The 500 - #161 - The Dock Of The Bay - Otis Redding

I was inspired by a podcast called The 500 hosted by New York-based comedian Josh Adam Meyers. His goal, and mine, is to explore Rolling Stone Magazine's 2012 edition of The 500 Greatest Albums of All Time. 

---

Album: #161
Album Title: The Dock Of The Bay

Artist: Otis Redding

Genre: Memphis Soul, Southern Soul

Recorded: Between July 11, 1965 - December 8, 1967

Released: February, 1968

My age at release: 2
How familiar was I with it before this week: A couple songs

Is it on the 2020 list? No
Song I am putting on my Spotify Playlist: Tramp

Recently, I participated in a task force organized by my school's oversight body (Thames Valley District School Board) and my Local Association (Elementary Teachers Federation of Ontario) to discuss the safe and effective use of generative Artificial Intelligence (AI) in the classroom. In "Initialism-Speak", The TVDSB & ETFO invited me to “talk AI. No wonder teachers befuddle parents when rambling on about education -- we sure love our acronyms and initialisms.

AI generated representation of our task force meeting about A.I.

The invitation was flattering. At nearly 60, it is nice to be considered among the "tech-savvy" educators. I was also chuffed to be assisting with the policy making that will guide the instruction of AI by my colleagues for the next few years. The applications for this technology are growing exponentially and, with students aged 3-18 in our charge, we can't ignore its ubiquity.

AI generated representation of a tech-savvy teacher in an elementary
school classroom.

Unlike my high school math teachers, who incorrectly predicted that we "wouldn't have a calculator in our pockets when shopping at the supermarket", it is gratifying to be part of an organization that recognizes the eventual omnipresence of AI and who is embracing the technology while recognizing the need for safety and transparency in its use.

AI generated representation as a teacher from the 80s warning
a student about the limitations of a calculator in the real world.

Encouraged by the school board’s deliberations, I introduced my Grade 7 students to the subsequently approved AI platform, Microsoft Copilot. I began by discussing plagiarism and used some of their favourite music as my attention grabber. Collectively, my class has curated an extensive playlist of music and, although my charges don't realize it, some of the songs they enjoy feature musical hooks, or samples, of other  artists’ work.

For example, many are fans of the song Lucid Dreams by Juice WRLD (born Jared Anthony Higgins). The hit song, which plays in the classroom several times a week, features a guitar riff that was sampled  from Shape Of My Heart -- a 1993 single by English musician Sting (born Gordon Sumner). Lucid Dreams was a massive hit for the fledgling emo-rapper, WRLD, with 2.8 billion streams on Spotify. However, 85 percent of the Lucid Dreams royalties are funneled directly to the bank account of Sting, who brazenly quipped that the money would "put my grandkids through college". Copyright royalties are a tricky business and Sting's team of lawyers easily leveraged the system to ensure he profited handsomely from a naive WRLD’s decision to allow the use of this sample without a pre-negotiated contract.

The students were incensed. Why would this massively wealthy old musician feel entitled to take so much from a fledgling artist, especially when the guitar part in question comprises only part of the entire song Lucid Dream? Most of it was original material; however, it was built around that initial melody. This proved a good lesson in the rules of intellectual property and ownership. It was also an engaging way for me to introduce the importance of crediting one's sources when borrowing the words or ideas of others.

AI generated representation of Sting taking a bag of
money from a sad Juice Wrld.

To my surprise, while listening to this week's record, The Dock Of The Bay by Otis Redding, I stumbled on another example. The album's fifth track, Don't Mess With Cupid, features a guitar lick at the start which is replicated on Party In The U.S.A., a massive hit in 2009 for contemporary pop star Miley Cyrus.

However, on closer examination, I realized that the Cyrus song features an interpolation, not a sample, from Don't Mess With Cupid. It is clearly inspired by the Redding track, but is not a note-for- note copy. The two can be heard side-by-side at this website.

Interestingly, Party In The U.S.A. does not give credit to Don't Mess With Cupid for this clear inspiration. So, I suppose you can sometimes get away with some plagiarism, but I'll leave that out of my future lesson.

Cartoon by Fritz Pirillo.

The Dock Of The Bay was the seventh studio record, and the first  posthumous release, by Otis Redding following his death in a December, 1967, plane crash -- an event I covered in my July, 2023, blog about Redding's record, Complete & Unbelievable Dictionary Of Soul.  The lead single, (Sittin' on) The Dock Of The Bay, was a monster hit which Redding completed recording just two days before his death. The rest of the album contains a number of singles, B-sides and previously released tracks.

Tragically, but saliently to this post, Redding earned no money from this legendary soul song and record. His untimely passing ensured his co-writer, Steve Cropper, and Redding’s estate would be the benefactors from this intellectual property. They would also benefit when it was recorded by more than 100 artists and sampled 23 times by contemporary hip-hop artists. (Source: Who Sampled Website)

ADDENDUM

As a side note, my students have won me over with many tracks and, I'll admit, Party In The U.S.A. gets stuck in my head pretty easily now. I have also become a fan of Juice WRLD, who struggled with mental health issues and died of a prescription overdose in 2019 at the age of 21.

Much like my students, I am aggrieved that the massively wealthy Sting would take so much from a young, naive artist who created something beautiful, unaware of  how recording rights and publishing work. Juice WRLD was a talent that, like Otis Redding, was lost far too soon.

