James Brown - Live at the Apollo [180g, Back To Black] (LP) Vinyl

Live at the Apollo is the first live album by James Brown and the Famous Flames, recorded at the Apollo Theater in Harlem on 24 October 1962 and released in May 1963 by King Records. It put Brown's stage show on record for the first time, and its commercial success established him as a leading rhythm and blues star.

The Album

Brown paid for the recording himself. King Records had opposed releasing it, believing that a live album featuring no new songs would not be profitable, and the label relented only under pressure from Brown and his manager Bud Hobgood. The night was captured in stereophonic sound on Ampex 350-2 tape machines by location engineer Tom Nola, with Chuck Seitz mastering, Gene Redd editing and Brown himself producing.

Brown's vocal group, the Famous Flames (Bobby Byrd, Bobby Bennett and Lloyd Stallworth), played an important co-starring role but were credited neither on the original sleeve nor on the label. They are named alongside Brown by MC Fats Gonder in the album's introduction, and were not formally credited until the CD release decades later. The band was directed by trumpeter Lewis Hamlin.

The record sold quickly, spending 66 weeks on the Billboard Top Pop Albums chart and peaking at number two. Rhythm and blues DJs would often play the whole of side one on air, pausing only to insert commercials and to turn the record over. It is equally well known for the volume and intensity of the Apollo crowd, especially through the slower ballad passages; writing in Rolling Stone, Robert Christgau singled out the perfectly timed female fan-screeches that punctuate the ten-minute Lost Someone. In 2015 Rolling Stone named it the greatest live album of all time.

This Pressing

This is the Polydor reissue in Universal's Back To Black series, a remastered single LP pressed on 180 gram heavyweight black vinyl in a reproduction of the original Dan Quest sleeve artwork. Catalogue number 422 843 479-1, barcode 042284347914.

Tracklist

Side 1

1. Introduction To James Brown (1:49)
2. I'll Go Crazy (2:05)
3. Try Me (2:27)
4. Think (1:58)
5. I Don't Mind (2:39)
6. Lost Someone Pt.1 (4:50)

Side 2

1. Lost Someone Pt.2 (6:10)
2. Medley: Please, Please, Please / You've Got The Power / I Found Someone / Why Do You Do Me / I Want You So Bad / I Love You Yes I Do / Why Does Everything Happen To Me / Bewildered / Please Don't Go (6:26)
3. Night Train (3:29)