Various Artists One Big Family Vol 4 2009

Every one of us has a favourite record label. I think for many of us at Ace towers, Stax is pretty much at the top of the pile. The independently owned Memphis label recorded soul for 15 years, both up-tempo and impassionately down. It scored hits in the USA and around the world and gave the world the iconic star quality of both Otis Redding and Isaac Hayes to name but two of its finest. The roll call beyond them is legendary and could take up a whole sleeve note but Booker T and the MGs, Johnnie Taylor, Rufus and Carla Thomas, Sam and Dave, the Bar Kays, William Bell and the Staple Singers all made the label known to fans of good music the world over. But we're record collectors, vinyl extremists and, maybe the odd anorak has an involvement as well, so what really gets us going are the obscurities, the ones that got away. Stax Of Funk 2 could be a tribute to that sort of record.