To anyone who knows the roots and branches of American music, the passing of Steve Cropper in December 2025 was seismic. As guitarist, songwriter, producer and engineer – not just for the iconic Stax record label but on a forest of sessions and solo releases – the Tennessee soul man was the DNA that coursed through the post-war era, his fabled right hand setting the pace of rock ‘n’ roll for 60-plus years. “Words fail me in describing his impact,” wrote Joe Bonamassa. “He was on the session when history was made. He came up with the parts we all studied. He produced the records we all worshipped.”


The wider world assumed 2024’s star-dusted, Grammy-nominated Friendlytown was the full stop on this most seminal of careers. Little did we know that he was already working on new material. “Making music was Steve's greatest joy,” explains Jon Tiven, the acclaimed songwriter/producer who first met Cropper in the early-’70s, became a close friend and helped ignite his post-millennial solo career. “Steve was so encouraged by Friendlytown. He was adamant he wanted to do another record.”


Appropriately for an album whose title references the guitarist’s most famous co-write – Otis Redding’s 1967 standard (Sittin’ On) The Dock Of The Bay – Watching The Tide saw Cropper roll back the years. Writing alongside Tiven and Midnight Hour vocalist Roger C. Reale – then tracking at Nashville’s historic RCA Studio C with a crack-squad band including Ana Grosh (vocals), Nioshi Jackson (drums), engineer Eddie Gore (keys/percussion), and a wishlist of guitar heroes (Eric Clapton, Billy Gibbons, Brian May, Ronnie Wood) – the 83-year-old sounds ageless and energised.


“This was his element,” nods Tiven, who also handled bass and some lead guitar on the record. “Once he got in the studio, it was like falling out of bed. I told him: ‘Don't worry about anything except sounding like yourself. Sign your name to these songs’.”


And nobody had a signature quite like Steve Cropper. Never a showy player, the Missouri-born, Memphis-raised guitarist was soon prized as the greatest engine-room on the Southern scene, the push/pull of his rhythm work as undeniable as a locomotive piston. Just as vital, Cropper was a walking encyclopaedia of his adopted home-city’s musical forms – blues, soul, R&B, gospel – and this served him well as the trusted first lieutenant of Stax co-founder Jim Stewart and cornerstone of the label’s house band, Booker T. & The M.G.’s. “Working with Steve was easy,” nods Tiven, “because he knew how to poke the best out of everybody.”