Entertainment

Cream of the Cropp(er)

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Album of the week

STEVE CROPPER, “Dedicated: A Salute to the 5 Royales”

****

Steve Cropper, founding member of R&B instrumental band Booker T. and the MGs, was also the guitar cornerstone of the Stax Records house band, who backed everyone from soulmen Sam & Dave to Wilson Pickett and Otis Redding, with whom he co-wrote “(Sittin’ on) the Dock of the Bay.”

His influence on Southern rock, classic R&B, soul, gospel and even Motown is enormous — so who inspired him?

Cropper answers with his new album, “Dedicated,” a tribute to the incredible and often forgotten 5 Royales, the ’50s R&B/doo-wop act from North Carolina.

It’s a loving — and rockin’ — 15-song homage to the band, with Cropper reprising the riffs of the Royales’ chief songwriter and guitarist, Lowman “Pete” Pauling, and with an all-star crew of vocalists including Stevie Winwood, Lucinda Williams, Bettye LaVette and B.B. King at the mike.

In a collection of standouts, the Cropper/Winwood pairing in “Thirty Second Lover” is the song that stops you and makes you say, “Wow!” Stevie W. gets gritty in his vocals (as if he’s singing for the Spencer Davis Group again), and Stevie C. lays down flowing, liquid guitar riffs and full, round notes that he bends on the guitar strings with the ease of Superman twisting iron bars.

Also notable is Williams’ bluesy take on the Royales’ original “Dedicated to the One I Love.” On “My Sugar Sugar,” vocalist Sharon Jones is wonderful in capturing a ’50s sound, and Blues Traveler harmonicat John Popper adds very nice blues harp accents.

Cropper will perform songs from the album at the 28th annual Roots of American Music Festival at 5 p.m. on Sunday in a free Lincoln Center Out of Doors performance at the Damrosch Park Bandshell. LaVette is a guest vocalist.