© Brian Hineline/Retna Ltd./Corbis
What do the following songs have in common? Eddie Floyd's Knock On Wood, Wilson Pickett's In the Midnight Hour, Sam & Dave's Soul Man and Otis Redding's (Sittin' On) The Dock of the Bay...
Well, OK, it's a tad obvious in this scenario. They were all co-written by Steve 'The Colonel' Cropper, a guitarist whose reputation as a legendary figure had, as such, been long established by the time the classic film The Blues Brothers was released, in which he made an effective cameo clad in a "...candy-ass monkey suit..."
That said, probably his best-loved work appears on Green Onions, immortalised in 1962 by Booker T. & the M.G.s.
© Michael Ochs Archives/Corbis
Steve is second-right in this great old shot of the band, Fender Tele in hand, and, below, enjoy a Shaky-Cam clip of a more recent performance that proves once again that less is most definitely more...
“People say to Pete Townshend, ‘Why do you jump about on stage?’ He doesn’t know. And it’s the same for me”: The Iron Maiden guitarist who plays every gig as if it’s the last
“Not that I was restricted in any way with Rush. I’m very proud of what we did. But this is a whole different kind of experience”: Alex Lifeson on disguised guitars, soloing strategies and finding fresh sounds and freedom with Envy Of None
