Producer helped spur Elvis comeback
NASHVILLE Lincoln (Chips) Moman, a Memphis producer, musician and songwriter who helped Elvis Presley engineer a musical comeback in the late ’60s and then moved to Nashville to record Willie Nelson, Merle Haggard and other top country performers, died June 13 in his hometown of LaGrange, Ga., a day after his birthday. He was 79.
Donny Turner, a family friend who spoke with his wife, Jane, said Moman died at a hospice facility after a lengthy struggle with lung disease.
Born Jun 12, 1937, he became a fixture for decades in the Southern music scene. Moman hitchhiked to Memphis from Georgia as a teenager and worked at the fledging Stax Records in the 1950s. He produced some of the first hits for the famous label, such as Last Night by the Mar-Keys.
He started his own studio, American Sound Studio, and formed the Memphis Boys studio band, which helped define the funky, down-to-earth Memphis sound of the 1960s. He helped produce hits from the Gentrys, B.J. Thomas and Neil Diamond. With Dan Penn, he co-wrote soul classics Dark End of the Street, a hit for James Carr and Do Right Woman, a hit for Aretha Franklin.
One of his most notable collaborations was with Presley. For much of the ’60s, Presley had turned out soundtrack albums as pallid as the movies they were derived from. But by the end of the decade, Presley was anxious to challenge himself and chose Moman’s studio for his intended comeback.
The result was a prolific and productive session, with Presley re-establishing his mastery of soul, gospel, country and blues and showing he could keep up with the latest sounds. The album From Elvis in Memphis, released in 1969, received some of the best reviews of his career and was followed a year later by Back in Memphis. Hit singles included Kentucky Rain, In the Ghetto and what became the signature song of the latter part of Presley’s career, the charttopping Suspicious Minds.
Moman left Memphis in 1972 and tried to start again in Atlanta, but when that didn’t work out, he moved to Nashville. There Moman continued his streak of musical success by writing and recording for country artists.
He is survived by his wife, his daughter Monique and son Casey.