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Booker T. & the MG’s
From HitStory, the pop encyclopedia of School of Rock · Artist
Booker T. & the MG’s · Booker T. & the MG's was an American instrumental R&B and jazz band formed in Memphis, Tennessee, in 1962. The original line-up consisted of Booker T. Jones on organ and piano, Steve Cropper on guitar, Lewie Steinberg on bass and Al Jackson Jr. on drums. In 1965 Donald Duck Dunn took over on bass. As the house band of the Stax label, they played on hundreds of recordings by artists such as Wilson Pickett, Otis Redding, Sam & Dave, Carla Thomas and Albert King. In doing so they helped to shape the typical Stax sound, Memphis soul.
Music and breakthrough
Green Onions came about in the summer of 1962. During a break in the studio, while they were accompanying Billy Lee Riley, the four of them played around with a bluesy organ riff. Stax boss Jim Stewart heard it and recorded it. The track was released with Behave Yourself as the other side, but the DJs and Cropper felt it should be the other way round. It reached number 1 on the American R&B chart and number 3 on the pop chart. Later albums included Soul Dressing, Hip Hug-Her, McLemore Avenue and Melting Pot.
Influence
The band consisted of two white and two black members, which made it one of the first racially mixed rock groups, in a time and a city where soul was seen mainly as black culture. Al Jackson was murdered in 1975; Dunn, Cropper and Jones often played together after that. In 1992 the band was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.
Listening
Green Onions · Booker T. & the MG’s, 1962Apple Music ↗
Discography
Studio albums
- 1962Green Onions
- 1965Soul Dressing
- 1966And Now!
- 1966In the Christmas Spirit
- 1967Hip Hug‐Her
- 1968Doin’ Our Thing
- 1968Soul Limbo
- 1969The Booker T. Set
- 1969Uptight (soundtrack)
- 1970McLemore Avenue
- 1971Melting Pot
- 1976Union Extended
- 1977Universal Language
- 1994That’s the Way It Should Be