The Greatest Cover Songs of All-time: 2. Aretha Franklin - "Respect"

0:03 Kalaroga Shark Media. I'm Garrett Fisher and this is the Hit Maker Chronicles. We're at number two on our countdown of the top ten best cover songs of all time, as voted by the staff at Calaroga Shark Media. We're one week away from revealing the greatest cover song of all time, and this week we're looking at a cover that transcended music entirely. A cover that became a civil rights anthem, a feminist declaration, and a cultural watershed moment all at once. A cover so transformative that it changed not just the song but the person who sang it, making her an icon forever. Respect by Aretha Franklin. Those opening piano chords, that voice demanding what she's owed, the backing vocals spelling it out are eespect, making it impossible to misunderstand. The horn hits, the groove, the power. It's one of the most important recordings in American music history, and it was originally written and recorded by Otis Redding in nineteen sixty five as a song about a man coming home from work and asking his woman for a little respect. This is the story of how Aretha Franklin took a song about traditional gender roles and turned it into a revolution. Let's start in Memphis in nineteen sixty five, Otis Redding was twenty three years old and one of the rising stars of Southern soul music. He was signed to Volt Records, a subsidiary of Stacks, and he was

1:36 known for his raw, powerful voice and his ability to pour emotion into every line he sang. Otis wrote Respect from his own perspective as a working man. The song was about coming home after a hard day's work and wanting his woman to give him some respect, to appreciate what he was doing to provide for the household. It wasn't mean spirited or demanding in an ugly way. Otis sang it with a kind of weariness, like he was asking for something basic that he felt he'd earned. The arrangement was classic Stacks, tight horn section, steady rhythm guitar that Memphis soul groove. Otis's voice was front and center, pleading and insisting at the same time. The song worked.

2:20 It had a good hook, a solid groove, and Otis's vocal performance sold the emotion. Respect was released as a single in August nineteen sixty five. It went to number thirty five on the Billboard Hot one hundred and number four on the R and B charts. That was a legitimate hit for Otis. It helped establish him as more than just a regional soul singer. It proved he could write songs that connected with audiences beyond the South. But the song was still clearly from a male perspective. It was about a man's needs, a man's expectations, a man asking for something from a woman. That perspective was typical for nineteen six. That's how a lot of soul and R and B songs worked. Men singing about what they wanted from women. Women singing about trying to please their men or dealing with heartbreak. Respect fit neatly into that framework.

3:14 It was a good song, but it wasn't revolutionary. And then two years later, Aretha Franklin heard it. Aretha was twenty five years old in nineteen sixty seven and at a turning point in her career. She'd been singing professionally since she was a teenager, had released several albums on Columbia Records that showcased her incredible voice, but never quite found the right commercial direction. She was talented, obviously, talented, but she hadn't broken through. In late nineteen sixty six, she signed with Atlantic Records. Producer Jerry Wexler brought her down to Muscle Shoals, Alabama, to record with the best session musicians in the South. They were looking for material that would showcase Aretha's voice, her range, her power, her ability to make you feel every emotion she was singing about.

4:01 Jerry Wexler suggested respect. He knew Otis's version, he thought Aretha could do something interesting with it. But Aretha didn't just sing Otis's song. She completely reimagined it. First, she changed the perspective. Where Otis was asking for respect, Aretha was demanding it. She wasn't pleading, she wasn't hoping. She was telling you that she deserved respect and she expected to get it. Second, she added new elements that Otis's version didn't have. The most famous edition was the spelling section rspect, where the backing vocals spelled out the word, making it impossible to miss, making it a declaration, a demand, a statement that couldn't be ignored. She also added the socket to me backing vocals, which became one of the most iconic elements of the song. That phrase repeated over and over added urgency and energy that turned the song into something you couldn't just listen to passively. You had to respond to it. Third, she changed the arrangement. The tempo was slightly faster, the piano was more prominent, the horns were sharper, more insistent, and Aretha's voice, that incredible instrument, commanded the entire production in a way that made every other element serve her vocal. Aretha recorded Respect at Atlantic Studios in New York in February nineteen sixty seven. Her sisters Carolyn and Irma sang backing vocals. The muscle shoals

5:33 rhythm section laid down that groove, and when Aretha sang, something magical happened. She wasn't just singing a song. She was making a statement about gender, about race, about power, about dignity, about what it meant to be a black woman in America in nineteen sixty seven, demanding to be treated with the respect she deserved. Respect was released as a single in April nineteen sixty seven. It went to number one on both the Billboard Hot one hundred and the R and B charts. It stayed at number one for two weeks on the pop chart and eight weeks on the R and B chart. It became the biggest hit of Aretha's career up to that point, and one of the biggest hits of nineteen sixty seven, and it became something more than a hit song. It became an anthem.

