Driving across the Great Basin of Nevada.

And I do love you, my oh my. Feel the head rush of those thundering drums and racing strings quaking like asphalt at 95 mph. This pop song swings from nervous foot-stomping energy to touch-the-sky elegance but in the end, it’s all about that voice, splintering and howling. Roaring. After playing ‘River Deep – Mountain High’ twenty-six times along Interstate 80 from Detroit to New York, I submit that this is one of the most important recordings in American history:

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Ike & Tina Turner – River Deep Mountain High
from River Deep Mountain High. Philles, 1965 | buy mp3s

It’s huge. Like a wall of sound. Right. Check those names: Ike and Tina, produced by Phil. Such a high felony count on this record. Maybe it’s just another instance of creative burnout leading to heavy drugs leading to sick times. Perhaps it’s testimony to the dark edges of American fame. We tend to create monsters.

Phil put Ike’s name on the record and gave him twenty grand with one condition: stay out of the studio. You’ve got to wonder how that conversation played out, with everybody striking strange bargains to get what they want. Tina gets the strings, Ike gets the fame, and Phil gets the record made exactly how he likes it. Phil thought it was the best record ever made and when it failed to chart past #88, he fell apart and retired for a couple of years.

Another quirk in the pedigree is that Dennis Hopper made the album cover. But how do you look at a record that’s retroactively associated with so much pain? Between Ike and Phil, you’ve got the worst kinds of crimes. Crimes against women. Murder. A dozen felony counts and 29 years. All of this came down the road years later, but future actions always color the works of the past. We read The Sun Also Rises and The Great Gatsby differently because of the dipsomania, madness and suicide beneath the pages.

So how do you listen to a record like this? You focus on Tina’s voice.