MUSICMEIHO

ETTA JAMES

2009-02-12T11:19:00.000-08:00

Sugar On The Floor by ETTA James

Biography by Bill Dahl (AMG)

Few R&B singers have endured tragic travails on the monumental level that Etta James has and remain on earth to talk about it. The lady's no shrinking violet; her autobiography, Rage to Survive, describes her past (including numerous drug addictions) in sordid detail.

But her personal problems have seldom affected her singing. James has hung in there from the age of R&B and doo wop in the mid-'50s through soul's late-'60s heyday and right up into the '90s and 2000s (where her 1994 disc Mystery Lady paid loving jazz-based tribute to one of her idols, Billie Holiday). Etta James' voice has deepened over the years, coarsened more than a little, but still conveys remarkable passion and pain.

Jamesetta Hawkins was a child gospel prodigy, singing in her Los Angeles Baptist church choir (and over the radio) when she was only five years old under the tutelage of Professor James Earle Hines. She moved to San Francisco in 1950, soon teaming with two other girls to form a singing group. When she was 14, bandleader Johnny Otis gave the trio an audition. He particularly dug their answer song to Hank Ballard & the Midnighters' "Work With Me Annie."

Against her mother's wishes, the young singer embarked for L.A. to record "Roll With Me Henry" with the Otis band and vocalist Richard Berry in 1954 for Modern Records. Otis inverted her first name to devise her stage handle and dubbed her vocal group the Peaches (also Etta's nickname). "Roll With Me Henry," renamed "The Wallflower" when some radio programmers objected to the original title's connotations, topped the R&B charts in 1955.

The Peaches dropped from the tree shortly thereafter, but Etta James kept on singing for Modern throughout much of the decade (often under the supervision of saxist Maxwell Davis). "Good Rockin' Daddy" also did quite well for her later in 1955, but deserving follow-ups such as "W-O-M-A-N" and "Tough Lover" (the latter a torrid rocker cut in New Orleans with Lee Allen on sax) failed to catch on.

James landed at Chicago's Chess Records in 1960, signing with their Argo subsidiary. Immediately, her recording career kicked into high gear; not only did a pair of duets with her then-boyfriend (Moonglows lead singer Harvey Fuqua) chart, her own sides (beginning with the tortured ballad "All I Could Do Was Cry") chased each other up the R&B lists as well. Leonard Chess viewed James as a classy ballad singer with pop crossover potential, backing her with lush violin orchestrations for 1961's luscious "At Last" and "Trust in Me." But James' rougher side wasn't forsaken -- the gospel-charged "Something's Got a Hold on Me" in 1962, a kinetic 1963 live LP (Etta James Rocks the House) cut at Nashville's New Era Club, and a blues-soaked 1966 duet with childhood pal Sugar Pie De Santo, "In the Basement," ensured that.

Although Chess hosted its own killer house band, James traveled to Rick Hall's Fame studios in Muscle Shoals in 1967 and emerged with one of her all-time classics. "Tell Mama" was a searing slice of upbeat Southern soul that contrasted markedly with another standout from the same sessions, the spine-chilling ballad "I'd Rather Go Blind." Despite the death of Leonard Chess, Etta James remained at the label into 1975, experimenting toward the end with a more rock-based approach.

There were some mighty lean years, both personally and professionally, for Miss Peaches. But she got back on track recording-wise in 1988 with a set for Island, Seven Year Itch, that reaffirmed her Southern soul mastery. Her following albums have been a varied lot -- 1990's Sticking to My Guns was contemporary in the extreme; 1992's Jerry Wexler-produced The Right Time, for Elektra, was slickly soulful, and her most other '90s outings have explored jazz directions. In 1998, she also issued a holiday album, Etta James Christmas. She was inducted into the Blues Hall of Fame in 2001, and in 2003 received a Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award. That year also saw the release of her Let's Roll album, followed in 2004 by a CD of new blues performances, Blues to the Bone, both on RCA Records. James then shifted gears and released an album of pop standards, All the Way, on RCA in 2006.

In concert, Etta James is a sassy, no-holds-barred performer whose suggestive stage antics sometimes border on the obscene. She's paid her dues many times over as an R&B and soul pioneer; long may she continue to shock the uninitiated.

**My Note: Having seen Etta at least 200 Times Live - these are some of my favorite songs - that she usually does at her show!!

LEE 'SHOT' WILLIAMS

2009-02-07T13:48:00.001-08:00

Ease On Down In The Bed by LEE 'SHOT' WILLIAMS

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Lee "Shot" Williams
Daddy B. Nice's #13 ranked Southern Soul Artist

About Lee "Shot" Williams
Lee Williams was dubbed "Shot" by his mother for his habit of wearing suits and dressing up as a "big shot." Born in 1938 in Lexington, Mississippi, he moved to Detroit in the fifties and then on to Chicago, where he eventually hooked up with fellow Mississippian Little Smokey Smothers. He interned with Chicago-based Magic Sam, then toured with Earl Hooker and Bobby "Blue" Bland.

His first album under his own name, Country Disco, was released in 1977. In the eighties, without commercial prospects, Williams moved back to Memphis, where he might very well have lived out the remainder of his life in obscurity but for small-label Black Magic's interest in giving him an opportunity. The result, Cold Shot, was voted the best blues album of 1995 by "Living Blues" magazine.
In 1996 Lee "Shot" Williams moved to Ecko Records, where he recorded Hot Shot, distinguished by creditable, straightforward blues numbers such as "Make Me Holler" and "I'll Take The Risk."

By 2000, however, Williams had honed a much more focused musical persona, evident in his smash chitlin' circuit hit, "She Made A Freak Out Of Me." The following year, he recorded his signature hit, "Somebody's After My Freak" (from the Somebody's After My Freak CD). Since then, Williams has continued to put out a steady stream of top-notch Southern Soul discs annually.

August 10, 2005. "Ease On Down In The Bed" from 2005's Nibble Man from Southern Soul label Ecko is yet another song that's as valuable for the musical directions it suggests as it is for Shot's patented up tempo magic. A percolating, organ-enhanced rhythm section strikes out into virgin territory, rhythmically speaking, while Lee "Shot" patters on in a seductive voice about bedroom geography. It's short on melody, but high on originality, groove and atmosphere.

INEZ and CHARLIE FOXX

2009-02-06T08:53:00.000-08:00

You Are The Man by iNEZ & CHARLIE FOXX

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Biography by Ron Wynn (AMG)
This brother/sister duo from Greensboro made a little noise on the soul scene in the '60s. They signed with Juggy Murray Jones' Symbol label in 1962. Their biggest hit was "Mockingbird," in 1963, which was a number two R&B and number seven pop smash. Their vocal tradeoffs and arrangement were primarily responsible for its appeal, though Foxx could do some sizzling numbers on her own. They continued with "Ask Me" and "Hurt by Love," then switched to Musicor. Their final moderate hit was "(1-2-3-4-5-6-7) Count the Days" in 1967 for Dynamo, which reached number 17 on the R&B charts. Inez Foxx had a solid LP on her own for Volt in 1969, At Memphis. But her solo songs for the label didn't generate much interest in the early and mid-'70s. James Taylor and Carly Simon later did a cover of "Mockingbird."

Review by Richie Unterberger (AMG)
Dynamo was the name of the Musicor subsidiary for which Inez & Charlie Foxx did most of their late-'60s recordings, and this collects a couple dozen tracks the duo cut for Musicor/Dynamo from 1966-1969. Their Dynamo output was more consistent than what they had recorded for Sue, thanks in part to input from producer Luther Dixon, who was married to Inez Foxx at the time. However, there was no outstanding single on the order of "Mockingbird" during their time with the label, and the pair still often sounded like a lesser, more pop-oriented version of Ike & Tina Turner. This is respectable but somewhat middling New York soul with, as was true of much of the city's 1960s soul output, a slicker sheen to the production than soul product from most other regions. On "I Love You 1,000 Times," they seem to be trying to mimic 1963-1964 Motown, and although they don't do so badly, that's a strategy doomed to failure. The comparison to the Turners bobs higher above the surface in the bluesy and sultry "I Stand Accused"/"Guilty" medley, one of the disc's highlights. A lowlight, however, is the outrageous 1968 medley of "Vaya Con Dios"/"Fellows in Vietnam," in which the traditional song turns into a rap about the Vietnam War. Just as you're getting all set for a protest or at least moving commentary, it builds into a plea for us to encourage American soldiers to get out of their foxholes and "kill another enemy to set us free, and to keep us free" -- not the sort of sentiment that could be heartily endorsed for a conflict that took so many needless lives, a disproportionate amount of whom (on the U.S. side) were African-Americans. This CD is preferable to a prior compilation of the Foxxes' Musicor/Dynamo work, Count the Days, as this has four more tracks, including a 1969 Inez Foxx solo effort, "You Shouldn't Have Set My Soul on Fire." Be cautioned that the version of "Mockingbird" is not the original 1963 hit single, but a 1968 remake with strings.

CLARENCE CARTER

2009-02-05T10:09:00.000-08:00

Did I Do The Right Thing by CLARENCE CARTER

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Daddy B. Nice's #7 ranked Southern Soul Forerunner
Biography by Jason Ankeny (amg)
Singer Clarence Carter exemplified the gritty, earthy sound of Muscle Shoals R&B, fusing the devastating poignancy of the blues with a wicked, lascivious wit to create deeply soulful music rooted in the American South of the past and the present. Born January 14, 1936, in Montgomery, AL, Carter was blind from birth. He immediately gravitated to music, teaching himself guitar by listening to the blues classics of John Lee Hooker, Lightnin' Hopkins, and Jimmy Reed. He majored in music at Alabama State University, learning to transcribe charts and arrangements in Braille.

With blind classmate Calvin Scott, Carter in 1960 formed the duo Clarence & Calvin, signing to the Fairlane label to release "I Wanna Dance But I Don't Know How" the following year. After the 1962 release of "I Don't Know (School Girl)," Clarence & Calvin left Fairlane for the Duke imprint, renaming themselves the C & C Boys for their label debut, "Hey Marvin." In all, the duo cut four Duke singles, none of them generating more than a shrug at radio -- finally, in 1965 they traveled to Rick Hall's Fame Studio in Muscle Shoals, AL, paying $85 to record the wrenching ballad "Step by Step" and its flip side, "Rooster Knees and Rice." Atlanta radio personality Zenas Sears recommended Clarence & Calvin to Atlantic producer Jerry Wexler, and the label issued "Step by Step" on its Atco subsidiary -- the record failed to chart, and the duo was once again looking for a label.

Backed by a four-piece combo dubbed the Mello Men, Clarence & Calvin spent the first half of 1966 headlining Birmingham's 2728 Club. One Friday night in June while returning home from the nightspot, the group suffered an auto accident that left Scott critically injured, initiating an ugly falling-out with Carter over the resulting medical bill. In the meantime, Carter continued as a solo act, signing to Hall's Fame label for 1967's "Tell Daddy," which inspired Etta James' response record, "Tell Mama." The superb popcorn-soul effort "Thread the Needle" proved a minor crossover hit, and after one additional Fame release, "The Road of Love," Carter returned to Atlantic with "Looking for a Fox," issued in early 1968. "Looking for a Fox" proved the first of many singles to slyly reference the singer's visual impairment, not to mention showcasing the libidinous impulses that dominate many of his most popular records.

But few performances better typified the emerging Carter aesthetic than "Slip Away," a superior cheating ballad spotlighting his anguished, massive baritone alongside the remarkably sinuous backing of Fame's exemplary backing band. The record was a Top Ten hit, and its follow-up, "Too Weak to Fight," also went gold, solidifying Carter's newfound commercial appeal. He ended 1968 with a superbly funky Christmas single, the raunchy "Back Door Santa," in addition to mounting a national tour featuring backing vocalist Candi Staton, who later became Carter's wife as well as a soul star in her own right.

The percolating "Snatching It Back" was Carter's first Atlantic release of 1969 -- its B-side, a remake of James Carr's deep soul classic "The Dark End of the Street," remains one of the singer's most potent efforts, drawing on traditional blues and gospel to explore both the absurdity and anguish of infidelity. Subsequent singles including "The Feeling Is Right," "Doing Our Thing," and "Take It Off Him and Put It on Me" were only marginally successful, but in 1970 Carter returned to the Top Ten with the sentimental "Patches," his biggest hit to date. He nevertheless stumbled again with a run of 1971 releases like "Getting the Bills" and "Slipped, Tripped and Fell in Love," and in the wake of "If You Can't Beat 'Em" -- a duet with Staton -- Carter left Atlantic in 1972, returning to Fame with "Back in Your Arms Again."

Released in 1973, the leering "Sixty Minute Man" proved a novelty hit, but in 1975 he attempted to reignite his career at ABC, releasing "Take It All Off" and "Dear Abby" to little notice. By the end of the decade Carter was relegated to small independent labels like Future Stars and Ronn, and in 1980 signed to Venture for the ill-advised "Jimmy's Disco" and "Can We Slip Away Again?" In 1985 he resurfaced on the fledgling Ichiban label, returning to the ribald deep soul of his heyday -- the LP Dr. C.C. earned positive reviews and spawned the hilariously lewd "Strokin'," a major word-of-mouth hit. (A sequel, "Still Strokin'," followed in 1989.) Carter continued recording and touring regularly into the 21st century, maintaining a strong fan base throughout the South.

