Ralph ‘Soul’ Jackson has been an R&B singer for near-on 50 years, hailing from a part of the world where God-given soul talents seem to run in the waters. Jackson comes from Phenix City, Alabama, deep in the so-called “Black Belt” where music is an essential part of life. His first single released in 1965 after Rick Hall brought Jackson to Muscle Shoals to work in his FAME studios. Since then the singer has kept up his rigorous performing schedule, as he says “I grew up in the country, a hard working environment where your ass had to get out there and work.” Jackson became known as the Alabama Love Man for his special appeal to female music fans. “See, I may sing my songs from the gut but they come from my heart. I learned very early that women appreciate attention, I’m not singing for women, I sing to them.”
Now after all these years, Jackson is releasing his debut album The Alabama Love Man on October 2nd via The Rabbit Factory and we have the pleasure of premiering the tune “For Just One Second”.
Jackson tells us about the song: “‘For Just One Second’ is a song I wrote at a difficult but hopeful time in my life and involves a special woman. This woman, who I am still friends with, we were both in a place where we couldn’t get on the phone or see each other and were writing letters every single day. Both of us have since sworn those letters got us through some pretty tough times and formed a deep bond between that will never go away. Each of those letters had one or two lines that really stuck with me, these lines were like hooks in a song and her strong words led to me to write this one. One letter closed with the line, ‘If I could just find a good man who can show me for just one second that he loves me, that’s all that matters, not any of these material things’ and I thought that was something special, it really stuck with me. See, she saw so many women trying to play me, spend my money and she wanted me to know that she just wanted my love. You can hear my good friend James from across town playing that honky tonk guitar on there, picking away with a torn piece of cardboard, just like Rick Hall used to do up in Muscle Shoals. This is one of my favorites on the record.”