afnever

I Never Loved A Man The Way I Love You
Release Date: March 10, 1967

Tracks
1. Respect
2. Drown In My Own Tears
3. I Never Loved A Man (The Way I Love You)
4. Soul Serenade
5. Don't Let Me Lose This Dream
6. Baby, Baby, Baby
7. Dr. Feelgood (Love Is A Serious Business)
8. Good Times
9. Do Right Woman - Do Right Man
10. Save Me
11. A Change Is Gonna Come
The reissue album comes in the mono version. They add extra tracks that are in stereo format.
12. Respect (stereo version)
13. I Never Love A Man (The Way I Love You) (stereo version)
14. Do Right Woman - Do Right Man (stereo version)

This album was Aretha's first with Atlantic and boy did she unleashe her soul! Before this she was with Columbia Records and wasn't doing so hot. They wanted to turn her into a Barbra Streisand or something. As if. But Aretha has said that she had a lot of good experiences there and learned a lot about recording and the studio. So when she came to Atlantic she wasn't totally uneducated. They just didn't give her the right production she needed. At Atlantic though Jerry Wexler sat her down at the piano and let the lady wail! it was all about Aretha and the piano. "I've never experienced so much feeling coming out of one human being" said Roger Hawkins. Dan Penn added, "When she hit that first chord, we knew everything was going to be alright." These were two of the musicians that were at her first recording session with Aretha. The song was "I Never Loved A Man." After that session a scuffle went on between Aretha's man (at the time) Ted White and a white musician. Ted and Aretha left and Jerry was frantic trying to find her. He did and they went on to record "Do Right Woman - Do Right Man." Things after that were pretty much alright.

You can see from the songs that SOUL was the key element here. They wanted to bring back some feeling to that time and they did. "Respect" became one of the most influential songs of the 60's. It viewed as a cry of freedom for eveyone being repressed at that time. Aretha and her sister Carolyn (rest in peace) came up with the idea of the "sock it to me" line. Which is supposed to be about "you know what" lol

From this album on Aretha played the piano and that's what made most of the songs unique. That's what I think is missing from the recordings she does today. Aretha playing piano. Are you listening to me out there. PUT ARETHA BACK ON PIANO!!