MR. ZAY

2009-01-31T17:22:00.000-08:00

Old School Lover by MR. ZAY

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Mr. Zay
Daddy B. Nice's #80 ranked Southern Soul Artist

About Mr. Zay
Mr. Zay's debut album, Old School Lover, was released in 2002 (Mardi Gras). The album established Mr. Zay's credentials as a slow crooner in the style of Sir Charles Jones, Glenn Jones, and Willie Clayton. With a vintage-sounding melody and crisp production, the title track was a standout.

GENE CHANDLER

2009-01-30T09:28:00.000-08:00

You Can't Hurt Me by GENE CHANDLER

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Biography by Richie Unterberger (AMG)
Gene Chandler is remembered by the rock & roll audience almost solely for the classic novelty and doo wop-tinged soul ballad "Duke of Earl"; the unforgettable opening chant of the title leading the way, the song was a number one hit in 1962. He's esteemed by soul fans as one of the leading exponents of the '60s Chicago soul scene, along with Curtis Mayfield and Jerry Butler. Born Eugene Dixon, he was a member of the doo wop group the Dukays and "Duke of Earl" was actually a Dukays recording; Dixon was renamed Gene Chandler and the single bore his credit as a solo singer. Chandler never approached the massive pop success of that chart-topper (although he occasionally entered the Top 20), but he was a big star with the R&B audience with straightforward mid-tempo and ballad soul numbers in the mid-'60s, many of which were written by Curtis Mayfield and produced by Carl Davis. Chandler's success became more fitful after Mayfield stopped penning material for him, although he enjoyed some late-'60s hits and had a monster pop and soul smash in 1970 with "Groovy Situation." His last successes were the far less distinguished disco- and dance-influenced R&B hits "Get Down" (1978) and "Does She Have a

Review by Andrew Hamilton (AMG)
A collection of Gene's Brunswick sides, 20 tracks of lively productions by producer Carl Davis. None of these sides made an impact on the pop chart and did only fair on the R&B chart, which is perplexing. Tunes like "Good Times," the romping, confident "Nothing Can Stop Me," his duet with Barbara Acklin "From the Teacher to the Preacher," "Fool For You," and the soulful "Here Comes the Tears" should have been much bigger. This is not definitive Chandler, but the 20 tracks are a good helping of some of his better recordings that were victimized by poor promotion.

JACKIE WILSON

2009-01-24T17:17:00.000-08:00

It's Been A Long Time by JACKIE WILSON

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Jackie Wilson (vocals; born June 9, 1934, died January 21, 1984)

They called him “Mr. Entertainment,” and indeed Jackie Wilson was a gifted singer of considerable range and a charismatic showman who commanded a stage like few before or since. Wilson possessed a natural tenor. He sang with the graceful control of Sam Cooke and moved with the frenzied dynamism of James Brown. With all the flair and finesse at his disposal, Wilson routinely drove audiences to the brink of hysteria. A mainstay of the R&B and pop charts from 1958 to 1968, Wilson amassed two dozen Top Forty singles, all released on the Brunswick label.

On record, he was often saddled with grandiose arrangements and dated material, but he transcended even the most bathetic settings with the tremulous excitement of his vocals. And while he was over-recorded, averaging two albums a year from 1959 to 1974, there are some genuinely noteworthy albums in his catalog, including Lonely Teardrops (1959), Jackie Sings the Blues (1960), Soul Time (1965) and Higher and Higher (1967).

The Detroit-born Wilson turned to R&B after stints as a gospel singer and amateur boxer. (He won the American Amateur Golden Gloves Welterweight boxing title.) Wilson joined Billy Ward and His Dominoes as lead singer in 1953, replacing Clyde McPhatter when the latter left to join the Drifters. Wilson remained with the Dominoes until 1957, singing on such high-charting numbers as “St. Therese of the Roses.”

Wilson launched his solo career in 1958 with the singles “Reet Petite” and “To Be Loved.” Both were penned by Berry Gordy, Jr., a struggling songwriter who had yet to found his Motown empire. Another Gordy composition, “Lonely Teardrops,” was Wilson’s breakthrough, topping the R&B chart and becoming a Top Ten hit on the pop side. More R&B chart-toppers followed in quick succession: “You Better Know It,” “Doggin’ Around,” “A Woman, a Lover, a Friend.” He was now being managed by Nat Tarnapol, who aimed him more at the middle-of-the-road white market. A 1962 album, for instance, was recorded live at the Copacabana. (Berry Gordy Jr. similarly groom the Supremes and the Temptations for upscale rooms and Vegas venues.) Wilson would alternate harder-grooving R&B songs like “Doggin’ Around” (#1 R&B, #15 pop) with almost operatic balladry such as “Night” (#4 pop) in an attempt to cover all the bases.

Wilson’s unabated success and output were astonishing, impacting the R&B charts in every year from 1958 through 1973. Scattered among a surfeit of schmaltzy ballads were such R&B gems as “Baby Workout,” “Think Twice” (a duet with LaVern Baker) and “Chain Gang” (with Count Basie). Wilson’s biggest hit, the exquisitely soulful “(Your Love Keeps Lifting Me) Higher and Higher,” came in 1967.

All totaled, he amassed 46 R&B hits, 24 of which crossed over to the pop Top Forty. He was unfailingly versatile, too, handling uptempo R&B and pop balladry with style and charisma. Jackie Wilson not only was “Mr. Excitement” but also, as some dubbed him, “the black Elvis.”

Wilson tore it up onstage with an act that radiated excitement and sex appeal. His popularity extended overseas, where, in 1963 he headlined a British show that had the Beatles as one of his opening acts. When the hits slowed down as musical tastes shifted in the late Sixties, Wilson remained active on the performing front. He was, in fact, performing “Lonely Teardrops” onstage in New Jersey when he suffered a heart attack that plunged him into a four-month coma and left him permanently incapacitated. His was one of the most tragic denouements in rock and roll history. Wilson remained in nursing homes for more than eight years until his death in 1984.

TIMELINE

June 9, 1934: Jackie Wilson is born in Detroit, Michigan.

1951: Bandleader/producer Johnny Otis discovers Jackie Wilson at a Detroit talent show and brings him to the attention of Billy Ward, with whose Dominoes Wilson will be invited to tour.

1953: Singer Jackie Wilson becomes an official member of Billy Ward and His Dominoes, replacing Clyde McPhatter.

June 1956: “St. Therese of the Roses,” by Billy Ward and His Dominoes - featuring Jackie Wilson on lead vocals - reaches #13 on the pop charts.

September 8, 1957: “Reet Petite (The Finest Girl You’d Ever Want to Meet),” Jackie Wilson’s debut single, is released on Brunswick Records.

April 21, 1958: “To Be Loved,” by Jackie Wilson, enters the R&B charts, becoming the first of 46 hits for the singer.

February 14, 1959: “Lonely Teardrops,” by Jackie Wilson becomes Wilson’s first Top Ten pop and tops the R&B chart for seven weeks.

July 11, 1960: “A Woman, a Lover, a Friend,” by Jackie Wilson, enters the R&B charts, will it will cap an amazing run of four #1 singles in less than two years.

December 1960: Jackie Wilson is voted Entertainer of the Year by Cash Box magazine.

February 15, 1961: Jackie Wilson is shot by a deranged female fan who has broken into his apartment. He is rushed to the hospital, where he recovers for six weeks (and leaves with the bullet still lodged in his abdomen).

May 4, 1963: “Baby Workout,” one of Jackie Wilson’s stronger R&B showings, tops the U.S. R&B chart for the first of three weeks. It also reaches #5 on the pop chart.

August 26, 1967: “(You’re Love Keeps Lifting Me) Higher and Higher,” by Jackie Wilson, enters the singles charts, where it will peak at #1 R&B and #6 pop. It is Wilson’s fifth (and final) R&B chart-topper.

September 7, 1968: “I Get the Sweetest Feeling,” by Jackie Wilson, peaks at #34 on the pop chart. It’s his last Top Forty single, though he’ll continue to impact the R&B chart.

November 29, 1969: The rock and roll revival is in full swing, as Richard Nadar’s second oldies concert at New York’s Madison Square Garden presents Bill Haley and His Comets, Jackie Wilson, Gary U.S. Bonds, and others.

September 29, 1975: Jackie Wilson suffers a heart attack while performing at the Latin Casino in Cherry Hill, New Jersey, as part of Dick Clark’s “Good Ol’ Rock ‘n’ Roll” tour.

January 21, 1984: Jackie Wilson dies in Mount Holley, New Jersey, after lingering in a brain-damaged state for eight years as a result of his 1975 heart attack.

January 21, 1987: Jackie Wilson is inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame at the 2nd annual induction dinner. Peter Wolf is his presenter.

June 1994: Rhino Records releases the three-disc box set Mr. Excitement, which chronicles the prolific, hit-filled career of R&B star Jackie Wilson.

ASHFORD & SIMPSON

2009-01-23T12:27:00.000-08:00

Gimme Something Real by ASHFORD & SIMPSON

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Superstar singer songwriter powerhouse couple Ashford & Simpson will release a definitive collection of their Greatest Hits, Ashford & Simpson: The Real Thing on CD, DVD and DVD Blu Ray (Burgundy Records / Sony Music). The first-ever live in-concert audio and video recordings are performances by the duo of the hit songs they have written for themselves as well as those made popular by other major music artists. The release date is January 27, 2009.

** This is only the music from the dvd - not the dvd ....

MARVIN GAYE

2009-01-22T12:44:00.000-08:00

Review by Stephen Thomas Erlewine (AMG)

The Shadow Of Your Smile by WILSON MEADOWS

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Vulnerable is the end result of a project entitled The Ballads that Marvin Gaye began in 1966. Gaye intended the project as a showcase for his crooning, as well as a way to pay tribute to the pop and jazz standards he loved. It was a labor of love that took him 12 years to complete, and even after it was finished, the record wasn't released until 1997. Was it worth the wait? For dedicated fans, it certainly was, since Gaye's voice is as beautiful and soulful as ever. However, anyone who is not a dedicated fan will find Vulnerable intriguing but significantly flawed, especially since several of the songs seem ill-suited for Gaye's seductive vocals. Which means that even though Vulnerable is a nice addendum to his catalog, it's little more than a curiosity.

MARTIN LUTHER KING JR.

2009-01-19T05:45:00.001-08:00

WALKED

SO

COULD RUN

AND WE COULD ALL LEARN TO FLY

WILSON MEADOWS

2009-01-18T11:22:00.000-08:00

I'm Changing by WILSON MEADOWS

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Daddy B. Nice's #19 ranked Southern Soul Artist

About Wilson Meadows

Wilson Meadows was born in Chattanooga, Tennessee in 1944. He grew up singing gospel music and while still young was a member of a group called the Zircons, who'd had a novelty hit back in the fifties. The Meadows Brothers, including Wilson, recorded at least two singles in the 70's, "I Can't Understand" and "I Tried It All." But that was as close as Wilson Meadows ever came to sniffing the "green" in the music business until 1997, when he was already in his fifties.

ROCKIE ROBBINS

2009-01-16T09:55:00.000-08:00

For the Sake Of A Memory by ROCKIE ROBBINS

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Biography by Ed Hogan (amg)

Born Edward W. Robbins, Jr. in Minneapolis, balladeer Rockie Robbins began singing at an early age. Working with famed arranger/producers Richard Evans (Natalie Cole, Peabo Bryson) and Johnny Pate (Curtis Mayfield and the Impressions, Lonette McKee, OKeh Records), Robbins made an impressive debut on his self-titled LP, which was released in the spring of 1979 on A&M Records. The ballad singles "If I Ever Lose You" and a cover of EWF's "Be Ever Wonderful" received a lot of radio airplay but weren't big sellers, although "Be Ever Wonderful" charted at number 67 R&B in late 1979. Another impressive fact is that the record was even made, as the original session tapes were somehow erased while en route from the recording studio to the record company. Although Rockie Robbins wasn't a major seller, A&M believed in Robbins and kept him as an artist. Teaming with producer/arranger Bobby Martin -- whose previous credits including arranging a slew of hits for Gamble & Huff's Philadelphia International Records and fellow A&M signees LTD with lead singer Jeffrey Osborne -- Robbins' second LP, You and Me, was issued the spring of 1980. The title track went to number nine R&B. The next single, the danceable, inspiring "Hang Tough," made it to number 70 R&B. Robbins' other A&M singles were "After Loving You," "Time to Think," and "I Believe in Love" (all were moderate hits). Switching to MCA Records, Robbins earned the distinction (like Loleatta Holloway and Ronnie McNeir, among others) of having two self-titled LPs in his catalog. The MCA LP was released in early 1985 and there was one charting single around the time of its release ("We Belong Together").

THE ELGINS

2009-01-14T04:31:00.001-08:00

Darlin' Baby by THE ELGINS

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Biography by Bryan Thomas

Of all the groups calling themselves the Elgins -- there was an L.A.-based doo wop group and another group of Elgins who recorded for Congress, while Ritha Mae and the Temptations even used the name for awhile -- this Detroit-based quartet proved to be the most memorable, scoring two minor R&B hits in 1966 with their Motown debut "Darling Baby" (pop number 72/R&B number four) and "Heaven Must Have Sent You" (pop number 50/R&B number nine, also a major R&B hit for Bonnie Pointer in 1979). Both songs were written and produced by the powerful Holland-Dozier-Holland triumvirate.

