Ninety-Nine And A Half (Won't Do) / Danger Zone
View on Discogs
Album Summary
Wilson Pickett laid down 'Ninety-Nine And A Half (Won't Do)' and 'Danger Zone' during those glorious, sweat-soaked sessions at Fame Studios in Muscle Shoals, Alabama — a place that was quietly becoming the holy ground of American soul music. Working under the watchful eye of producer Jerry Wexler for Atlantic Records, Pickett was surrounded by those impossibly tight Muscle Shoals session musicians who brought a raw, blues-drenched fire that nobody else could touch. Released on Atlantic Records in 1966, this single arrived right in the heart of Pickett's most electrifying creative run — a period when he and Atlantic together were bottling something pure, something real, and sending it out to a world that was hungry for every last drop of it.
Reception
- 'Ninety-Nine And A Half (Won't Do)' charted on the Billboard R&B charts, holding down Pickett's reputation as one of Atlantic's most consistently powerful forces on the soul charts throughout 1966.
- The single connected deeply with soul and R&B audiences, riding the wave of momentum Pickett had been building with his string of hard-driving Atlantic releases during this period.
- Critical reception honored these tracks as true expressions of the raw Southern soul aesthetic — with particular reverence paid to the volcanic intensity of Pickett's vocal delivery and the muscular, no-nonsense backing arrangements behind him.
Significance
- 'Ninety-Nine And A Half (Won't Do)' stands as a defining document of mid-1960s Southern soul, capturing that sacred collision of gospel-rooted vocal power and the deep, blues-inflected grooves that made the Muscle Shoals sound unlike anything else on earth.
- The sessions that brought these tracks to life helped cement Fame Studios as a cornerstone of American soul music production, playing a pivotal role in shaping how Atlantic Records approached recording Black artists during one of the most creatively fertile decades in popular music history.
- Wilson Pickett's work on this single was part of a larger cultural reckoning — a moment when raw, unvarnished Southern soul was staking its claim alongside the polished Detroit sound, carving out a distinct and enduring strand of 1960s Black American musical expression.
Tracklist
-
A Ninety-Nine And A Half (Won't Do) 102
2:39
-
B Danger Zone 113
2:10
Artist Details
Wilson Pickett was a soul and R&B powerhouse born in Prattville, Alabama, who rose to glory in the 1960s cutting some of the most raw, electrifying records to ever come out of the American South, recording landmark sessions at FAME Studios in Muscle Shoals and Atlantic Records that produced stone cold classics like "In the Midnight Hour" and "Mustang Sally." His gritty, screaming vocal style bridged the worlds of gospel fire and secular funk, earning him the well-deserved nickname "The Wicked Pickett" and placing him right alongside Otis Redding and James Brown in the holy trinity of Southern soul. Pickett's influence ran so deep that his recordings didn't just define an era — they laid the very foundation for funk, classic rock, and everything that came after, making him one of the most sampled and celebrated voices in the history of popular music.
