Sam Moore told Dave Prater that he would "never speak to him again" after the height of their success.
The late 'Soul Man' singer - who died on Friday (10.01.25) at the age of 89 following complications from surgery - shot to fame alongside Dave as part of the R+B duo in the 1960s but their friendship began to wane along with their success, and the pair remained off speaking terms.
17 January 2025
His obituary, published by The Times, explained: "Between 1965 and 1968, Sam and Dave scored a string of further hits including You Don't Know Like I Know, I Thank You and Hold On, I'm Comin' and the ballad Soothe Me, constituting a body of work as enduring and potent as anything to emerge from the golden age of 1960s soul music. As a live act, the duo's frenzied stage show rivalled even that of Otis Redding, with whom they toured Britain and Europe in 1967 and who was wary of going on stage after them.
Moore and Prater 'were high-energy performers, and their force mushroomed when they were together', Robert Gordon wrote in Respect Yourself, the official history of Stax. "They were double dynamite, each at full tilt, exploding together with exponential force." At their height they had their own plane, touring with a 16-piece band and 35-strong entourage and working an average of 280 shows a year.
"Then it all went horribly wrong, the duo's decline largely self-inflicted rather than the result of changing musical fad and fashion. In 1968 Prater shot and injured his wife during a domestic argument. He wasn't charged but Moore - no angel himself with a background as a pimp and conman who had served jail time - told him that while they could continue to perform together, he would never speak to him again."
Dave died in 1988 at the age of 50 in a car accident, almost two decades on from their split that came as a result of a desire to pursue solo projects
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