The group's story begins in 1962 with a vocal trio calling themselves the Downbeats. Johnny Dawson, Cleo Miller, and Robert Fleming had occasionally accompanied Marv Johnson -- including their uncredited backing on "Once Upon a Time" -- prior to Johnson's hits for United Artists Records. The Downbeats also cut tracks for the Lupine family of labels before signing to the Tamla label. Their releases for the Motown family imprint were sporadic, however.

In 1966, lead vocalist andra Mallett (a.k.a. Sandra Edwards) -- one of the finest vocalists in the Motown Records stable -- joined Dawson, Miller, and Fleming. Four years earlier, in 1962, Mallett had recorded "It's Going to Be Hard Times" b/w "Camel Walk" for Tamla as Sandra Mallett and the Vandellas. Motown was all set to issue the quartet's debut for their VIP label, "Darling Baby," a Holland-Dozier-Holland production credited to the Downbeats. The song had been adapted from Lamont Dozier's solo release, "Dearest One" (Melody Records, June 1962). However, before Motown shipped the "Darling Baby" single, they slapped new labels on the 45s with the group's new name: the Elgins. Berry Gordy -- who reportedly insisted they change their name -- wanted to use the name now that the original Temptations -- Otis Williams, Paul Williams (no relation to Otis), Al Bryant, Melvin Franklin, and ddie Kendricks -- were no longer using the name once they signed to Motown's Miracle subsidiary.

VIP failed to promote the single outside the greater Detroit area, but it still managed to score a slot on the national R&B charts (number four) and charted at number 72 on the pop charts. Eight months later, the Elgins issued "Heaven Must Have Sent You," which charted Top Ten R&B briefly at number nine and number 50 on the pop charts. They followed up with a full album, Darling Baby, and another single, "I Understand My Man," but chart success eluded them and they disbanded shortly afterwards in 1967.

In 1971, Motown re-released "Heaven Must Have Sent You" in 1971. In the late '80s, a new group of Elgins was formed by British-born mogul/producer Ian Levine, who had previously worked with the re-formed Miracles and ontours (to name two). Johnny Dawson was the only original Elgin in the lineup. Sandra Mallett -- now going by Sandra Edwards -- was replaced by Yvonne Vernee-Allen. The other members were Jimmy Charles and Norbert McLean. This newly configured lineup recorded a remake of "Heaven Must Have Sent You," which had been a major hit for Pointer when she covered it only a few years prior. Levine also recorded a solo effort by Edwards.

REGGIE P

2009-01-13T12:46:00.000-08:00

Ready To Accept by REGGIE P

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Reggie P.
Daddy B. Nice's #70 ranked Southern Soul Artist

About Reggie P.

Born in Memphis, Tennessee, Reggie P. entered the music business via the legendary funk band, the BarKays, in the late nineties. His first solo effort, Who Am I (Avanti, 2000), was an uneven assortment of songs and styles ranging from rock ("Dream Weaver" and "Your Lover Is A Bad Habit") to urban-smooth ("In The Air Tonight") to the Southern Soul promise of "Let Me. . . " and "Nobody Wants You."

An even more obscure LP (All Music Guide doesn't even list it), Can't Turn A Street Woman Into A Housewife, appeared in 2003. The CD found Reggie P. still vacillating between styles, with yet another reprise of the Gary Wright tune, "Dream Weaver." The disc, however, was notable for introducing two mid-tempo tunes that defined the Southern Soul formula Reggie P. would finally choose for good: "Don't Want To Lose Your Love" and "Droppin' Salt." "Droppin' Salt" in particular intrigued Deejays of the Deep South, and word of mouth drew fans to Reggie P.

Reggie P.'s breakout CD, Why Me? (Allison), arrived in 2005. Led by its title track, the independently-produced disc was everything its forerunners had not been: a tightly-focused, emotionally and musically-overpowering expression of Southern Soul music at its best.

The vocal mastery displayed on the album stand-outs--"Why Me?," "Come On Girl," "Hold On," "Eyes Are Rainin'" (with Sir Charles Jones, who also composed) and "Droppin' Salt" (wisely reprised from the Can't Turn A Street Woman Into A Housewife album)--catapulted Reggie P. into the first rank of Southern Soul vocalists.

From CD BABY: Notes:

Earning his "Prince and Badd Boy of Southern Soul" reputation through his raw vocals, hard image, and at times, outlandish persona, Reggie P.'s soulfully crafted recordings and smoldering live performances have ignited a blaze in the South, and unfortunately for some, there's not an extinguisher in sight.

Born and raised in Memphis, Tennessee, home of the historical Beale Street and Stax Records, where many nationally acclaimed artists such as Isaac Hayes, and Otis Redding revolutionized the music industry, Reggie P. is no amateur to the music scene. Discovered by and a former member of the very well known and loved funk group, The BarKays, Reggie has performed alongside and opened for such headliners as Mel Waiters, The Isley Brothers, R. Kelly, Tyrone Davis, The O'Jays and countless others.

Debuting his long awaited album, "Why Me?" Reggie P. gives you a V.I.P. invitation into his heart, mind, and soul. Combining the heartfelt lyrics and swaying melodies of his love ballads such as "Hold On" and "Ready To Accept" with his intensifying display of verbal foreplay and love making in "Come On Girl," Reggie P. is not afraid to show his sensitive nature, one of the many qualities that has left the ladies of the South mesmerized. Don't worry, Fellas... Reggie didn't forget about you. Reggie P.'s "Soul Steppin" will have you stepping for weeks. This funky groove along with "Drop That Thang" will definitely have you setting a blaze on the dance floor.

With an array of outstanding musical talent, Reggie P. has proven that he is more than qualified to carry the title, "The Prince and Badd Boy of Southern Soul!"

Check out the review by fans: http://cdbaby.com/cd/reggiep

EDDIE FLOYD

2009-01-11T18:21:00.000-08:00

Stop Look What You're Doin by EDDIE FLOYD

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Biography by Steve Huey (AMG)

Soul singer/songwriter Eddie Floyd scored one of the defining hits of the Memphis soul sound with "Knock on Wood," a number one R&B smash that typified the Stax house style at its grittiest. Floyd was born in Montgomery, AL, in 1935, but grew up in Detroit, where his uncle Robert West owned a couple of record labels, including Lupine. In 1955, Floyd co-founded the seminal proto-soul group the Falcons, who eventually scored a major R&B hit with "You're So Fine" in 1959 (with Joe Stubbs, later of the Contours and 100 Proof Aged in Soul, as lead singer). After Stubbs' departure, Floyd spent a brief period as the Falcons' lead singer, until Wilson Pickett joined up. Now recording for West's Lupine imprint, the Falcons and Pickett cut their second undisputed classic, the gospel-inflected ballad "I Found a Love," in 1962. Pickett subsequently went solo, and the Falcons broke up in 1963.

Floyd recorded a few solo sides for Lupine, and moved to Washington, D.C., for a time to work with his DJ friend, Al Bell; the two founded a label and production company, Safice, co-writing songs and releasing Floyd's recordings. When Bell accepted a job as promotions director at Stax, Floyd followed him to Memphis, where he signed on with Stax as a staff writer and producer. He worked chiefly with Carla Thomas and William Bell at first, and often wrote in tandem with house guitarist Steve Cropper. In early 1966, their composition "634-5789 (Soulsville, USA)" became a number one R&B hit for Wilson Pickett; around the same time, Floyd released his first single for Stax, "Things Get Better," which failed to chart. That summer, Floyd cut "Knock on Wood," another song he'd written with Cropper; initially intended for Otis Redding, the tune wasn't big with Stax management because it was strongly based on the chord changes of Wilson Pickett's "In the Midnight Hour." However, distributor Atlantic smelled a hit, and released the song nationally; their instincts proved correct, as "Knock on Wood" became Stax's third number one R&B hit by the end of the year (strangely, it barely made the Top 30 on the pop charts). Floyd followed his instant soul classic with several more Top 40 R&B hits over the next four years, including "Raise Your Hand," "Love Is a Doggone Good Thing," "On a Saturday Night," "I've Never Found a Girl (To Love Me Like You Do)" (his second biggest hit), and a cover of Sam Cooke's "Bring It on Home to Me."

In spite of diminishing commercial returns, Floyd stayed with Stax as a performer and writer right up to the label's bankruptcy in 1975. He spent two years with the Southern soul/blues label Malaco, recording the album Experience in 1977; while it was regionally popular, the Southern soul sound had long since fallen out of commercial favor. A brief stint at Mercury failed to remake Floyd for the disco age, and after recording with British mod revivalists Secret Affair, he largely drifted away from the studio. Floyd attempted a comeback on Ichiban with 1988's Flashback album; the following year, he performed at President Bush's inaugural ball, and went on to tour with the Blues Brothers Band. In 1998, Floyd made a guest appearance in Blues Brothers 2000, and also performed "634-5789" with Pickett and Jonny Lang. Meanwhile, countless artists have covered "Knock on Wood," most prominently a disco version by Amii Stewart that topped the pop charts in 1979. While in his seventies, Floyd recorded the affirming Eddie Loves You, a project where he revisited some of his classic songs. The album was released in 2008 from a revitalized Stax Records, the perfect pairing of artist and label.

Review by Richie Unterberger (AMG)

Floyd's seventh and last album for Stax contained a tiny R&B hit in the title track. The record employed the Con Funk Shun rhythm section that would soon rise to soul stardom on their own. But there wasn't much special about the tunes, which revealed some influences from the sounds of Philadelphia and Hi Records, both of which were then peaking in popularity. The CD reissue pairs the album and its predecessor, Baby, Lay Your Head Down (Gently on My Bed), onto one disc, although it's sequenced so that the earlier LP plays first.

RUE DAVIS

2009-01-11T07:07:00.001-08:00

A Lonely Man by RUE DAVIS

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Rue Davis

Daddy B. Nice's #65 ranked Southern Soul Artist

Performer, producer and arranger Rue Davis flies beneath the musical radar, even for listeners schooled in Southern Soul music. A contributor to countless Southern Soul R&B discs, with a subtle but far-reaching influence on his peers, Davis himself has never been able to snag a solo contract with a Southern Soul "major" label like Malaco, Ecko or Mardi Gras.

Davis has a tune on his Dapp Daddy CD called "(We Were) Taylor Made," in which he sounds like the reincarnation of Johnnie Taylor. It's a reminder that Taylor remains Davis's (and many other contemporary Southern Soul artists') principal influence.

The song "Take Me Back To Farish Street" from the same Dapp Daddy disc (Knock On Wood, 2003) sounds a little like "fluff"--pop--on the first couple of listenings, but like "Honey Poo" it ages well. It also suggests a "sound" Rue Davis might explore further, to bring his artistic identity out from the long shadow cast by Taylor.

That being said, Rue Davis is steeped in the Southern Soul scene--he is a thoroughly seasoned performer.

RON ANTHONY

2009-01-10T21:13:00.000-08:00

You Are My Lovesong by RON ANTHONY

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Ron won 1st Place in the 2007 Int'l Great American Song Contest - R&B/Hip Hop. His song "You Are My Love Song" earned accolades from contest judges, who called it the "perfect" love song - "full of romantic imagery, with an unforgettable melody."

Ron Anthony
Ron believes it’s time to put the LIVE back into performances and ROMANCE back into R&B music. As one of the hottest, most talented new singer/songwriters to hit the scene, he is leading that charge, ready to take the world by storm with his energetic performances, live band, romantic lyrics and a voice that Luther Vandross anointed as the next crooner! One of the lsst things Luther told Ron was "if you believed in yourself as I believe in you, heaven would be your audience and the stars would be at your feet!"

This Brooklyn native’s roots are in the church. A natural performer, he started singing at the age of 3 in a gospel choir where he discovered the power of music and his love for live performances. Ron spent his summers with his grandparents in North Carolina where he delighted the congregation with his rousing and evocative solos. He graduated from Erasmus Hall High School of Performing Arts, the training ground for multi-talented artists Barbra Streisand and Stephanie Mills. It was here that he developed his distinctive sound and five-octave tenor. Ron then studied with the famed artistic director Harry Poe at Mindbuilders Creative Arts Center where he triple majored in acting, musical theater and dramatic arts.

In 1992, Ron won a lead role in the touring production of “Mama, I Want to Sing”, spending several years performing in the United States, Europe, Japan and Taiwan where he made a name for himself as a live performer. He also began to build a solid reputation as a background singer, working with Phoebe Snow, Chico Debarge and Amel Larrieux.

Through these shows Ron caught the attention of the one of the greatest R&B vocalists of our time. Luther Vandross saw several of Ron’s performances and recognizing his undeniable talent, signed Ron to an exclusive deal to his production company. He spent the next year singing backgrounds with Luther off and on and recording and writing his music while performing private gigs and club dates.

Since then, Ron has been captivating audiences with his charismatic vocals and dynamic stage performances. Ron’s focus is reintroducing smooth lyrics and seductive melodies to today’s R&B and soul music. He signed with Notable Entertainment, the manager behind the phenomenal success of multi-platinum Grammy winner Ashanti and headed to the studio, crafting the heartfelt ballads “You and Me” and “You Are My Love Song”, the party song “Ay Oh!” and the tribute to his son "My Little Boy”.

“My music is multi-generational,” explains Ron. “I write songs that everyone can relate to – an eclectic mix of old school and the new.” He counts soul pioneers Donny Hathaway, Stevie Wonder and Marvin Gaye among his influences, but it was the poetry of Maya Angelou that inspired him to develop his talents as a songwriter. His music explores the themes of love, respect and social responsibility.

