"Phenomenon means having your first single, ‘Woman to Woman,' sell a million in its first eight weeks," wrote Stax employee Deanie Parker in her liner notes for Shirley Brown's Woman to Woman album, released in 1974 on Stax's Truth imprint. The East St. Louis native came to Stax by way of Albert King, who'd discovered her when she was all of 14. When matched with the powerful James Banks, Eddie Marion, and Henderson Thigpen composition "Woman to Woman," Brown hit a nerve with female listeners. In a spoken intro, Brown said: "Hello, may I speak to Barbara? Barbara, this is Shirley. You might not know who I am, but the reason I am calling you is because I was going through my old man's pockets this morning. And I just happened to find your name and number." After presenting her case, Brown sang earnestly about not letting anyone else "break up my happy home" because "I love that man and he's mine." The song notched #1 R&B and #22 Pop. A follow-up, "It Ain't No Fun" by Fredrick Knight, charted #94 Pop. Songs by Knight, Sir Mack Rice, and the late Jerry Ragovoy round out the original album release. The reissue contains five bonus tracks by writers Carolyn Franklin, Otis Redding, Aretha Franklin, and Stevie Wonder. After Stax's closure, Brown signed to Arista and with Stax's co-founder Jim Stewart and Bettye Crutcher producing, reaching #15 with "Blessed is the Woman (With a Man Like Mine)" and has more recently recorded for Malaco.