Album of the week: Shotgun by Junior Walker and the All Stars

Each week our music editor Dave Randall picks an album (with a local connection) you need to hear …

I’m sure many of you watched Steve McQueen’s excellent Mangrove on the telly this week.

Among many other things, the film reminded me of some footage I have seen of the RamJam Club in Brixton from the same era.

A year before The Mangrove opened its doors in 1968, the RamJam Club hosted a rising Motown Records star – the singer and saxophonist Junior Walker and his All Stars.

Luckily for us, someone filmed the gig.

So, partly as an excuse to share that footage, and partly because it’s a Motown funk classic, my album of the week is Shotgun from 1965.

By the way, if you have memories of the RamJam Club, which used to be at 390 Brixton Road (now the UCKG church), I’d love to hear them – please feel free to share in the comments. 

Dave Randall is a musician and author of Sound System: The Political Power of Music