Ron’s talents extend beyond the studio. He is a skilled actor who has appeared in the musical “Aint Misbehavin’” and shared the stage with CeCe Winans, Regina Belle, Shirley Caesar, Vanessa Bell Armstrong, Stephanie Mills and Isaiah Washington. Most recently he opened for Gladys Knight on Valentine's Day 2007, and also the Temptations Review featuring Dennis Edwards and Mint Condition in Chicago, IL. Ron was also featured artist on Howard University's WHUR FM and spotlighted as "Artist of the Month" on the Netherlands' premiere R&B website www.SaveOurSoul.nl.

With his powerful vocals and signature sound, Ron Anthony has ushered in a new era of Grown and Sexy R&B.

ERIC BIBB

2009-01-09T07:20:00.001-08:00

If Our Hearts Ain't In It by ERIC BIBB

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Biography by Richard Skelly (AMG)

Like Josh White Jr., who is the son of folk singer Josh White, singer, songwriter and guitarist Eric Bibb was raised in the folk tradition, the son of the folk singer Leon Bibb. Bibb's uncle was the world famous jazz pianist and composer, John Lewis, part of the Modern Jazz Quartet. Bibb was raised in a music-filled household, as family friends in the 1950's and 60's included Pete Seeger, Odetta, Bob Dylan and the late Paul Robeson, who was named Eric's godfather. Bibb got his first steel guitar at age seven, and he got some advice from Dylan that he never forgot, to "keep it simple, forget all that fancy stuff." When he was 13, Bibb entered New York City's High School of Music and Art, where he studied double bass, vocals, classical guitar and piano. When he was 16, his father asked him to play guitar in the house band for his TV talent show, Someone New.

In 1970, Bibb left New York City for Paris, where he met with guitarist Mickey Baker. There, he began to focus in on blues guitar, and, after moving to Stockholm, he became enamored with pre-war blues. He continued to write his own songs and perform during this time and returned to New York in 1980 to pursue a career as a folk and blues singer. He moved back to Sweden five years later and continued performing but also taught music in school. His debut, Spirit and the Blues showcased the sounds of bouzouki, mandolin, accordion and a gospel group, inspired by other recordings that married blues men like Leadbelly with gospel groups like the Golden Gate Quartet. He performed at the London Blues Festival in 1996, where he shared a set with Corey Harris and Keb' Mo', and he quickly followed up with 1997's Good Stuff. His third album, Me To You, featured performances and collaborations with some of his musical heroes, including Pops and Mavis Staples and Taj Mahal. He followed up the success of the album with tours of the UK, USA, Canada, France, Germany and Sweden. He recorded and released "Home To Me" in 1999, Roadworks in 2000, Painting Signs and Just Like Love in 2001, and he put out a third release in 2001, A Family Affair, which featured duets and solo tunes by Bibb and his father. Bibb joined Robert Cray on two U.S. tours in 2001 and 2002 and opened for Ray Charles in the summer of 2002. Bibb has been nominated for a Grammy for "Shakin' a Tailfeather" and he has been nominated for many W.C. Handy Awards in a variety of categories.

Ever the prolific songwriter, forever brimming with new musical ideas and a freshness of appreciation with no dimming in his enthusiasm for performing, Bibb has kept up a hectic schedule of performing and recording since Home to Me and A Family Affair were released in 2001. He recorded Natural Light for Earthbeat in 2003, Roadworks and Sisters and Brothers in 2004, and Friends in 2004. His more recent recordings include 2005's A Ship Called Love, Diamond Days and Twelve Gates to the City in 2006, and a collaboration with his father, Praising Peace: A Tribute to Paul Robeson. Not all of Bibb's releases are available in the U.S., but most can be found via the Internet. He released a live album in 2007, An Evening with Eric Bibb for the Telarc Blues label. Bibb's latest album, 2008's Get On Board, [Telarc Blues] features performances by Bonnie Raitt and Ruthie Foster. Bibb describes the sounds and songs on the album best when he says, it's "a further exploration into the place where blues meets gospel and soul."

PERCY SLEDGE

2009-01-08T13:02:00.001-08:00

For The Good Times by PERCY SLEDGE

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Biography by Stephen Thomas Erlewine (amg)

Percy Sledge will forever be associated with "When a Man Loves a Woman," a pleading, soulful ballad he sang with wrenching, convincing anguish and passion. Sledge sang all of his songs that way, delivering them in a powerful rush where he quickly changed from soulful belting to quavering, tearful pleas. It was a voice that made him one of the key figures of deep Southern soul during the late '60s. Sledge recorded at Muscle Shoals studios in Alabama, where he frequently sang songs written by Spooner Oldham and Dan Penn. Not only did he sing deep soul, but Sledge was among the pioneers of country-soul, singing songs by Charlie Rich and Kris Kristofferson in a gritty, passionate style. During the '70s, his commercial success quickly faded away, but Sledge continued to tour and record into the '90s.

While he worked as a hospital nurse in the early '60s, Sledge began his professional music career as a member of the Southern soul vocal group the Esquires Combo. On the advice of local disc jockey Quin Ivy, he went solo in 1966. Ivy fancied himself a record producer and he agreed to help shape Sledge's song "When a Man Loves a Woman" into a full-fledged single, hiring Spooner Oldham to play a distinctive, legato organ phrase. Ivy released the single independently and quickly licensed it to Atlantic Records, who quickly bought out Sledge's contract. "When a Man Loves a Woman" became a huge hit in the summer of 1966, topping both the pop and R&B charts. It was quickly followed that year by two Top Ten R&B hits, "Warm and Tender Love" and "It Tears Me Up," which were both in the vein of his first hit. Although few of his subsequent singles were hits -- only "Take Time to Know Her" reached the R&B Top Ten in 1968 -- many of the songs, which were often written by Dan Penn and/or Oldham, were acknowledged as classics among soul aficionados.

Despite his strong reputation among deep soul fans, Sledge's sales had declined considerably by the early '70s, and he headed out on the club circuit in America and England. In 1974, he left Atlantic for Capricorn Records, where he surprisingly returned to the R&B Top 20 with "I'll Be Your Everything." Instead of re-igniting his career, the single was a last gasp, as far as chart success was concerned. Over the next two decades he continued to tour, and in the late '80s, "When a Man Loves a Woman" experienced a resurgence in popularity, due to its inclusion in movie soundtracks and in television commercials. Following its appearance in a 1987 Levi commercial in the U.K., the single was re-released and climbed to number two. Two years later, he won the Rhythm and Blues Foundation's Career Achievement Award. Sledge was able to turn this revived popularity into a successful career by touring constantly, playing over 100 shows a year into the '90s. In 1994, he released Blue Night, his first collection of new material in over a decade, to uniformly positive reviews.

MARTHA REEVES AND THE VANDELLAS

2009-01-03T17:10:00.001-08:00

Hello Stranger by MARTHA REEVES & THE VANDELLAS

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THE RIGHTEOUS BROTHERS

2009-01-01T17:11:00.000-08:00

Unchained Melody by THE RIGHTEOUS BROTHERS

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IT'S A NEW YEAR - SO TIME FOR A CHANGE --- TIME FOR SOME BLUE-EYED SOUL .....

Biography by Richie Unterberger (AMG)

They weren't brothers, but Bill Medley and Bobby Hatfield (both born in 1940) were most definitely righteous, defining (and perhaps even inspiring) the term "blue-eyed soul" in the mid-'60s. The white Southern California duo were an established journeyman doo wop/R&B act before an association with Phil Spector produced one of the most memorable hits of the 1960s, "You've Lost That Lovin' Feelin'." The collaboration soon fell apart, though, and while the singers had some other excellent hit singles in a similar style, they proved unable to sustain their momentum after just a year or two at the top.

When Medley and Hatfield combined forces in 1962, they emerged from regional groups the Paramours and the Variations; in fact, they kept the Paramours billing for their first single. By 1963, they were calling themselves the Righteous Brothers, Medley taking the low parts with his smoky baritone, Hatfield taking the higher tenor and falsetto lines. For the next couple of years they did quite a few energetic R&B tunes on the Moonglow label that bore similarity to the gospel/soul/rock style of Ray Charles, copping their greatest success with "Little Latin Lupe Lu," which became a garage-band favorite covered by Mitch Ryder, the Kingsmen, and others.

Even on the Moonglow recordings, Bill Medley acted as producer and principal songwriter, but the duo wouldn't break out nationally until they put themselves at the services of Phil Spector. Spector gave the Wall of Sound treatment to "You've Lost That Lovin' Feelin'," a grandiose ballad penned by himself, Barry Mann, and Cynthia Weil. At nearly four minutes, the song was pushing the limits of what could be played on radio in the mid-'60s, and some listeners thought they were hearing a 45 single played at 33 rpm due to Medley's low, blurry lead vocal. No matter; the song had a power that couldn't be denied, and went all the way to number one.

The Righteous Brothers had three more big hits in 1965 on Spector's Philles label ("Just Once in My Life," "Unchained Melody," and "Ebb Tide"), all employing similar dense orchestral arrangements and swelling vocal crescendos. Yet the Righteous Brothers-Spector partnership wasn't a smooth one, and by 1966 the duo had left Philles for a lucrative deal with Verve. Medley, already an experienced hand in the producer's booth, reclaimed the producer's chair, and the Righteous Brothers had another number one hit with their first Verve outing, "(You're My) Soul and Inspiration." Its success must have been a particularly bitter blow for Spector, given that Medley successfully emulated the Wall of Sound orchestral ambience of the Righteous Brothers' Philles singles down to the smallest detail, even employing the same Mann-Weil writing team that had contributed to "You've Lost That Lovin' Feelin'." It's a bit of a mystery as to why the Righteous Brothers never came close to duplicating that success during the rest of their tenure at Verve. But they would only have a couple of other Top 40 hits in the 1960s ("He" and "Go Ahead and Cry," both in 1966), even with the aid of occasional compositions by the formidable Goffin-King team. In 1968 Medley left for a solo career; Hatfield, the less talented of the pair (at least from a songwriting and production standpoint), kept the Righteous Brothers going with Jimmy Walker (who had been in the Knickerbockers).

Medley had a couple of small hits in the late '60s as a solo act, but unsurprisingly neither "brother" was worth half as much on their own as they were together. In 1974 they reunited and had a number three hit with "Rock and Roll Heaven," a tribute to dead rock stars that some found tacky. A couple of smaller hits followed before Medley retired from performing for five years in 1976. The Righteous Brothers continued to tour the oldies circuit off and on in the 1980s and 1990s. It was while on one of these tours that Bobby Hatfield died suddenly on November 5, 2003.

2009

2009-01-01T06:17:00.001-08:00

AULD LANG SYNE by THE STYLISTICS

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THE MANHATTANS

2008-12-30T06:31:00.001-08:00

Summertime In The City by THE MANHATTANS

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Biography by Steve Huey (amg)

The Manhattans were one of those classic R&B vocal groups who manage to achieve incredible career longevity by adapting their style to fit changing times. Formed in the '60s as a doo wop-influenced R&B quintet, the Manhattans reinvented themselves as sweet smooth soul balladeers during the '70s. In doing so, they somehow overcame the death of lead singer George Smith, and with new frontman Gerald Alston became more popular than they'd ever been, landing an across-the-board number one hit in 1976 with "Kiss and Say Goodbye." Under the leadership of Winfred "Blue" Lovett (who also composed some of the group's biggest hits), the Manhattans survived as a viable chart act well into the '80s, over two decades after their formation.

The Manhattans got together not in their namesake location, but in nearby Jersey City, NJ, in 1962. The group was centered around lead singer George "Smitty" Smith and bass (and sometime lead) vocalist Winfred "Blue" Lovett; the other original members were Kenny Kelley, Richard Taylor, and Edward "Sonny" Bivins, the latter of whom sometimes co-wrote material with accomplished songwriter Lovett. In 1964, the Manhattans signed with the Newark-based Carnival label and teamed up with producer Joe Evans; they scored their first hit in early 1965 with "I Wanna Be (Your Everything)," a number 12 R&B hit that established their way with a ballad right from the beginning. It was the first of eight singles for Carnival, a string that continued up through 1967. None were huge hits, but nearly all of them reached the Top 30 on the R&B charts, and are still prized by collectors of vocal-group soul for their aching harmonies, Smith's intense leads, and lack of concession to mainstream pop audiences.

In 1969, the Manhattans signed on with DeLuxe and issued several singles over the course of 1970. Unfortunately, Smith fell ill that year, and the group hired Phil Terrell as a temporary fill-in. Sadly, Smith passed away in 1971; he was replaced on lead vocals by Gerald Alston, who brought a smoother, more pop-friendly sound to the group. That quality soon became apparent when the Lovett-penned "One Life to Live" zoomed into the R&B Top Five in late 1972, giving the Manhattans their first major hit. The following year, they left DeLuxe for Columbia, where their debut single, "There's No Me Without You" (written by Sonny Bivins), equaled the R&B chart peak of "One Life to Live" by reaching number three. Initially working with producer Bobby Martin, the Manhattans' records now fell into line with the sweet, string-laden sound of contemporary '70s soul. The Manhattans hit the R&B Top Ten again in 1974 with "Don't Take Your Love" and 1975 with "Hurt," but their biggest success was still to come.

