Renowned music writer Peter Guralnick takes on rhythm and blues in "the best history of '60s soul music anyone has written or is likely to write" (New York Times).

A gripping narrative that captures the tumult and liberating energy of a nation in transition, Sweet Soul Music is an intimate portrait of the legendary performers--Sam Cooke, Ray Charles, James Brown, Solomon Burke, Aretha Franklin, Otis Redding, and Al Green among them--who merged gospel and rhythm and blues to create Southern soul music. Through rare interviews and with unique insight, Peter Guralnick tells the definitive story of the songs that inspired a generation and forever changed the sound of American music.

"One of the ten books [I] couldn't live without."--Ta-Nehisi Coates