Released in 1962, “Green Onions” is an instrumental composition recorded by Booker T. & the M.G.s under the label of Stax Records in Memphis, Tennessee, that peaked at No. 1 on the Billboard R&B singles chart. The only instrumental in Rolling Stone’s 500 greatest songs of all-time list, the single pioneered the sound that would define the Southern soul. The song would influence other seminal R&B artists, including Wilson Pickett and Otis Redding, advancing the development of American soul music.
The band’s debut album, “Green Onions,” instead of the group picture, has a photo of green onions as its cover. The album art was “more notable for what the record company chose not to picture,” a racially diverse band consisting of two Black and two white members (Bomar, 2011, p. 6). This interracial collaboration foreshadowed the societal transformations that came with the Civil Rights Movement. “Soul music meant economic empowerment, black creative expression, an integrated creative endeavor, articulation of civil rights goals,” capturing the essence and becoming the “soundtrack” to the movement (Danielson, 2015, p. 11), (Reed, 2019, p. 65). When brainstorming ideas for the single’s title, guitarist Steve Cropper remarked that “onions make people cry and not everybody likes onions, but what about green onions?” (Bomar, 2011, p. 3-4). Even the title, serving as a metaphor for the bitterness of racial bigotry with an opportunity for growth signified by “green,” seemed to capture the tension of fighting for the empowerment of the Civil Rights Movement.
At heart, the song is a twelve-bar blues groove overlaid with terse rhythm-guitar chords, lush blues riffs, and a rippling Hammond M3 organ line. Especially the latter, as frontman Booker T. Jones noted, had “a sustained sound as opposed to a piano,” which “imbued the song with a vaguely menacing intensity” (Catlin, 2017), (Bomar, 1990, p. 6). This warbling tone of the organ in the melody combined with the calm, restrained, concise guitar blues licks in the accompaniment gave the song a “sense of relaxed authority” (Pareles, 1990). The steady accompaniment and catchy melodies, characteristic of the emerging R&B and funky soul sound, made the song memorable and easy to dance to, which explained its overwhelming positive public reception. Its danceable yet restrained dynamic is explained by the suspense within the harmonic repetition that creates a rhythmic tension between the solos and melody. For this “cool” ambiance, the song has been extensively used in films. Recently, it was featured in the 2015 film Legend’s soundtrack that tells the story of the Kray brothers who ruled London’s underground mafia scene during the 1960s, giving the film its elegant and restrained aesthetics.
In contrast to rock music, that through dramatic solos, accentuates individualism at the core of American ideals, soul music seemed to embrace another reality, that of collectiveness and cooperation through the collected yet dynamic composition. “Green Onions” exemplify this group harmony in its mixed-race collaboration and its instrumental groove that unites drastically different solos under a consistent tour de force that supports the variation in melody. This consistency effectively captures the essence of the fight toward egalitarianism and racial harmony of the Civil Rights Movement, conveying the message that an interracial band did and can work side-by-side, reinforcing each other’s strengths.
Like a soundtrack to a great movie, the funky soul sound helped sonically elevate the message of the Civil Rights movement. As a fan of contemporary R&B artists, who arguably would not be here without the advancement of soul music propelled by the Memphis sound, I find “Green Onions” elements in these artists’ works. In the catchy 80s-inspired retro-funk-style songs of The Weeknd, flirting with impulses without committing, I find the same tension between melody and rhythm in “Green Onions.” The soul-sampling songs of Kanye West empower listeners with self-confidence in the same way “Green Onions” captures the movement’s ambition. Despite having no lyrics, “Green Onions” conveys a powerful message of self-empowerment and audacity, serving as a testament to the courage of the Memphis funk sound and the Civil Rights Movement.
References
Bomar, S. B. (2011). “Green Onions” – Booker T. & the M.G.s (1962). The Library of Congress.
Catlin, R. (2017). Booker T. Jones, on the Stax Records soul sound he helped create.The Washington Post. Web.
Danielson, J. (2015). The role of soul: Stax Records and the civil rights movement in Memphis, Tennessee. Graduate Theses and Dissertations. Web.
Pareles, J. (1990). Review/Pop; Booker T. and the M.G.’s recapture the past.The New York Times. Web.
Reed, T. V. (2019). The Art of Protest: Culture and Activism from the Civil Rights Movement to the Present. University of Minnesota Press