In early 1975, the Manhattans had recorded a Blue Lovett composition called "Kiss and Say Goodbye," which was released as a single almost a full year later. It became the second platinum single in history (after Johnnie Taylor's "Disco Lady") and their first number one hit in the spring of 1976, not just on the R&B charts, but the pop side as well -- a remarkable feat, considering that they'd never had a single peak higher than number 37 on that survey. While it proved difficult to match the crossover success of "Kiss and Say Goodbye," the Manhattans reeled off a string of Top Ten R&B hits -- "I Kinda Miss You," "It Feels So Good to Be Loved So Bad," "We Never Danced to a Love Song," and "Am I Losing You" -- that lasted into early 1978 and made them staples on the newly emerging quiet storm radio format. Their momentum slowed over the next couple of years, but they came back strong in 1980 with "Shining Star" -- not a cover of the Earth, Wind & Fire hit, but a co-write by their new producer Leo Graham. "Shining Star" reached the Top Five on both the pop and R&B charts, went gold, and won a Grammy -- overall, not a bad haul.

The Manhattans' last major hit came with 1983's "Crazy," which put them in the R&B Top Five for the final time; they bade farewell to the Top 40 in 1985 with a cover of Sam Cooke's "You Send Me." That year Richard Taylor left the group, which carried on as a quartet for a few years; Taylor passed away in December 1987. Gerald Alston signed with Motown as a solo artist in 1988, upon which point the group finally parted ways with Columbia and recorded an album for the small Valley Vue label before disbanding. Alston and Lovett reunited in 1993; with new members Troy May and David Tyson, they toured regularly into the new millennium, with the occasional recording appearing on a small label.

Review by Richie Unterberger (amg)

The Manhattans' second Columbia album was a somewhat poorly conceived affair, combining one LP side of new recordings and a second LP side of released and unissued tracks they'd cut for DeLuxe before signing with Columbia. As those Deluxe tracks were several years old (some perhaps having been recorded even four or five years earlier), the record spanned too wide of a time frame to qualify as a wholly new (or wholly realized) effort. Certainly it's not as consistent, either in style or quality, as their 1973 Columbia debut There's No Me Without You. It was decent (though not brilliant) period early- to mid-'70s soul, however, including the Top Ten R&B (and pop Top 40) hit "Don't Take Your Love," as well as the much smaller chart single "Summertime in the City." The latter song was certainly reminiscent of the early-'70s Temptations' funk, while the former was very much a lush Philly soul-style ballad. The Philly soul path, in both its ballad and funk modes, was also followed by some of the "new" tracks, such as "Save Our Goodbyes" and the title song. While the older selections on side two have a less Philly-fied vibe, really they don't sound that out of place; "Blackbird" is much in line with the O'Jays' early-'70s recordings and both "Strange Old World" and "Nursery Rhymes" again recall the funked-out Temptations, though the covers of "Fever" and "A Change Is Gonna Come" were a little more old-school. The album was combined with its predecessor, There's No Me Without You, on a single-disc Kent CD reissue in 2004.

My comment: I love The Manhattans - no matter what the reviews are!

THE NEW BIRTH

2008-12-29T02:51:00.000-08:00

Your Love Is by The New Birth

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Biography by Craig Lytle (amg)

Formed by Tony Churchill and music-industry veteran Harvey Fuqua, New Birth was originally named the Nite-Liters. As the Nite-Liters, they enjoyed chart action with three R&B hits: "K-Jee," "Afro-Strut," and "Pull Together." Of the three, "K-Jee" was the most successful, peaking at number 17 during a 13-week run.

The roots of the band lie with Leslie and Melvin Wilson, who were gospel singers living in Muskegon, MI. After moving on to Detroit in the late '60s, their interest remained centered in gospel. Melvin Wilson eventually met the Nite-Liters, who at the time were backing Motown artists, and expressed the possibility that he and his brother Leslie could perform with them. As fate would have it, the two brothers became acquainted with former Marvelette Anne Bogan, who introduced them to Fuqua. He had three groups under his tutelage: Love Peace & Happiness (of which Leslie and Melvin became members), the Nite-Liters, and New Birth. All but two members of New Birth had left the group around this time, leaving just Londee Loren and Bobby Downs. The three groups toured, backed each other up, and ultimately merged into one, with New Birth the name of the new group.

Leslie, with his feisty vocals, and Melvin, with his more serene appeal, emerged as the primary lead singers. New Birth's first release was the R&B Top Ten single "I Can Understand It." Led by Leslie Wilson's intense vocals and reminiscent of Bobby Womack, the single zoomed up the charts, peaking at number four after only 12 weeks. In January of 1974 they released "It's Been a Long Time," one of their celebrated hits and another Top Ten entry. That single was followed by the classic, soulful ballad "Wildflower." During this time, the group was living in California, which presented problems; from egotism associated with the lights of Tinseltown to group-management problems, the band's best interests began to suffer. Consequently, New Birth terminated its affiliation with their founder and producer Fuqua, manager Jerry Weintraub, and RCA Records. In mid-1975 they signed with Buddah Records and immediately recorded their first and only number R&B one, "Dream Merchant." They recorded just one album for Buddah, however, before signing with Warner Bros. and later Ariola. In 1977, Leslie and Melvin Wilson left the group, and by 1979 the rest of the group had disbanded. However, in 1994, Leslie and Melvin re-formed the group and began performing at venues around the nation.

Review by Amy Hanson (amg)

Their second album for Warner Bros. and the last before the band called it quits two years later, New Birth's late-1977 Behold the Mighty Army LP may have sounded their death knell, but it still managed to shimmy up the R&B charts, scoring the band their sixth Top 30 hit in four years. Packed with brass and bass and funk guitar riffs, New Birth attempted to revitalize themselves one last time -- and, true to form, they succeeded, with a fierce set that brought two more singles to the charts. Both the opening "The Mighty Army," which wraps the groove around a near-seven-minute jam, and the resonating "Deeper" can be counted among some of the band's finest moments. Elsewhere, "Ain't It Something" combines a slick, brassed-up vibe with rough vocals to stunning effect, while New Birth takes the energy down a notch across a handful of slower songs, including the dirty funk of "Squeezing Too Much Living" and "Your Love Is," a wonderful ballad that has so many golden moments that it's a surprise that it was lost in the band's hit machine. Although there's no doubt that the band had a heyday across their Nite-Liters incarnation, it's important to note that as New Birth, they still had some feisty tricks up their sleeve. Ultimately, Behold the Mighty Army is proof of that pudding, for even teetering on the brink of destruction, the band pulled together a remarkable set.

THE MARVELETTES

2008-12-28T11:15:00.000-08:00

Someway, Somehow by The Marvelettes

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Biography by Richie Unterberger (AMG)

Probably the most pop-oriented of Motown's major female acts, the Marvelettes didn't project as strong an identity as the Supremes, Mary Wells, or Martha Reeves, but recorded quite a few hits, including Motown's first number one single, "Please Mr. Postman" (1961). "Postman," as well as other chirpy early-'60s hits like "Playboy," "Twistin' Postman," and "Beechwood 4-5789," were the label's purest girl group efforts. Featuring two strong lead singers, Gladys Horton and Wanda Young, the Marvelettes went through five different lineups, but maintained a high standard on their recordings. After a few years, they moved from girl group sounds to up-tempo and mid-tempo numbers that were more characteristic of Motown's production line. They received no small help from Smokey Robinson, who produced and wrote many of their singles; Holland-Dozier-Holland, Berry Gordy, Mickey Stevenson, Marvin Gaye, and Ashford-Simpson also got involved with the songwriting and production at various points. After the mid-'60s Wanda Young assumed most of the lead vocal duties; Gladys Horton departed from the group in the late '60s. While the Marvelettes didn't cut as many monster smashes as most of their Motown peers after the early '60s, they did periodically surface with classic hits like "Too Many Fish in the Sea," "Don't Mess With Bill," and "The Hunter Gets Captured by the Game." There were also plenty of fine minor hits and misses, like 1965's "I'll Keep Holding On," which is just as memorable as the well-known Motown chart-toppers of the era. The group quietly disbanded in the early '70s after several years without a major hit.

Review by John Lowe (amg)
By this time Gladys Horton left the group and was replaced by the talented but eccentric singer/songwriter Anne Bogan. Young took control of the group and moved them more into a softer pop sound, closer to the frothy Supremes than Martha and the Vandellas. Although the material was a bit weaker, there are plenty of good songs, most notably Smokey Robinson's amusing "My Baby Must Be a Magician" and the haunting "Destination: Anywhere," in which Young performs a tremendous vocal.

MERRY CHRISTMAS

2008-12-24T19:29:00.000-08:00

I WISH YOU ALL - SEASON'S BLESSINGS - AND A JOYOUS HOLIDAY SEASON!!

GLADYS KNIGHT

2008-12-21T16:39:00.000-08:00

BODY & SOUL - SENSUAL CHRISTMAS

2008-12-21T14:26:00.000-08:00

Willie B

2008-12-18T07:12:00.001-08:00

by Willie B

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Can't find any information on him - BUT he is definitely chitlin circuit soul - for those of you who enjoy my southern soul posts!!

ULTIMATE CHRISTMAS SOUL

2008-12-11T08:43:00.001-08:00

Dear Santa Claus by bOBBY womack

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THE SUPREMES (1965) - Remastered

2008-12-11T06:08:00.000-08:00

Silver Bells by The Supremes

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Odetta, Voice of Civil Rights Movement, Dies at 77

2008-12-06T12:42:00.000-08:00

Odetta, a titan of American folk music, demonstrated time and again that her talent transcended any one style. She died Dec. 2, 2008, at 77.

Odetta was a folk icon, but her music included blues, jazz, spirituals, Appalachian songs and English folk songs. Her 27th solo album, ''Blues Everywhere I Go'' (2000), paid homage to the great blueswomen of the ‘20s and ‘30s: Bessie Smith, Ma Rainey, Victoria Spivey, Sippie Wallace and Memphis Minnie.

''One of the many reasons I wanted to do the blues album is that I get pretty fed up with stereotyping of our black community as being represented by prurient sex or 'I'm gonna shoot you or I'm gonna cut you','' she said in a phone conversation from her home in New York in July 2000. ''There was blues in the '20s and '30s that dealt with society's foot stepping on our throats.''

Social protest was evident in Odetta's vast repertory. The seeds of social conscience were planted during her childhood in Los Angeles. ''They didn't have signs for black and whites, but you knew where you could and couldn't go,'' she said. ''There were no signs, but there was attitude.''

Odetta Holmes was born in 1930 in Birmingham, Ala., but grew up in Los Angeles. “A teacher told my mother that I had a voice, that maybe I should study,” she said. She later found her own voice by listening to blues, jazz, and folk music from the African-American and Anglo-American traditions. She earned a music degree from Los Angeles City College. Her training in classical music and musical theater work was “a nice exercise, but it had nothing to do with my life,” she said. “The folk songs were -- the anger.”

She left home at 18 to perform in the chorus of a national tour of ''Finian's Rainbow,'' a musical, appropriately enough, about prejudice. She settled in San Francisco where she learned to play the guitar and began performing in the folk clubs.

Her first solo album, "Odetta Sings Ballads and Blues," resonated with an audience hearing old songs made new in a voice that plunged deep and soared high. “The first thing that turned me on to folk singing was Odetta,” Bob Dylan said, referring to that record, in a 1978 interview with Playboy. He said he heard “something vital and personal. I learned all the songs on that record." The 1956 album included “Mule Skinner,” “Jack of Diamonds,” “Water Boy,” and “ ‘Buked and Scorned.” ’’

Odetta’s reputation was that of a singer of uncompromising integrity as a result of performances at the Newport Festival, at Carnegie Hall and for President John F. Kennedy on the nationally televised program, ''Dinner With the President.'' She marched with the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. in Selma and she sang at the 1963 March on Washington. Odetta was an influence on Joan Baez and Janis Joplin and younger singer-songwriters like Tracy Chapman.

Her acting credits included Tony Richardson's ''Sanctuary'' (1960) with Yves Montand and Lee Remick. And on television she appeared with Cicely Tyson in ''The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman.'' She also appeared with the Stratford Shakespeare Company in Ontario and at the Neptune Theater in Halifax.

Glory Glory by Odetta

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BILL CODAY

2008-12-05T11:53:00.000-08:00

TIME to give you all a break from Christmas music - LOL

Bring Your Lunch by Bill Coday

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Leave the Light On by Bill Coday

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Daddy B. Nice's #51 ranked Southern Soul Artist
Author's Forward: June 29, 2008.

He was Southern Soul's "Everyman." He wasn't a musical genius, nor an innovator. He was very much in the shadow of the "greats"--O. V. Wright, Johnnie Taylor, Tyrone Davis and others whose material he so frequently championed. And yet, at his passing on June 7, 2008, the loss hurts with unexpected force.

Bill Coday knew Southern Soul so well, he lived and breathed the genre. And with his passing went a store of knowledge about Southern Soul in ever-shorter supply in this day of young artists eager to break into Southern Soul but woefully unaware of its essential sound.

Bill Coday knew that "sound." Every record he made was unmistakably Southern Soul rhythm and blues. And now that he is gone, one wishes to be sitting at a little table a couple steps from a little dance area in a hole-in-the-wall with Bill Coday in front of the microphone.

Like a little child wanting nothing more than to to be picked up and hugged by a big, warm, understanding adult, one mourns his death as one mourns the loss of a family-member.

