Friday On My Mind 22: Green Onions

Posted in 1960s, Friday On My Mind, Music at 15:00 on 3 September 2010

Just before my time there was a vogue for instrumental bands – The Shadows, The Ventures, The Tornados – but this more or less petered out with the advent of The Beatles.

Booker T and The MGs started out in that earlier era but carried on in that vein; so unusually for bands in the mid to late 1960s continued to eschew actual songs. According to Wikipedia they were (ahem) instrumental in shaping the sound of Southern and Memphis Soul.

I believe I first heard of them when they released Soul Limbo, a minor hit in Britain – and a track now much more famous as being the theme music for Cricket coverage on the BBC (TV and radio) – after which their earlier records received some retrospective airplay. They later had a much bigger hit with Time Is Tight.

I was going to have this track in the Friday slot a few weeks ago but a restricted blog which I frequent got there before me so I’ve held it over till now.

This is a live version of the band’s first single, Green Onions.

Booker T and The MGs: Green Onions