See A Little Further (Than My Bed)
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Album Summary
The Staples — that blessed family unit of gospel and soul, led by the incomparable patriarch Roebuck 'Pops' Staples alongside his daughters Mavis, Cleotha, and Yvonne — brought 'See A Little Further (Than My Bed)' to the world in 1977 through Warner Bros. Records. This was a group in transition, having left their storied home at Stax behind and now moving through the shifting currents of the mid-to-late 1970s soul landscape, where disco and urban funk were rewriting the rules of Black popular music almost overnight. The record finds the Staples leaning into that contemporary sound, working within the production sensibility of the era while never fully letting go of the spiritual and socially conscious heartbeat that had always made them something deeper than a pop act — because with the Staples, it was never just music. It was a calling.
Reception
- The album did not make significant waves on the mainstream charts, arriving at a moment when the Staples' commercial peak had largely crested following their stronger mid-1970s output, and it found only modest traction within the R&B market.
- Critical response at the time of release was relatively understated, though Mavis Staples' vocal performances — that voice, that undeniable instrument — were recognized as a consistent source of power across everything the group recorded during their Warner Bros. years.
- The record found itself caught in a difficult space between gospel traditionalists who wanted the old fire and mainstream soul listeners chasing the newest sound, a tension that shadowed much of the Staples' work during this period of their career.
Significance
- This album stands as a living document of how a foundational gospel-soul act — one whose roots ran all the way back to the freedom movement — wrestled with the fast-changing commercial terrain of the disco era, holding onto their identity even as the industry pressed for reinvention.
- Mavis Staples' vocal presence throughout this project continued to burnish her legacy as one of the most consequential voices in the entire American soul and gospel tradition, giving even this lesser-celebrated corner of the Staples catalog a weight and dignity it deserves.
- The record reflects the broader, bittersweet reality facing legacy civil rights-era soul artists in the late 1970s, as an industry hungry for the new too often turned its back on the elders who had laid the very foundation it was dancing on.
Tracklist
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A See A Little Further (Than My Bed) (Stereo) —
3:58
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B See A Little Further (Than My Bed) (Mono) —
3:18
Artist Details
The Staples were a Chicago-bred family act led by the incomparable patriarch Roebuck "Pops" Staples, whose shimmering guitar work laid the foundation for one of the most spiritually charged sounds in all of soul music. With daughters Mavis, Cleotha, and Yvonne — and son Pervis holding it down in the early years — the group wove gospel roots into a funky, socially conscious tapestry that made folks want to shout, cry, and march all at the same time. Through the golden years of the seventies on Stax Records, they delivered stone-cold classics that carried the weight of the movement and the warmth of a Sunday morning, cementing their place as true messengers of the people.