His music was never brilliant enough to garner the accolades given the aforementioned mentors, whom he's now joined. And yet, with his death Bill Coday's music has been transformed into an incredible comfort zone, a musical legacy to bask in, a warm, nurturing reserve of material the value of which suddenly surpasses any value accorded it during his lifetime.

If the music as a whole is temporarily weaker for his passing, Bill Coday now looms as a larger and livelier character on the unfolding, historical tapesty of Southern Soul R&B. Coday joins Taylor, Davis, Ronnie Lovejoy, Little Milton, Quinn Golden, Ollie Nightingale and others, and stands among them as would a band of brothers.

--Daddy B. Nice

— Ed Hogan , All Music Guide
Soul singer Bill Coday first came to fame with the hit single "Get Your Lies Straight" during the early spring of 1971. Signed to Crajon Productions, owned by the husband and wife team of Bill and Denise Jones (who recorded under the name Denise LaSalle and scored a 1971 gold single, "Trapped by a Thing Called Love"), Coday was the perfect vehicle for LaSalle's blues-oriented R&B songs. Born May 10, 1942, in Coldwater, MS, Coday began his singing career as a teenager, performing in juke joints around Blytheville, AK, with a band that included Son Seals. In 1961, he relocated to Chicago, IL, donning the name Chicago Willie. LaSalle spotted the singer while he was performing at the Black Orchid club. She teamed him with Memphis, TN, soul music producer Willie Mitchell whom she often worked with on her releases for Detroit, MI's Westbound label and for those of other Crajon artists (the Sequins' hits "Hey Romeo" and "The Third Degree"). Mitchell went on to have hits with another Chicago singer, Syl Johnson, and gold and platinum-laced success with Al Green on Hi Records. Coday's first Crajon singles, "Sixty Minute Teaser" and "I Get High on Your Love," were regional hits. The third single, "Get Your Lies Straight," proved to be the breakthrough, going to number 14 R&B on Billboard's charts in early 1971. On the flipside was "You're Gonna Want Me." As was the custom on a fast-selling national record, the independently-distributed Crajon leased Coday's single to the much larger Galaxy label, a subsidiary of Berkeley, CA's Fantasy Records, for wider distribution. The follow-up, issued on Galaxy, the Denise LaSalle song "When You Find a Fool, Bump His Head," made it to number 48 R&B in summer 1971. There were other Galaxy singles, but none charted nationally. Coday enjoyed a regional hit on Crajon with "I'm Back to Collect" in the first half of 1973. Some of his Galaxy/Crajon releases can be found on the compilations All Night Long They Played the Blues (1992), Bad Bad Whiskey (1993) -- both from U.K. label Ace Records -- and an '80s collection of Coday's Crajon singles on Japanese label Vivid Sounds. In 1973, he signed with Epic Records and the single "I Don't Want to Play This Game" was issued. It was later included on the 1975 Epic compilation Lost Soul, reissued as a 1994 CD by Sony Legacy. In 1984, Coday began to tour with Denise LaSalle as her opening act. He began recording again after several years away from the studio. Signing with Memphis-based label Ecko Records, his first release was the appropriately titled Sneakin' Back album. The tracks "Her Love Is Good Enough to Put in Collard Greens," "I Can Move the Hoochie Coochie Man," "Doctor Thrill Good," and a remake of "Get Your Lies Straight" became favorites with blues lovers and blues-formatted radio stations. His second Ecko CD, Can't Get Enough, included "In the Room Next to the Room" and "Not a Word" with labelmate Barbara Carr. Coday's third Ecko CD, 1999's Put Me in the Mood, gave his fans more of his tasty blend of spicy, bluesy Southern soul.

ARETHA FRANKLIN (2008)

2008-12-04T09:48:00.001-08:00

T'was The Night Before Chr by Aretha Franklin

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AL GREEN

2008-12-04T09:28:00.000-08:00

O Holy Night by Al Green

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AL GREEN

2008-12-04T09:13:00.001-08:00

I'll Be Home For Christmas by Al Green

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20 MOTOWN CHRISTMAS CLASSICS

2008-12-02T09:24:00.000-08:00

HAPPY CHRISTMAS FROM MOTOWN

2008-12-02T08:43:00.001-08:00

BRIAN MC KNIGHT

2008-11-29T11:06:00.000-08:00

I'll Be Home For Christmas by Brian McKnight

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Biography by Craig Lytle (AMG)

Brian McKnight grew up in a family where music came naturally. He was a member of the church choir along with his immediate family; his grandfather was the director. With a gospel upbringing, McKnight explored other genres of music. Still in his early teens, he exercised his writing ambitions by penning instrumentals (soft jazz, easy listening). He formed a band and began performing his originals at local venues. By the age of 18, McKnight had secured a publishing deal. His calling to the national scene manifested itself when his older brother Claude and the group he was a member of, Take 6, signed a recording contract with a major label.

After sending out numerous demos to various record companies, McKnight's tape drew the interest of Mercury Records president Ed Eckstine (son of Billy Eckstine). Eckstine was so impressed with McKnight's sound that the young artist was signed to a deal within two weeks. McKnight's first release on Mercury was "The Way Love Goes," peaking at number 11 after 19 weeks on the Billboard R&B charts. His two follow-up singles barely cracked the Billboard R&B Top 60, including "Love Is," a duet with Vanessa Williams featured on Beverly Hills 90210. Ironically, that single peaked at number three on the Billboard pop charts, introducing McKnight to a crossover audience.

In addition to being a singer, McKnight is a songwriter, multi-talented musician, arranger, and producer. The success he has achieved as producer and songwriter on his own projects has facilitated his popularity as a producer and songwriter for other artists. However, the Buffalo native retained the services of hip-hop producer Sean "Puffy" Combs on the release of his 1997 CD Anytime, which features the club-flavored single "You Should Be Mine." A Christmas album, Bethlehem, followed in 1998, and a year later McKnight returned with Back at One. Superhero from 2001 kicked off with the surprisingly rock title track while 2003's U Turn was a fairly straightforward and ballad-filled affair. A divorce and some time playing guard for the California ABA basketball team the Ontario Warriors kept McKnight out of the musical picture for a couple years before 2005's lush Gemini marked his return. Ten followed in 2006.

This is Brian's new Christmas Cd in stores now .... Enjoy!!

AARON NEVILLE

2008-11-29T10:34:00.000-08:00

by Aaron Neville

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It's getting to that time of year - when we all start digging in the crates looking for the soulful Christmas tunes!! So lemme start you off .....

AARON NEVILLE

2008-11-28T08:28:00.000-08:00

For The Good Times by Aaron Neville

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Aaron's newest - but loaded with moldie oldies!! Enjoy!

THE MARCELS

2008-11-11T19:15:00.000-08:00

18 - Over The Rainbow
Biography by Ron Wynn (Amg)

This Pittsburgh ensemble deserved a much better fate than being known primarily for a novelty-tinged cover of "Blue Moon." Baritone vocalist Richard F. Knauss teamed with Fred Johnson, Gene J. Bricker, Ron Mundy, and lead vocalist Cornelius Harp, an integrated ensemble. They named themselves after Harp's hairstyle, the marcel. The group did a string of covers as demo tapes that were sent to Colpix. The label's A&R director had them cut several oldies at RCA's New York studios in 1961, one of them being "Blue Moon." They used the bass intro arrangement from the Cadillacs' "Zoom" and the results were a huge hit. It eventually topped both the pop and R&B charts, and also was an international smash. The group eventually appeared in the film Twist Around the Clock with Dion and Chubby Checker. They eventually recorded an 18-cut LP for Colpix. Alan Johnson and Walt Maddox later replaced Knauss and Gene Bricker, making them an all-black unit. The group did score another Top Ten pop single with "Heartaches," another cover of a pre-rock single. This peaked at number seven pop and number 19 R&B in 1961. They continued recording on Kyra, Queen Bee, St. Clair, Rocky, and Monogram with varying lineups, but never again equaled their past success.

Review by Bruce Eder

Lest anyone think the Marcels were a one-song phenomenon (i.e. "Blue Moon"), this CD will be a valuable learning experience, as well as delightful listening. Drawing primarily from their singles (with three LP cuts and an unissued outtake filling out the song lineup), this is a fairly dazzling array of vocal acrobatics, much of it hung around old pop standards, among them "Summertime," "That Old Black Magic," "My Melancholy Baby," and "Over the Rainbow," as well as songs of more recent vintage. Among the discoveries to be made here is a gloriously radiant recording of an otherwise "lost" Barry Mann/Cynthia Weill number called "Find Another Fool." Cornelius Harp's lead on "Summertime" is a glorious thing to hear, while the brilliantly arranged "Heartaches" -- dominated by Walt Maddox's baritone -- which managed to hit number nine nationally, manages to encompass something essentially poignant about R&B and rock & roll, and elicit a laugh or two (or three) in the process. Original producer Stu Phillips, whose subsequent career involved him in everything from the Monkees to the soundtrack of Battlestar Galactica, did a brilliant job on these tracks, which hold up very well today, the voices always out front and in your face, and just enough rhythm section and whatever lead instrument (usually a sax) to sweeten the mix and add a little punch behind the group. If this disc has any flaw, it's that the makers didn't follow the chronological order of the recording dates, which means that the sounds of the two distinctly different lineups of the group are intermingled -- but the notes also include a chart delineating precisely which lineup sang on which songs, and that's excellent compensation. The sound holds up extremely well for a CD mastered in 1990, and the only reason for not picking this up would be to grab Sequel records' Complete Colpix Sessions instead, which features 38 songs from the same source as these 18.

MIRIAM MAKEBA - R.I.P. - MAMA AFRICA

2008-11-11T08:47:00.000-08:00

South African singing legend Miriam Makeba has died aged 76 after a concert in Italy.
17 - Pata Pata
Makeba, who was affectionately known as 'Mama Africa', suffered a heart attack shortly after a concert against organized crime in the southern Italian town of Baia Verde late on Sunday. She was the first black South African musician to game international fame, winning renown in the 1950s for her sweeping vocals. Born in a shantytown outside Johannesburg, Makeba spent 31 years in exile after speaking out against apartheid. Former South African President Nelson Mandela called her 'South Africa's first lady of song', saying her music inspired hope.

Miriam Makeba
Legendary South African singer and outspoken opponent of apartheid, she was exiled for 30 years

Miriam Makeba, who has died aged 76, was known as Mama Africa and the Empress of African song. She was one of the most visible and outspoken opponents of South Africa's apartheid regime from the 1960s till its dismantling in the early 1990s. She was also the anti-apartheid movement's most audible spokesperson, having entered the top flight of international performers and able to sell out prestigious concert halls with a repertoire that changed little over three decades of musical evolution.

Makeba's career propelled her from township singing group to global celebrity, feted in some countries and banned from others. She was a natural and consummate performer with a dynamic vocal range and an emotional awareness that could induce the delusion of intimate contact in even the most impersonal auditorium. But her personal life was an epic tragedy of injustice, domestic upheaval, exile and torment.

Miriam "Zenzi" Makeba was born in a township suburb of Johannesburg. Her father, Caswell, was Xhosa: her mother, Christina, was Swazi. The name Zenzi (from the Xhosa Uzenzile, meaning "you have no one to blame but yourself"), was a traditional name intended to provide support through life's difficulties.

Later the family moved north to Transvaal, where Caswell worked as a clerk for Shell. Her mother was a spiritual healer who also took jobs as a housemaid. After the early death of her father, Miriam was forced to work, and for a short spell she also did housework. But she had already noticed that "music was a type of magic" which could elevate her from the poverty that surrounded her. As a young girl, her singing had been praised at the Methodist Training school in Pretoria, but what should have been the highlight of her amateur career turned to disappointment. She had been due to sing What a Sad Life for a Black Man for the visit of King George VI, but after the children had stood waiting in the rain, the royal visitor drove by without stopping to hear them.

When apartheid was introduced to South Africa in 1948, Makeba was old enough to grasp the consequences, and to see the limitations placed on the career of her mentor Dolly Rathebe, her senior by four years. Makeba gave birth to her daughter Bongi at the age of 17 and was then diagnosed with breast cancer, which was treated unconventionally, but successfully, by her mother. The first of her five husbands left her shortly after.

Her musical career progressed more smoothly. Since the turn of the century, American jazz and ragtime had been absorbed into South Africa and transposed into local forms. Combined with Anglican church hymnody, this had led to the distinctive vocal harmonic style known as mbube, practised in many communities by "evening" or "night" choirs of enthusiastic amateurs. Following a period with the Cuban Brothers, Makeba's big break came in 1954 when she joined the Manhattan Brothers, a top band whose vocal harmonies were modelled on the American Mills Brothers and the Ink Spots.

Initially, when the Manhattans travelled abroad Makeba joined a female group called the Sunbeams, who became better known as the Skylarks. They recorded more than 100 songs, many of which became big hits, with Miriam singing alongside Abigail Kubeka, Mummy Girl Nketle, Mary Rabatobi and sometimes with Dorothy Masuka, who brought songs from her homeland of Northern Rhodesia (now Zambia).

Eventually, Makeba went on tour with the Manhattans, getting her first taste of the outside by world visiting Rhodesia (Zimbabwe) and Congo. Playing at home she also experienced some of the most heartless and shameful aspects of the apartheid system, which she later recalled in her autobiography, Makeba: My Story (1988), written with James Hall.

