Perhaps he was reflecting on the memorable year he’d experienced. The wake of the murder of civil rights’ leader Martin Luther King, Jr.The daydreaming mood of the lyric was based in truth, as Redding had started writing “Dock Of The Bay” when he was in California, sitting on a rented houseboat in Sausalito. Role in unitingĭue to this classic being composed by bothīlack and White artists, it proved to be a symbol of racial unity in It also appears in television shows like Family Guy and Sons of Anarchy. Hill, both of which were based on the aforementioned conflict.Īdditional popular media this classic found its way onto is the 1986 Tom Cruise film Top Gun. ItĪlso featured in American movies such as 1986’s Platoon and 1987’s Hamburger Gotta Get Out of This Place: The Soundtrack of the Vietnam War (2015). To it alluding to a more-peaceful reality than the one they wereįacing. Accordingly, it has been featured in the book We Vietnam War strongly-identified with this song due Usage of “Sittin’ On) The Dock of the Bay in MediaĪmerican soldiers who participated in the The record label eventually included it on Redding’s posthumous album of the same name, The Dock of the Bay. It was originally released on 8 January 1968. When did “(Sittin’ On) The Dock of the Bay” come out? Of this track was inspired by an attempt by the artist to sound more like Theīeatles and that fact that Redding was evolving artistically in general due to recent
It should be noted that Redding’s composition Redding and Cropper are the only two writers of this song. However, Redding’s lyrics are still based on real-life events. In fact they were inspired by his stay in a boathouse in Sausalito, California. Otis “didn’t really write about himself”,Īnd as such he was the one who usually handled the task of writing lyrics about The rest of it was penned by Steve Cropper, a guitarist who wasĮmployed, like Redding, by Stax Records. Indeed Cropper claims that Otis Redding only wrote the first verse of This classic earned Otis Redding a posthumous Grammy Award for Best Rhythm & Blues Performance and both he and Steve Cropper a Grammy for Best Rhythm & Blues Song. However, Redding added this part only because he forgot the actual lyrics he intended to use in that section. Indeed this now-iconic whistling was more or less a placeholder, as in if Redding had actually survived to rework the song it is postulated that it would have been removed. In fact the whole song would have likely sounded differently had Redding lived to work on it further. Many have dubbed the outro to this song as “perhaps the most famous whistling in music history”. (BMI) has accredited “(Sittin’ On) The Dock of the Bay” with being “the sixth-most performed song of the 20 th century”, despite the fact that the artist behind it never had a chance to do so live. But for the sake of history, the most-notable cover is perhaps Michael Bolton’s, as not only did his rendition help launch his career, but it is also the favorite version of Zelma Redding’s, Otis Redding’s widow. Logically a song of this magnitude has been covered by a number of artists. Otis Redding’s son, Otis Redding III, performed “(Sittin’ On) The Dock of the Bay” at the inauguration of the Brannan Street Wharf in San Francisco on 17 July 2013. Moreover the lyrics of the song are actually engraved at the pier for viewing by the general public.And why? This was because it was a deviation from what they had grown to expect from the artist. His wife Zelma was not too enthused neither. When the labels who employed Redding first heard “(Sittin’ On) The Dock of the Bay”, they weren’t overly-impressed.Additionally it has been placed on Rolling Stone’s “500 Greatest Songs of All Time” list at an even equally-impressive number 26.On the UK Singles Chart, “(Sittin’ On) The Dock of the Bay” peaked at number 3.
As such, “(Sittin’ On) The Dock of the Bay” also proved the be the signature song of Redding’s career, as it has sold in excess of four-million copies. brought forth what turned out to be the first song by a deceased artist to top the Billboard Hot 100.