Dan Penn - The Inside Track on Bobby Purify

The Inside Track on Bobby Purify traces the arc of one of Dan Penn’s recording projects from his original blueprint to its ultimate commercial release providing the listener with a unique behind-the-scenes experience of the whole process of songwriting and production from Dan’s side of the desk. This CD package contains a sixteen-page booklet featuring photographs and interviews with Dan about the recordings.

Inspired by Solomon Burke’s soul-deep interpretation of Don’t Give Up On Me in 2002, Dan Penn reunited with his co-writers of the Grammy Award-winning song for a new project. He instinctively knew that team had more great songs in the same vein ready to be mined, but to get them dug out, they needed to dedicate some time to head down south for some quality writing…and equally good eating. The demos he recorded during these songwriting sessions with his collaborators Carson Whitsett and Bucky Lindsey are a joy to hear as they feature Dan’s voice at its absolute, soulful best. Normally, these private tapes would not be made commercially available, but when they are heard alongside the ultimate versions that he produced by Bobby Purify, the vision of Dan Penn the producer is self-evident.

Dan had identified Bobby as the ideal singer for this next production having been reintroduced to him after a gap of some twenty years. Back home in his Nashville studio in 2004, Penn cut ten new tracks based on the demos featuring what Jerry Wexler referred to as “Bobby Purify’s glorious, God-given voice”. Dan called on fellow southern-soul session stars Carson Whitsett, Spooner Oldham, Reggie Young, Jimmie Johnson, David Hood and Wayne Jackson to lay down the perfect foundation for what became Bobby Purify’s 2005 album - Better To Have It. Bobby had gone totally blind a few years before these Nashville recording sessions and sadly lacked the confidence to go out on tour with this great studio band as intended. Consequently, the album was deleted and has been unavailable until this reissue. The twenty tracks on this release consist of the ten original demo versions of the songs sung by Dan Penn followed by the same ten as they appeared on the original Bobby Purify album.