In 1957 she was recruited as a soloist in the African Jazz and Variety Review that toured Africa for 18 months. Then she landed the female lead role in King Kong, a legendary South African musical about the life of a boxer, which played to integrated audiences and spread her reputation to the liberal white community.

The key to her international success was a small singing part in the film Come Back Africa, a dramatised documentary on black life directed covertly by Lionel Rogosin. Makeba played herself, singing two songs in a shebeen. When the film was finished Rogosin invited her to attend a screening at the 1959 Venice film festival, where she became an instant celebrity. She was flown, via London, to New York, where she appeared on television and played at the Village Vanguard jazz club.

The calypsonian Harry Belafonte took her under his wing and guided her through her first solo recordings. African standards such as Pata Pata and the Click Song, which she first performed with the Skylarks, formed the basis of her repertoire and remained the most popular songs throughout her career. Shortly after the Sharpeville massacre in 1960, Miriam heard that her mother had died, but her own South African passport had been revoked and she was prevented from returning home for the funeral. Thus began 30 years of exile.

Her life in the US continued to unfold like a showbiz dream. She was recording and touring, and meeting all the stars, from Bing Crosby to Marlon Brando: the young newcomer was also staggered to find herself appearing along with Marilyn Monroe at the famous birthday celebration for John F Kennedy.

Her first return to the continent of Africa came with a visit to Kenya in 1962. The following year she gave the first of several addresses to the UN special committee on apartheid, and South Africa reciprocated by banning her records. Shortly afterwards, she was the only performer to be invited by the Ethiopian emperor Haile Selassie to perform in Addis Ababa at the inauguration of the Organisation of African Unity.

A second marriage, in 1959, proved short-lived. In 1964, Hugh Masekela, the South African trumpeter, became her third husband, and she went to perform in Algeria and at the OAU conference in Accra, Ghana. Backstage at a show in San Francisco, a Kenyan student taught her a song which would become part of her standard repertoire. Called Malaika, it is a Swahili love song which she was wrongly informed was a traditional composition. In 1966 she earned a Grammy award with Belafonte.

Increasingly involved in, and identified with, black consciousness, Miriam became associated with radical activity not just against apartheid but also in the civil rights movement and then black power. In 1967, while in Guinea, she met the Black Panther leader Stokely Carmichael, who became her next husband the following year.

Carmichael changed his name to Kwame Touré and she returned with him to his own place of exile in Guinea, the west African Marxist state whose leader, Sekou Touré, gave sanctuary to enemies of the capitalist west. After that fourth marriage ended in divorce in 1978, she turned down a proposal by the president, but two years later married an airline executive and moved to Brussels. During her time in Guinea, Makeba had become a double exile, unable to return home and unwelcome in many western countries (she was banned from France), although she collected a sheaf of diplomatic passports from sympathetic African states and enlivened several independence celebrations. She recruited a pan-African squad of top musicians who were on call to accompany her on frequent foreign trips.

She also endured some bizarre showbusiness episodes. In Denmark, a country where she had solid support, she once failed to appear for a show. She returned some years later only to be jailed for a night until the outstanding financial penalty had been paid on her behalf. There was also controversy in Tanzania over the provenance of Malaika, which several east Africans had claimed to have written.

When Makeba played at the Royal Festival Hall, London, in 1985, it was her first appearance in Britain for 11 years, and also her 53rd birthday. There she replied to the criticism that she had turned her back on the west and had gratuitously insulted white people, notably some unfortunate teachers in Jamaica who had suffered an unjustified, personal attack while watching her perform: "People have accused me of being a racist, but I am just a person for justice and humanity. People say I sing politics, but what I sing is not politics, it is the truth. I'm going to go on singing, telling the truth." When her beloved daughter Bongi died after a traumatic miscarriage that year, Miriam succumbed to a kind of "spiritual madness" that she believed she had inherited from her mother. The following year she was awarded the Dag Hammarskjöld peace prize for her campaigning efforts.

She always took time to endorse the cultural boycott of South Africa of which she was a figurehead. As the apartheid barriers showed signs of crumbling she was embroiled in another strange episode, which saw ANC supporters boycotting her show at the Royal Albert Hall. She herself was accused of breaking the boycott by collaborating with Paul Simon on his controversial Graceland project, with an album in 1986 and concerts, including one in Zimbabwe the following year. Simon was the one being picketed for not conferring with the exile groups before his recruitment drive for South African session players. Makeba and Masekela gave him full support, however, and welcomed the controversy because it brought important issues into general discussion and made cultural activity even more potent.

To much of the world, Makeba had reached a level of statesmanship that verged on saintliness. She was the first choice performer at festivals as euphoria built up before and after the release of Nelson Mandela in February 1990 and the realisation that apartheid was almost over. After 30 years away, Miriam returned to South Africa to a respectful reception and performed sporadically. But the music business had moved on and, despite working with the hotshot producer and multi-instrumentalist Sipho Mabuse, the opportunities for giving concerts had diminished.

Many younger South Africans had no idea who Makeba was or what she had struggled for on their behalf. Nonetheless, when she announced her retirement in 2005, she found that she was still popular abroad: "Everyone keeps calling me and saying 'you have not come to say goodbye to us!'"

So the farewell tours continued till her death in Naples, where she collapsed on stage after singing in a concert in memory of six immigrants from Ghana shot dead last September, an attack blamed on the city's organised crime. When she was in Britain last May with her much younger eight-piece band, led by her grandson Nelson Lumumba Lee, John L Walters found her in "confident, clear-voiced form", defying the limitations placed on her mobility by osteoarthritis. She is survived by Nelson and her granddaughter Zenzi Monique Lee.

• Miriam Zenzi Makeba, singer and activist, born March 4 1932; died November 10 2008

THE ROYALETTES

2008-11-10T17:18:00.001-08:00

Boomp3.com
Biography by Richie Unterberger (amg)

This Baltimore quartet was something of a link between the girl group and "sweet soul" styles. Their harmonies were clearly grounded in the early-'60s girl group approach. But they also benefited from pop-oriented, occasionally grandiose production at the MGM label, where they recorded their most successful work. If they sometimes sounded like a female version of Little Anthony & the Imperials' later recordings, it's no coincidence. Little Anthony's producer, Teddy Randazzo, also handled the Royalettes, and wrote much of their MGM material.

The Royalettes made some obscure singles for Chancellor and Warner Bros. before being signed to MGM in 1964. Their third single, the lush "It's Gonna Take a Miracle," was by far their most successful outing, stopping just shy of the Top 40. It was destined to be more identified, however, with singer/songwriter Laura Nyro, who made it the title track of her 1971 album of soul covers. In 1982, Deniece Williams took the song into the Top Ten with her own rendition.

The Royalettes did have another small hit in 1965 with "I Want to Meet Him," but never dented the charts again, although MGM spared no expense on their elaborate productions for the group's singles. A final MGM single, produced by Bill Medley of the Righteous Brothers, also failed to get anywhere, and the group broke up by the end of the 1960s, after a final 45 for Roulette.

LEVI STUBBS - (R.I.P) - THE FOUR TOPS

2008-10-17T23:38:00.000-07:00

Levi Stubbles (June 6, 1936 – October 17, 2008), better known by the stage name Levi Stubbs was an American baritone singer, best known as the lead vocalist of the famed Motown R&B group The Four Tops.
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Biography

Stubbs began his professional singing career with friends Abdul "Duke" Fakir, Renaldo "Obie" Benson and Lawrence Payton to form the Four Aims in 1954. Two years later, the group changed their name to the Four Tops. The group began as a supper-club act before finally signing to Motown Records in 1963; by the end of the decade, the Four Tops had over a dozen hits to their name. The most popular of the Four Tops hits, all of which featured Stubbs on lead vocals, include "Baby I Need Your Loving", "I Can't Help Myself (Sugar Pie, Honey Bunch)", "It's the Same Old Song", "Reach Out I'll Be There", "Standing in the Shadows of Love", "Bernadette", "Still Water (Love)", and "Ain't No Woman (Like the One I've Got)".

Although Stubbs was a natural baritone, most of the Four Tops' hits were written in a tenor range to give the lead vocals a sense of urgency. Stubbs and the other Tops remained a team until Payton died in 1997, at which point Theo Peoples took his place. The Four Tops were elected to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1990. Benson also died on July 1, 2005. Levi Stubbs passed away after a long illness on October 17, 2008.

As an actor, credited as Levi Stubbs, Jr., he provided the voice of the carnivorous plant "Audrey II" in the movie version of the musical Little Shop of Horrors (1986) and the voice of Mother Brain in the animated TV series Captain N: The Game Master (1989). Stubbs has also guest starred in a number of TV shows as himself.

Stubbs and his wife Clineice were married from 1960 until his death, and had five children. In 1995, Stubbs was diagnosed with cancer, and later, a stroke, and stopped touring. Since 2000, Theo Peoples has taken Stubbs' place as the lead singer of the Four Tops, with Ronnie McNeir taking the place that Payton originally held. Stubbs died October 17, 2008 at his home in Detroit after a long serious illness including cancer and a stroke. He was 72.[1]

Stubbs was a cousin of soul singer Jackie Wilson.

STACEY LATTISAW & JOHNNY GILL

2008-10-15T22:49:00.001-07:00

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Biography by Stephen Thomas Erlewine

When she was a teenager in the early '80s, urban soul singer Stacy Lattisaw had a string of Top 40 R&B hits, with three songs -- "Let Me Be Your Angel," "Love on a Two Way Street," "Miracles" -- crossing over to the pop mainstream. Lattisaw recorded her first album for Cotillion Records at the age of 12 in 1979, under the direction of producer Van McCoy. However it wasn't until she hooked up with Narada Michael Walden, a former drummer with the Mahavishnu Orchestra who was just beginning a career as a producer, that she became a star. Under Walden's direction, she had five hit albums between 1981 and 1986. She continued recording into the late '80s, signing to Motown in 1986, but her audience slowly disappeared. By the early '90s, she decided to retire from a music career and concentrate on raising her family.

Biography by William Ruhlmann

Born in Washington, D.C., Johnny Gill was discovered by singer Stacy Lattisaw after singing in his family's group Wings of Faith from age five. His solo career began in 1983 with the Top 30 R&B single "Super Love." In duo with Lattisaw, he scored an R&B Top Ten hit in 1984 with "Perfect Combination." In 1988, Gill joined New Edition, replacing Bobby Brown. In 1989 he sang on two R&B hits: "Where Do We Go from Here," a #1 by Stacy Lattisaw, and "One Love," by George Howard. Gill finally scored as a solo singer in 1990 with the release of his album Johnny Gill, which sold a million copies, topped the R&B chart, and made the Top Ten in the pop chart. Following the relative failure of 1993's Provocative -- which didn't produce any Top 10 R&B singles and only went gold -- Gill reunited with New Edition in 1996. A month after New Edition released Home Again in September of 1996, Gill released Let's Get the Mood Right.

LES MCCAAN

2008-10-14T14:57:00.001-07:00

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Biography by Scott Yanow (AMG)

Les McCann reached the peak of his career at the 1968 Montreux Jazz Festival, recording "Compared to What" and "Cold Duck Time" for Atlantic (Swiss Movement) with Eddie Harris and Benny Bailey. Although he has done some worthwhile work since then, much of it has been anti-climactic.

McCann first gained some fame in 1956 when he won a talent contest in the Navy as a singer that resulted in an appearance on television on The Ed Sullivan Show. After being discharged, he formed a trio in Los Angeles. McCann turned down an invitation to join the Cannonball Adderley Quintet so he could work on his own music. He signed a contract with Pacific Jazz and in 1960 gained some fame with his albums Les McCann Plays the Truth and The Shout. His soulful, funk style on piano was influential and McCann's singing was largely secondary until the mid-'60s. He recorded many albums for Pacific Jazz during 1960-1964, mostly with his trio but also featuring Ben Webster, Richard "Groove" Holmes, Blue Mitchell, Stanley Turrentine, Joe Pass, the Jazz Crusaders, and the Gerald Wilson Orchestra. McCann switched to Limelight during 1965-1967 and then signed with Atlantic in 1968. After the success of Swiss Movement, McCann emphasized his singing at the expense of his playing and he began to utilize electric keyboards, notably on 1972's Layers. His recordings became less interesting to traditional jazz fans from that point on, and after his Atlantic contract ran out in 1976, McCann appeared on records much less often. However, he stayed popular and a 1994 reunion tour with Eddie Harris was quite successful. A mid-'90s stroke put him out of action for a time and weakened his keyboard playing (his band began carrying an additional keyboardist) but Les McCann returned to a more active schedule during 1996 and was still a powerful singer. His comeback was solidified by 2002's Pump It Up, a guest-heavy celebration of funk and jazz released on ESC Records.

Review by Andrew Hamilton (AMG)

The godfather of contemporary jazz-soul chills, changing the pace from his electrifying collaborations with Eddie Harris -- Swiss Movement and Second Movement -- that preceded and followed this mellow set of mostly love songs, which includes four selections from the pens of Helen and Kay Lewis (aka the Lewis Sisters). Two cuts, "Baby, Baby" and "Can't We Be Strangers Again," were originally done by Motown's Miracles and Edwin Starr & Blinky respectively. "How Many Broken Wings" and "What I Call Soul" are the sisters' other contributions, and McCann executes them to perfection. The keyboardist plays with an underlying intensity on Bill Evans' "Unless It's You," while the title track is good hard bop. Atlantic Records hasn't reissued this LP, so you have to rummage the Goodwills, online sites, and flea markets for a copy.

