And Christ Receive Thy Soul: Al Green 80

Al Green - Take Me to the River

We're back to brighten Monday, as promised, with the 80th trip around the sun for a universal legend in need of less than no intro.

Can you believe Al Green is 80? Gosh, I feel extra old.

He still performs like he's 28, too.

I think he might be the winner, among people I've covered, of the Most Children Have Been Conceived To His Music title.

It might be a statistical tie between him and Barry White. For the runoff, we go to Instances Of Purely Recreational Sex With Them As A Soundtrack, and then to non-hetero activities if it's still tied.

Anyway as I said, Al Green needs no introduction, and I truly pity anyone for whom he does LOLOLOL.

The story goes that in the 1970s Al found Jesus, and switched to singing for God, because the woman he was then cheating on doused him with flaming grits in the shower and then blew her brains out all over the bedspread moments later.

Did I mention it was with his own gun? Some folks need a loud wake up call, something to counteract the sins within, I guess. It could be Christ, crocheting, chocolate or calculus, but there has to be an escape hatch for them in the narrative of looming destruction they see themselves weaving.

In Al's case, there's a good chance I'd be posting the numbers with the hyphen in between at the bottom of this had he not found a way to get off the excess train he was riding back then, so I suppose it's all for the best.

I mean, I was watching the Midnight Special of his, from 1974, and although the performance is in other galaxies and leaves the audience near to Soul-induced-death-by-ecstasy, it's somewhat obvious he was high as a kite for the taping, at one point accidentally switching off the mic as he was talking up the next tune.

So you could say it was the cross or the crematorium for him, as it is for a lot of believers. Hey, if that is what got him to 80, why shouldn't the first three songs of every set be R&B bangers about finding the path to The Lord?

Here, to celebrate his octogenarianization today, I remastered this 1999 bit of Danish confection from someone's master FM cassette, you'll see.

Al Green

Roskilde Festival

Roskilde Dyrskuepladsen

Roskilde, Denmark

  7.4.1999  

  

01 introduction

02 L-O-V-E (LOVE)

03 Falling In Love (In the Holy Name of Jesus)

04 He's Coming Back

05 Jesus Will Fix It/band introductions

06 Let's Stay Together

07 Call Me (Come Back Home)

08 How Can You Mend a Broken Heart?

09 Take Me to the River

10 medley: incl. Bring It On Home/I've Been Loving You Too Long/My Girl/Sittin' On the Dock of the Bay/Tired of Being Alone

11 Love & Happiness

Total time: 55:34

Al Green - vocals

Bobby Summers - keyboards

Tony Smith - guitar

Warren Gaston - guitar

Darryl Wells, Sr. - drums

Darryl Wells, Jr. - percussion

Anthony Royal - horns & vocals

Dennis Bates - horns

John Sangster - horns & vocals

Wayne Tucker - bass

Linda Jones - vocals

Harvey Jones - vocals

other vocalists unidentified

off-air FM capture of indeterminate origin; likely a master cassette

edited, retracked & remastered by EN, April 2026
405 MB FLAC/direct link

I've been down with a pinched foot nerve (yes, it sucked as bad as it sounds), but I'll be back at some point with more stuff soon. Unless someone gets me with the hot grits in the shower, at which point I may start a Gospel blog consisting of pristine transfers of all vintage, private press 1970s Christadelic Funk LPs.

Until then, let's get next to Al Green -- born this day in 1946 -- so he can blow our minds and keep us together, OK? Love & Happiness to all!--J.