“If there was a Berry Gordy figure at Stax, I would say it was Wexler in the early days and Al Bell in the later period.”

Hey there,

I was reading your column, and couldn’t leave without offering a correction on the two quotes above

Jerry Wexler was absolutely NOT a Berry Gordy figure at Stax, and he NEVER helped run the studio.

Jerry Wexler cut a distribution deal with Stax, and left them alone to write, perform, record, produce, and promote their material. Jim Stewart and his sister Estelle Axton were the nominal “Berry Gordy” figures, in that they owned and ran the label, but the actual operation of Stax records, at least musically, was far more collaborative and organic than anything that was going on at Motown.

As far as Atlantic artists being sent to Stax goes, Wexler would do that because he knew that the musicians, writers, and general atmosphere at Stax would bring out the best in his artists. In the case of Sam and Dave, Atlantic had had a string of failures with them and sent them to Stax as a ‘last resort’ to see if they could make something of the duo. The rest, as they say, is history. Eventually Wexler and Atlantic ‘reclaimed’ Sam and Dave and once again were utterly incapable of getting a hit out of them. Sam and Dave were broken up within a couple of years of leaving Stax. Incidentally, while not up to the standards that were set at Stax, Sam and Dave’s later Atlantic recordings were still quite good.

Finally (and thanks for reading this far if you have), it should be noted that in the previously mentioned distribution deal between Atlantic (run by Wexler) and Stax, there was a clause that gave Atlantic ownership of the Stax catalog after the distribution deal ended. Jim Stewart, the founder of Stax has gone on the record and said that this clause was not mentioned in the original contract discussions and that he didn’t read the fine print when he signed the deal. If this is correct (standard distribution deals do not normally hand over entire label catalogs and Stewart’s account has never been disputed), then rather than being the Berry Gordy figure at Stax, Wexler was a swindler who stole the Stax Records catalog (up until that point) and very nearly destroyed the company.

If you’d like to know more about Stax records, there’s a terrific book called Hitsville USA written by Rob Bowman that tells the story of Stax in tremendous detail with a ton of interviews. There’s also a PBS American Masters documentary called Respect Yourself that does a good job of telling the story in an hour and a half.

Cheers!