DISC REVIEW: "Thank You Friends: The Ardent Records Story"
Thank You Friends: The Ardent Records Story
Various Artists
Big Beat Records
The recent triumphant appearance by Terry Manning at the Memphis Pops Festival illuminated one of Memphis music's more obscure but fascinating eras. Manning, a famed producer and engineer best known for his efforts on mega-sellers by artists such as ZZ Top and Shania Twain, started his career in Memphis working every job imaginable at upstart Ardent Records. John Fry's little studio that could started in his "Granny's sewing room," soon graduated to being a virtual annex of Stax Records, and eventually became one of the top studios-for hire in the country, a destination for the likes of R.E.M., the White Stripes, Led Zeppelin, Bob Dylan, and countless others.
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But Ardent also produced a lot of less-heralded music under its own imprints, including Ardent and Power Play. Culminating in the work of Big Star and Alex Chilton, these albums helped give rise to power pop and laid the foundation for much Memphis music to come. It's that legacy that is explored on Thank You Friends, a two-disc retrospective from the Memphis-mad English label Ace, via its Big Beat subsidiary.
Disc one covers the garage-rock-inspired work and psychedelic invention that marked the label's efforts from its first commercial location on National Street. Highlights of this disc include several unreleased Manning recordings as well as tracks from party band legends Lawson & Four More, and an unusually ornate "Miss Eleana" from folkster Sid Selvidge. With early solo tracks from Alex Chilton, Chris Bell, and Bell's proto-Big Star outfit Rock City, disc one hints at what was to come.
The notable tracks on disc two -- covering work done at the studio's Madison Avenue digs its home since the early '70s -- include a slew of demos, different mixes, and alternate takes of Big Star and Chilton songs, including versions of classics like "Back of a Car" and "For You." Equally enjoyable are a handful of lesser-known tracks by cult favorites The Scruffs and Tommy Hoehn.
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