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Released by Stax Records in December 1967, The Soul Of A Bell was the debut LP from noted Memphis singer-songwriter William Bell, who began his recording career 12 years earlier as a member of a vocal harmony group called The Del Rios, who cut a one-off single for the Meteor label after winning a local talent contest. Originally born William Yarborough, Bell remained with The Del Rios until 1962, when they were offered a deal by Stax Records, then a rising Memphis-based R&B label run by siblings Jim Stewart and Estelle Axton. Impressed by Bell’s talent, they offered him a solo deal and, later the same year, the singer wrote and recorded what became his debut single for Stax, ‘You Don’t Miss Your Water’. Though it wasn’t able to dent the US R&B charts, this plaintive, piano-led, ballad (which Bell wrote when he was feeling homesick while working in New York) sold 200,000 copies and made No.95 in the US pop charts. Bell’s subsequent singles during the next 12 months didn’t do as well. To make matters worse, in 1963, Bell was drafted into the US army for a mandatory two-year stint. In the meantime, though, he was beginning to gain a reputation as a songwriter of note and had his songs recorded by Carla Thomas, the UK’s Georgie Fame, and Otis Redding. The latter, then Stax’s rising male star, recorded ‘You Don’t Miss Your Water’ on his classic 1965 LP Otis Blue. A year after his exit from the US military, Bell had to make up for lost time and did so by debuting in the US R&B Top 30 during 1966 with ‘Share What You Got’, followed by ‘Never Like This Before’ a few months later. That success prompted Stax to release Bell’s debut album, The Soul Of A Bell, which combined previous single releases with cover versions of then current soul hits (as was standard practice for R&B albums at the time).