A Meat and 3 Sides

The mystery of my very first show was unexpectedly solved at a music documentary.

I'd been eager to see "Muscle Shoals," about the famed recording studio in Alabama where some of the biggest (and most unknown) names went to record.

Jay, owner of Deep Groove records on Robinson Street, introduced the film because he was raised in Muscle Shoals. In fact, the woman who did his family's ironing was Percy Sledge's cousin. Folding newspapers for his paper route one day, he read that the Rolling Stones had been there recording.

Things like that were teases to the world-class recordings happening in the small town, sucking him in.

He also brought up something that had occurred to me: how in the world had a documentary about this place never been made before now?

Seems no one ever had the money to do it right until one of the heirs to a candy fortune drove through town and got interested.

Thank god for that because the result was a breathtaking documentary, both visually and in scope.

Local belief says that the Tennessee river sings a song and that's what makes the music coming out of there so magical, Or "greasy" as Aretha Franklin calls it.

The movie tells the story of Rick Hall, the man who started FAME studio, convinced that he needed to make every recording a hit or he'd be poor and homeless again.

That drive made him a tough taskmaster but, oh, the sound he could pull out of people.

He assembled a group of musicians for his house band, a group that became known as the Swampers and could create music to fit whatever artist walked in.

"All that funky sound was because we didn't know how to play smooth," one of them says self-deprecatingly.

No, all that funk was what they were able to conjure up as a band, making them sound so black that after Paul Simon heard the Staple Singers record, he called down and said he wanted those same black players who'd played on "I'll Take You There."

"That can happen, but those guys are mighty pale," he was told.

One of the best parts of the movie was really old footage of some of these artists singing, like Percy Sledge singing "When A Man Loves a Woman," a clip that gave me goose bumps.

Sledge talks in the movie about how his knees were shaking he was so nervous about recording what went on to become a timeless song.

Most of the early singers that came to Muscle Shoals were black and for some, it was their first time playing music with whites. Hall points out how big a part his studio played in race relations in the south.

A still handsome Wilson Pickett talks about getting off the plane in Alabama and meeting Hall and thinking, "What am I doing with this cracker?" Meanwhile Hall thinks he looks menacing.

They went on to make seminal R & B music together, with Pickett saying how the Swampers were able to get into a groove and work it till they got it.

Part of the big deal of that was that before this time, musicians used written arrangements in recording studios, but not these guys. Instead, they came in, listened to the nut of the song and then began noodling around until someone locked into something and the others followed along.

"Our job was to become their band when they came in," said a Swamper.

I was amazed to learn that prior to coming to Muscle Shoals, her record label had been marketing Aretha as smooth-sounding with lush orchestral arrangements behind her, stuff, as she says, "I couldn't sink my teeth into."

"I Never Loved a Man Like I Love You" was the turning point in her career because of that session.

Several people tried to explain the Swampers' unique sound, which was heavy on bass and drums and represented the first close mic'ing of drums.

Eventually local boy Duane Allman is used as a house musician, even convincing Pickett to cover "Hey Jude" mid-session. All of a sudden, according to his brother Greg, southern rock was born.

Then an unknown band from Jacksonville, Florida showed up wanting to record and the Swampers, now operating out of their own Muscle Shoals studio, knew they were on to something.

After recording tracks with Lynyrd Skynyrd, the record company heard them and was dissatisfied, insisting that "Free Bird" be cut down to three minutes and 45 seconds.

The Swampers refused and the label pulled the band out of there and somehow managed to get them an opening spot on the Who's upcoming arena tour.

That's where I come in.

My very first show was that one - Lynyrd Skynyrd opening for the Who at the Capital Center in Maryland.

I was young, I had never been to a show and I was not prepared for a 20,000-seat venue where it seemed like 15,000 of them were smoking - either cigarettes or joints.

At one point, I laid my head on my first boyfriend's shoulder to close my burning eyes and soon  a security guard came over to check with my boyfriend to see if I'd OD'd.

Yea, it was a different time.

So I finally open my eyes and the opening band comes out and no one in the arena knows them. No one.

Lynyrd Synyrd are up there giving it their all, drunk (and probably high) as all get-out, shaking up beers and spraying the crowd with them, but singing their brand of southern rock to the rafters.

And all around us, everyone is asking each other, who the hell are these guys and how did they get on the Who's tour?

No one could figure it out. And now I know.

You may not have your own a-ha moment watching this terrific documentary, but you'll be amazed to see how many major artists chose Muscle Shoals' funky sound for themselves.

Etta James. Paul Simon, Rod Stewart. Traffic, Clarence Carter. The Staple Singers. Bob Seeger. Boz Scaggs. The Rolling Stones.

Wanna hear some great old music? Wanna learn some cultural history? Wanna see some of the most magnificent cinematography of a river ever made?

I don't care if you're a documentary dork like me or not, get thee to Criterion Cinemas.

And it's definitely the only way to understand what Aretha means when she says, "These cats were really greasy."