He wrote some of the greatest songs in American music, Dark End of the Street, Do Right Woman, I’m Your Puppet, and now, at 84, Dan Penn is back with an excellent new album, Smoke Filled Room. Penn got his first chart record while still a junior in high school, went on to produce The Box Tops, was in the room when Otis Redding recorded You Left the Water Running, and co-wrote Do Right Woman over a guitar in Chips Moman’s front room, only to watch Aretha Franklin walk out of the Muscle Shoals session, before Jerry Wexler finished it in New York. And that falsetto at the end of the James Carr recording of Dark End of the Street? That was him too. He still performs, occasionally writes, and picks up the phone to Jason Barnard.
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Podcasts also available: Steve Cropper, John Paul White, Bettye LaVette, John Mayall, Rita Coolidge
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