6:19 The civil rights movement adopted it immediately. Here was a song about demanding respect, sung by a black woman with power and authority and zero willingness to compromise. At a moment when black Americans were fighting for basic civil rights, when they were being told to wait, to be patient, to accept less than they deserved, here was Aretha Franklin spelling it out rspect. The Women's movement adopted it too. Here was a song where a woman wasn't asking for permission or hoping a man would treat her well. She was demanding respect as a right. In nineteen sixty seven, that was radical. Women were still fighting for basic equality, equal pay, equal opportunities, the right to control their own lives, and here was Aretha saying, I deserve respect, not because you're generous enough to give it to me, because I've earned it. The song transcended both movements and became something even bigger. It became about human dignity, about self worth, about refusing to accept less than you deserve from anyone ever.

7:27 Otis Redding's response to Aretha's version was remarkably gracious. He acknowledged publicly that the song had become hers, that she'd found something in it that he hadn't fully realized when he wrote it. He said that when he heard her version, he understood that she'd taken his song and made it into something more important than he'd ever imagined. That takes humility, that takes artistic integrity. Otis could have been defensive about it, could have insisted on performing his version as the original, could have resented hit Aretha's success with his composition. Instead, he acknowledged the truth. She'd made it better, she'd made it matter more. Tragically, Otis Redding died in a plane crash in December nineteen sixty seven, just eight months after Aretha's version of Respect became a hit. He was twenty six years old. He never got to see the full impact of what Aretha had done with his song, never got to see it become one of the defining recordings of the civil rights and feminist movements. But before he died, he'd acknowledged that the song belonged to Aretha. Now and history has proven him right. We'll be right back. So what made Aretha's version so much more powerful than Otis's.

8:53 Why did her cover become a cultural touchstone while his original remained a solid soul hit but nothing more. Part of it is the performance. Aretha's voice is one of the greatest instruments in the history of recorded music. She could do things with her voice that almost nobody else could. The power, the control, the ability to shift from gentle to overwhelming in a single phrase. When Aretha demanded respect, you believed her, You felt it, You understood that this wasn't negotiable. Part of it is the arrangement. The additions Aretha made, The spelling section, the backing vocals, the sharper horns, the more insistent rhythm, transformed the song from a personal plea into a universal declaration. Those elements made it anthemic in a way that Otis's version wasn't. But the biggest part of it is the context and the perspective shift.

9:47 In nineteen sixty five, a black man asking for respect from his woman was a personal story in nineteen sixty seven, a black woman demanding respect from everyone was a political statement. Aretha's version arrived at exactly the right moment. The civil rights movement was at a crucial point. The women's movement was beginning to organize and demand change, and here was this song that spoke to both movements simultaneously, that said what millions of people were feeling but hadn't quite been able to articulate. When Aretha sang respect, black Americans heard a demand for civil rights, women heard a demand for equality, and everyone heard someone refusing to accept being treated as less than they deserved. That's not just a great cover, that's a cultural earthquake. The impact of Aretha's Respect extended far beyond nineteen sixty seven. The song won two Grammy Awards that year, Best R and B Recording and Best R and B Solo Vocal Performance Female. It was inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame. Rolling Stone magazine ranked it as one of the greatest songs of all time.

10:54 The Library of Congress added it to the National Recording Registry as culturally significant. Aretha performed Respect thousands of times over her career. It became her signature song, the song everyone wanted to hear, the song that defined her public identity. She was the Queen of soul, and respect was her crown. The song also became inseparable from the movements it had come to represent. When people fought for civil rights, they sang respect. When women marched for equality, they sang respect. When anyone stood up and demanded to be treated with dignity, respect was there. Aretha Franklin passed away in August twenty eighteen at age seventy six. The tributes that poured in all mentioned respect. The song was played at memorials, funerals, celebrations of her life. It was the song that everyone agreed to find, not just her career, but her impact on American culture. And when people think of respect today, they don't think of Otis Redding. They think of Aretha Franklin.

11:57 They think of that voice, that demand, that real fusal to accept anything less than what she deserved. Otis wrote a great song. Aretha made it immortal. Respect is number two on our countdown because it represents the absolute pinnacle of what a cover can achieve socially and culturally. Yes it was a number one hit, Yes it won Grammys. Yes, it made Aretha Franklin a superstar. But more importantly, it became a rallying cry. It became a statement of principle. It became proof that a song could change how people thought about themselves and what they deserved. It's number two because Aretha Franklin took a song about a man wanting respect from his woman and turned it into a song about everyone, black people, women, anyone who'd ever been treated as less than they were, demanding respect from a world that had denied it to them for too long. It's number two because the spelling section our Espect became one of the most recognizable moments in popular music, a moment where the song literally spelled out what it was demanding, so there could be no confusion, no misunderstanding, no way to pretend you didn't hear. And it's number two because when Otis reading himself acknowledged that Aretha had taken his song and made it hers, he was acknowledging something profound that the best covers don't just reinterpret a song, they

13:27 complete it. They find what was always there waiting to be discovered and bring it into the light. Otis Redding wrote respect about what a working man deserved at home. Aretha Franklin made it about what every human being deserves. Everywhere, same word, same title, completely different meaning, and the whole world listen. This is Garrett Fisher and this is the hit Maker. Chronicles join us next Sunday, June seventh for number one on our countdown of the top ten best cover songs of all time. The greatest cover song ever record did