Ear Fuzz Competition Time: Atlantic Soul

Otis Redding: I Love You More Than Words Can Say
From: Atlantic Unearthed: Soul Brothers [Rhino, 2006]

As an apology for the tardiness of my recent posts I thought I'd try and make amends to you, the beautiful reader, by doing something we haven't done round in here in quite some time, and that's run a competition.

Up for grabs are the new compilations of rare and unreleased Atalantic Soul tracks by many of the big stars of the sixties. You may have already checked out some tracks from these on both Soul Shower and Soul Sides but I can only apologise for my late entrance to the party and swear it, possibly, won't happen again.

When I first got my hands on these compilations I must confess that, like Oliver at Soulsides, I felt a little bit of disappointment over the releases, problem being that the catalogue's history is so rich that my expectations were incredibly high for every track. However, on subsequent listens I've discovered many gems in the pack and do believe it's a goldmine for those enamoured with this period in Atlantic's history. I didn't want to post up too much more on top of the lovely tracks featured by AK and Oliver so thought I'd just give you Otis's ballad featured on the Soul Brothers compilation, a sweet little track featuring, unusually for Otis, some lush string arrangements.

Right, question time, I racked my brain for minutes hours on end before, inspired by the albums up for grabs, settling on the following competition question:

All I want you to do is tell me, in as many or few words as required, what soul music means to you. Email your answers to me here. End date for this competition is 31st July and the winner is based entirely on my subjective judgement. You'll receive a free copy of each CD in the post (I'll even mail it across the Atlantic for you because, damn it, I care) and I'll post up the winning entry on Ear Fuzz.

On a side note we're looking to possibly expand our roster of posters at the moment as well so this could be the beginning of a beautiful friendship.

Even if you can't be arsed to enter or don't win I'd highly recommend checking out the collections anyway as there are some real finds on the two discs that have been wallowing in obscurity for far too long. You can find more information about both releases at Rhino's website