. She gave an interview to Music Life Magazine in 2018 in which she remembered her father fondly, felt proud of his achievements and was determined to protect his legacy. “My greatest memory is just that my dad was so down to earth. If he was not singing, my daddy probably would have been a comedian because he always had a lot of jokes. He was always a good story teller and he loved to joke and laugh. If you would’ve met my dad, you would’ve thought that you knew him for about 20 years. That’s how down to earth he was.” She recalled Bobby Womack, Solomon Burke and Little Richard coming to their house, all joking and having a laugh and him spending hours by the river teaching her how to fish. However, the marriage really ended as early as 1962 when Pickett met Dovie Hall, who was a huge influence on his life, yet still suffered paranoid jealousy and regular domestic violence throughout their fifteen year relationship.

His brushes with the law mainly took place after his divorce and his recording career ended, when his addictions became worse and uncontrolled. He was charged with first-degree reckless endangerment and criminal possession of a dangerous weapon in 1975 when he shot through a hotel room door at the Isley Brothers, infuriated and intoxicated after a hunting trip.

In 1984, Pickett was involved in a bar fight in Hackensack, New Jersey, where he brought a loaded shotgun. He was convicted but avoided prison time, receiving a fine of $1,000 and two years of probation instead. The judge took into account his lawyer’s claim that Pickett did not have a violent past, despite the prosecutor’s protestations over his previous arrests and fascination with weapons.

In 1991, Pickett was arrested for yelling threats while drunkenly driving his car over the front lawn of Donald Aronson, the mayor of Englewood, New Jersey. He faced charges of drunk driving, refusing to take a breath test, and resisting arrest. Pickett agreed to perform a benefit concert in exchange for having the disorderly conduct and property damage charges dropped.

In 1992, Pickett struck 86-year-old pedestrian Pepe Ruiz with his car. Police allegedly found six empty miniature vodka bottles and six empty beer cans in Pickett’s car. Ruiz died later that year. Pickett pleaded guilty to drunk driving charges and agreed to rehab and received a reduced sentence of one year in jail and five years probation.

A week later, a judge ordered Pickett to move out of his home after his live-in girlfriend charged him with threatening to have her killed and throwing a vodka bottle at her. In Cusseaux v. Pickett, the plaintiff, Jean Marie Cusseaux, lived with the defendant, Wilson Pickett, Jr., for about ten years, during which time she alleged he severely mistreated her, putting her health and well-being at risk and causing her physical injuries on numerous occasions. Cusseaux claimed that Pickett’s actions were part of a continuous pattern of violent behavior often linked to his intoxication. She cited specific instances of physical assault and being struck by objects, leading to serious injuries requiring medical attention. Cusseaux alleged that this abuse resulted in her suffering from battered-woman’s syndrome but Pickett’s lawyers moved to dismiss the first count, arguing that battered-woman’s syndrome was not a recognised cause of action in New Jersey. The case was legally significant as the court decided to recognise battered-woman’s syndrome as a valid cause of action, and allowed Cusseaux’s claims to proceed.

Sadly, making legal history didn’t teach him anything, as often happens with people who have addictive disease. In 1996, Pickett was arrested for assaulting his then girlfriend, Elizabeth Trapp, while under the influence of cocaine; she declined to press charges but, nevertheless, he was still charged with possession.

Pickett was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1991. In 1993, he was honored with a Pioneer Award by the Rhythm and Blues Foundation. In 2005, he was voted into the Michigan Rock and Roll Legends Hall of Fame and in 2015 was inducted into the National Rhythm & Blues Hall of Fame. He was invited to perform at Atlantic Records’ 40th Anniversary concert in 1988, and his music was prominently featured in the 1991 film The Commitments, with Pickett as an off-screen character. He does appear in Blues Brothers 2000, performing 634-5789 (Soulsville, U.S.A.), a film that was made in 1998.

Wilson Pickett Jr died on January 19, 2006, as a result of a heart attack, aged 64. Of course, the world would be better without his unforgiveable violence, especially towards women. If he’d had a better start in life, never suffered with drug addiction and had been a better human being, he may well have been a great singer but he would not have made the records he did, would not have been a Soul pioneer and would never have been such an influence in the world of music. His personality is embedded in The Exciting Wilson Pickett. It would not exist, or, at least, it would not be as clear a definition of Southern Soul as it is.

There is a lot of great art that has been created by bad people. Carevaggio, Marlowe, Bernini, Wagner, Spector, or James Brown all had a darkness within them that gives their work many of the qualities that make it stand out. It is said that knowledge means power. Knowing these artists’ personal history affects the way we view their art. The graphic detail of the adjusted neck position in Judith Beheading Holofernes, the vivid psychological trauma of Dr Faustus, the tight grip Pluto has of Proserpina’s thigh in The Rape Of Proserpina, the emotional intensity of Tristan und Isolde, the military precision of the Wall of Sound, and the unrelenting rhythmic discipline of the J.B.s have an unsettling frisson to them, enhanced by the artists’ character. You might not regard Pickett’s grunt ‘n’ grind as worthy of comparison but it, too, is an expression of complex individual traits. Knowing what we do about his criminal and misogynist behaviour, we could choose not to listen to his music again. It would be perfectly understandable if you decide to cancel Wilson Pickett but, in his case, there is no need to separate the man from his art. His carefully cultivated public image was so evidently in keeping with his actual persona. The Exciting Wilson Pickett is an astonishing achievement and is still thrilling after sixty years of listening exactly because of its arrogance, aggression and sense of entitlement.

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