The Essential Ann Peebles

Cheap double CD best of. A delicate, slinky figure with a powerhouse voice, Ann Peebles occupied a special place among the many great talents that roamed the halls of Memphis' iconic R&B label Hi Records in the 1960s and 1970s. While producer Willie Mitchell was the company's heart, musicians the Hodges Brothers its soul and Al Green its top star, it was Peebles who gave the label its first national success and a lasting female identity. Over the course of seven albums and dozens of singles for Hi, Peebles expressed a complex range of moods and emotions in her music. Her songs were alternately pleading ('I Needed Somebody') and defiant ('I Pity The Fool'), seductive ('Being Here With You') and destructive ('I'm Gonna Tear Your Playhouse Down') but always utterly soulful.