The 500 - #254 - (Complete & Unbelievable) The Dictionary Of Soul - Otis Redding

I was inspired by a podcast called The 500 hosted by Los Angeles-based comedian Josh Adam Meyers. His goal, and mine, is to explore Rolling Stone Magazine's 2012 edition of The 500 Greatest Albums of All Time. 

---

Album: #254
Album Title: (Complete & Unbelievable) The Dictionary of Soul
Artist: Otis Redding
Genre: Memphis Soul
Recorded: May to September, 1966
Released: October, 1966
My age at release: 1
How familiar was I with it before this week: A couple songs

Is it on the 2020 list? Yes, dropping 194 to #448 spots since 2012
Song I am putting on my Spotify Playlist: Try A Little Tenderness

In the wee hours of December 10, 1967, Ben Cauley, trumpet player for the funk band Bar Kays, shut his eyes for a little sleep. The plane he was on, a Beechcraft H18, was flying from Cleveland International Airport to Dane County Regional Airport (formerly Truax Field) in Madison, Wisconsin.

Typical flight path - Cleveland to Madison Wisconsin

Cauley awoke suddenly upon hearing his bandmate, Phalon Jones, screaming, "Oh no!" as he looked out of the plane's window. Seconds later, Cauley found himself waist deep in ice-cold water inside the fuselage of the aircraft. He unbuckled his safety belt quickly and grabbed a seat cushion as a floatation device. There was a breach in the side of the downed Beechcraft, allowing the frigid water of Lake Monona to rush through. Kicking his legs furiously, Cauley exited the breach and somehow made it to the surface, a short distance from shore. A non-swimmer, he was unable to return to help his bandmates (Jones, Ronnie Caldwell, Carl Cunningham and Jimmy King) or the other passengers, valet Matthew Kelly, pilot Richard Fraser and singer, songwriter, multi-instrumentalist Otis Ray Redding Junior.

At the time, 26-year-old Redding was enjoying music industry acclaim. He had just released his fifth studio record, The Dictionary Of Soul, and he was on a promotional tour of the United States. In April, 1966, performed for three consecutive nights at the famed Whiskey A Go Go in Los Angeles. California, to a predominantly white audience. A live recording, featuring a selection of the songs he performed at the time, was posthumously released in October, 1968.

Otis Redding In Person At The Whiskey A Go Go (1968).

The show received critical acclaim from  the press and the many musicians in attendance, including Bob Dylan. Dylan was so dazzled, he offered Redding the opportunity to record his song Just Like A Woman. Redding politely declined. However, English band Manfred Mann did not, and had a hit with it later that year.

Redding’s electrifying performances galvanized his appeal with white audiences, notably at the Monterey International Pop Festival, June 16-18, 1967. The festival was also the American debut of the Jimi Hendrix Experience, The Who, and Ravi Shankar. Further, it marked the first large-scale performance by Janis Joplin. With such star-studded talent, that festival is remembered as perhaps the starting point for "The Summer of Love", the, now-infamous, hippie, flower-power, social movement that would end the tumultuous decade.

Promotional poster for the 1967
Monterey Pop Festival.

Redding's performance electrified the audience. According to music historian Ian Inglis:

"Redding had not been considered a commercially viable player in the mainstream white American market...(but)... his performance at Monterey Pop was a natural progression from local to national acclaim and the decisive turning-point in his career."

This performance was also captured on video and posthumously released as a record in 2019. It is an astonishing, 18-minute video that has to be seen to be believed. 

One hundred and sixty six days after that fateful plane crash, on the afternoon of December 10, 1967, the wreckage of the Beechcraft H18 was retrieved from the depths of Lake Monono. Redding's body was recovered along with the other six passengers.

Survivor Ben Cauley would, understandably, be haunted by the memories of the crash for decades after. He continued to perform music with the Bar Kays and several other funk and soul acts until suffering a stroke in 1989. He died in 2015 at the age of 67.

Crews retrieve the Beechcraft H18 from the waters of Lake Monono.

In January, 1968, (Sitting On) The Dock Of The Bay was released. Redding had finished recording it three days prior to the tragedy that claimed everyone aboard the plane. The record immediately rocketed to the top of the charts, becoming the first #1 hit ever released posthumously and Redding’s biggest hit. The song was in sharp contrast to the high-energy sound that led to his many nicknames – The Big O, The Mad Man From Macon, Rockhouse Redding and, of course, The King Of Soul. In The Dock of the Bay, Redding reflected on a simpler life, 'sitting alone, watching ships roll in and out of the harbour from sunrise to sunset as the tides come and go.'

At 26, Redding was on the verge of massive commercial success when that fateful night intervened. Undoubtedly, he was one of the greatest singers and front-men of his generation. How fitting then that Dock Of The Bay was his final song. Its contemplative simplicity provided a beautiful pause in his hurly-burly life. Perhaps, it also invites the listener to pause, and stop and wonder..."What might have come next for this massive talent had his life not been cut so tragically short?"

It can also serve as a reminder to us that life is short and, sometimes, we have to stop, take stock of our own lives, count our blessings and enjoy the moment.

Shakespeare was right, ‘Life is but a brief candle’.

I hope you can find a moment to do that soon. Thanks for reading.