IRMA THOMAS

2008-10-12T17:16:00.000-07:00

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Review by J. Poet (amg)
After a lifetime in the business, the Soul Queen of New Orleans finally won a Best Contemporary Blues Grammy in 2006 for After the Rain. As everyone knows, there's a lot more to Thomas than the blues. She's a powerful R&B belter, simmering soul singer, and all round entertainer as comfortable with a standard like "Stormy Weather" as she is with a new tune like Dr. John's "Be You." True to its punny title, Simply Grand features Thomas in the company of 13 piano players laying down accompaniment on the acoustic grand. The tunes are old and new, borrowed and blue, but Thomas makes them all her own. The most powerful tracks here showcase Thomas and a solo pianist, bringing the feel of a smoky late-night bar on the end of lonely street to life. "Be You" features Dr. John, who played piano on the very first Thomas recording session, 1959's "You Can Have My Husband (But Don't Mess with My Man)." Rebennack's piano on "Be You" is dramatic and funky, halfway between a Mardi Gras romp and a Sunday morning sermon. Written by Rebennack and Doc Pomus, it's a simple, soulful love song with a playful vocal by Thomas . On the Louis Jordan standard "If I Had Any Sense I'd Go Back Home" Mac and Thomas get down and dirty, with Thomas delivering a casual vocal that plays around with the beat, while Rebennack backs her with clusters of rippling arpeggios. "Somebody Told You," a sassy Allen Toussaint R&B number Thomas recorded back in 1962, gets a reprise (in the same key as the original) with John Medeski rolling out some stomping New Orleans fonk on his solo while Thomas testifies with her usual soulful intensity. Marcia Ball chose the Leon Russell tune "Same Old Blues" for the session and gives it a gospel twist that lets Thomas flex her moaning lower resister. Randy Newman supplies keys and his own "Think It's Going to Rain Today" to close the album. Thomas makes a bleak lyric even more forlorn with an understated sighing vocal that's downright heartbreaking. But the album also has it's sassy, uptempo moments. John Fogerty's "River Is Waiting" also has a celebratory churchy ambience with great backing vocals, Henry Butler's sanctified piano, and Thomas' testifying lifting the tune to heaven. "Early in the Morning," another Louis Jordan tune, a tongue in cheek tale of a woman looking for solace after being up all night, gets a humorous read from Thomas and pianist Tom McDermott. "Underground Stream" is a pop tune from pianist David Egan that combines R&B and gospel with a classic '40s pop feel. The chorus is instantly memorable, and if there was any justice in the world it'd be the monster hit Thomas deserves.

LITTLE JOHNNY TAYLOR & TED TAYLOR

2008-10-10T17:15:00.000-07:00

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(AMG)
Review by Bill Dahl

Now here'a a relic from Little Johnny Taylor's prolific early '70s Ronn tenure that also features soul-blues singer Ted Taylor. Although they weren't related (except by label), the "Super Taylors" shared this album like long-lost brothers. Four duets find the two complementing one another most soulfully; otherwise, the album is comprised of solo sides by both (including Johnny Taylor's "Everybody Knows About My Good Thing").
Tracks

WILSON PICKETT

2008-10-09T13:30:00.001-07:00

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Review by Ron Wynn

A funny title, and a little bit better material and production for yet another Pickett attempt on RCA. He got a couple of chart hits, although the album itself didn't fare well. But it just wasn't the same; no longer was he roaring and belting out lyrics over a driving beat. Instead, he seemed like a mellow, almost restrained pop/soul type.

HMMMM - I'm not paid to be a critic But I liked this album.

Having had the pleasure of seeing the 'Wicked pickett' several times - it was nice to know that he had a quieter side to his music. Unfortunately, it didn't sell well - so he went back to making the kind of music that was expected by his buying public. But in some of his shows he did tone it down .....

SPANKY WILSON

2008-10-08T12:12:00.000-07:00

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Biography by Marisa Brown (amg)

Born in Philadelphia, PA, soul singer Spanky Wilson (a nickname she received as a child due to the spankings her father gave her when she behaved badly) joined the scene in the late '60s with big-band recordings, moving to Paris in 1985 to continue her career there. With collaborations with the like of the Duke Ellington Orchestra, Lalo Schifrin, Marvin Gaye, Willie Bobo, and Sammy Davis, Jr., along with her own solo work, Wilson became a DJ favorite all over the world, including in England, where musician and producer Will Holland (Quantic, Quantic Soul Orchestra) spent many years searching for her (she had moved to Los Angeles in 2000). In 2004 Holland finally found Wilson, and they worked together on two songs for Quantic's record, Mishaps Happening, leading to a full-length Wilson and QSO album, I'm Thankful, which came out in 2006 on Ubiquity.

Review by Richie Unterberger (amg)

Everything that could be dug up from Spanky Wilson's mid-1970s stint at Westbound Records is on this 18-track compilation, including all ten tracks from her 1975 Specialty of the House LP; two cuts that surfaced many years later on CD compilations; and six previously unreleased items retrieved from the vaults. It adds up to a respectable, but not exciting, collection of material by a versatile singer whose jazz-pop leanings are evident in some of the tunes and performances, yet who is reasonably comfortable with numbers that call for more standard soul-funk stylings. Wilson might be a little too talented to deserve the "journeywoman" sticker, but nonetheless this music isn't much above that label, offering fair early-to-mid-1970s soul that's a little less slick than much such fare of the period, almost entirely steering clear of any hints of disco. For the most part, the best cuts are actually those that depart a little from the mainstream soul format, like a satisfyingly funky take on Bill Withers' "Kissing My Love" and a chance to revisit her somewhat jazz-poppier origins on "Home." Some of the cuts not released at the time gave her opportunities to try out some unexpected material, like her earthy take on Harlan Howard's "He Called Me Baby" and her cover of Lesley Duncan's "Love Song" (made more famous by Elton John). The discofied version of Howard's "The Chokin' Kind" was a bad idea, however.

VERNON BURCH

2008-10-07T12:22:00.000-07:00

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Review by Alex Henderson (AMG)

In the late '70s and early '80s, some people argued that Vernon Burch had made a big mistake by leaving the Bar-Kays. At the time, the Bar-Kays were huge. A combo that was originally known for Memphis soul had successfully reinvented itself as a hardcore funk band, and its albums of the period were doing a lot better than Burch's solo efforts. Naturally, some people couldn't help but wonder if Burch would have been better off sticking around for smashes like "Holy Ghost" and "Shake Your Rump to the Funk." But he didn't want to spend his entire career as the Bar-Kays' guitarist; he was determined to see what he could accomplish on his own. Recorded in 1979, Get Up was Burch's second album for Chocolate City/Casablanca and his fourth solo album overall. This LP, which marked the first time he worked with producer/drummer James E. Gadson, was a departure from his previous releases in that it found him emphasizing dance-oriented material. "Once Again in My Life" is the record's only ballad, and Burch is obviously going after the disco crowd on up-tempo dance items like "Arrogant Lady," "Never Can Find the Way (Hot Love)," and "Dr. Do It Good." Even the familiar "Try a Little Tenderness" (a major hit for Otis Redding in the 1960s) gets the disco-funk treatment. Get Up isn't a masterpiece, but it's generally enjoyable -- and it was an improvement over 1978's Love-A-Thon.

LYN COLLINS

2008-10-04T14:09:00.000-07:00

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Biography by Steve Huey (AMG)

Nicknamed the "Female Preacher," Lyn Collins was discovered in the early '70s along with her relatives Bootsy and Catfish Collins by James Brown, who was making the transition to the hardest funk phase of his career. Lyn Collins was born June 12, 1948, in Abilene, TX, where she grew up; she began singing in her teens, waxing a tune called "Unlucky in Love" at age 14, and married a man who served both as her manager and as the local promoter for the James Brown Revue. Collins sent Brown a demo tape and he responded by essentially putting her on standby in 1970, when Marva Whitney left the Revue. Former vocalist Vicki Anderson elected to rejoin, however, so Brown instead invited Collins to come to Georgia for a recording session in early 1971, which produced the single "Wheel of Life." By the end of that year, Anderson was ready to leave again, and Collins officially joined the James Brown Revue. In 1972, Brown's People Records label released Collins' self-penned single "Think (About It)"; produced by Brown, it became her first and biggest hit, made her the most commercially successful female singer in Brown's camp, and was later sampled for the main vocal hook in the party rap classic "It Takes Two" by Rob Base & DJ E-Z Rock. Collins' first full-length album, also titled Think (About It), was released later in the year. Collins continued to record singles for Brown through 1973, also fulfilling her heavy touring commitments as a member of the Revue. Collins' second album, Check It Out if You Don't Know Me by Now, was released in 1975. She eventually became a backup session vocalist, also appearing on the soundtracks of the film Dr. Detroit and the TV series Fame. Around the late '80s/early '90s, Collins attempted a comeback as a dance-club diva, recording the house single "Shout" for Belgium's ARS label, and a self-penned track called "Break Your Heart" for an Italian label. In 1993, Collins' profile was given a boost by female dancehall reggae singer Patra, who invited Collins to perform on her hit remake of "Think (About It)"; partly due to the resulting interest, her two official albums were reissued in England and Holland. In addition, Collins' work has appeared on Polydor compilations like James Brown's Funky People and James Brown's Original Funky Divas, as well as the bootleg singles comp Female Preacher; she continued to tour and perform, most notably at the European Jazz/Funk Festival (in both 1998 and 1999) and the Montreux Jazz Festival. Shortly after returning from a European tour in February of 2005, Lyn Collins passed away on March 13, 2005 at the age of 56.

Review by Tim Sendra
At the time of the release of Think (About It) in 1972, Lyn Collins had been a member of James Brown's performing revue for about two years. Her full-throated voice had earned her the nickname "the Female Preacher" and a shot to record her own album. Of course, the Godfather was in the producer's chair, writing four of the nine tracks, directing the J.B.'s as they laid down their usual funky grooves, and liberally adding vocals throughout. The title track is the main point of interest here; from Collins' throat-ripping vocals to the track's nasty groove to Brown's background interjections, this is a killer. (Rob Base & DJ E-Z Rock later sampled the track for their rap classic "It Takes Two"). The rest of the record is a little uneven: "Just Won't Do Right" is a good doo wop-ish ballad with some churchy organ and great vocals by Collins and Brown, "Wheels of Life" is a nice little groover that sounds like vintage Aretha Franklin, and "Women's Lib" is a very slow ballad that lets Collins show off her anguished yowl of a vocal to its fullest. Where the album stumbles is on the covers of familiar songs. Her versions of Bill Withers' "Ain't No Sunshine" and the Gamble & Huff classic "Never Gonna Give You Up" are mediocre, and worst of all is her leaden take on "Fly Me to the Moon." Still, the record is worth tracking down for hardcore James Brown or funky soul fans. The less devoted should look for "Think (About It)" on one of the many compilations on which it appears.

BIG CYNTHIA

2008-10-03T22:31:00.001-07:00

WELL IT IS FRIDAY - So here's something a little different - LOL
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Daddy B. Nice's #58 ranked Southern Soul Artist

Cynthia Walker (Big Cynthia) was born in Houston, Texas, the daughter of Junior Walker, of Junior Walker & The All Stars fame ("What Does It Take To Win Your Love"). She began singing in local clubs as a teenager and became the opening-act artist for Southern Soul headliners, including Johnnie Taylor and Peggy Scott-Adams, who came through town. Avanti Records issued her debut CD, currently unavailable.

In 1997 Ace Records featured two tracks by Cynthia Walker on its highly-regarded sampler, Kings And Queens Of Ace. "I'm Bill's Wife," with the lyric, "Bill goes both ways," capitalized on R&B's early-to-mid-90's fascination with bisexuality, memorialized in most fans' minds by Peggy Scott-Adam's smash hit "Bill." The song gave ample evidence of Walker's blues diva's talents.

"I Should Quit You Baby," from the same compilation, was a straight-blues rant in the style of Chick Willis's "Stoop Down Baby," and a precursor of much of Cynthia's later choice of material.

Meanwhile Big Cynthia, as Cynthia Walker, also worked in the gospel circuit. In 1998 she was a featured vocalist on The Greater Walters of Chicago's gospel CD He Can Do Anything.

Renowned Southern Soul performer Mel Waiters signed Big Cynthia to his Brittney Records label, resulting in the 2002 CD, Ain't Nothing Like A Big Woman. The title track and the song "Freaky With You" in particular received favorable airplay on Stations of the Deep South.

Doing It Big (TMR) appeared in 2005, and the radio single from the CD, "If You Wanna Get It," a duet with up-and-coming vocalist Mr. David (of "Shoo Da Wop"/Sir Charles Jones fame), became an overnight chitlin' circuit favorite. The follow-up, "Eatin' Ain't Cheatin'," was as ribald and R-rated as contemporary chitlin' circuit R&B gets.

TOWNSEND TOWNSEND TOWNSEND & ROGERS

2008-10-02T11:21:00.000-07:00

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Townsend, Townsend, Townsend & Rogers was a band Produced & Conceived By Ed Townsend.

They Were Formed In 1978, Where They Got Signed To Chocolate City Records. The Members Of The Group Were Ed Townsend, His Sons David Townsend & Michael Townsend & His Nephew David Rogers. Their 1st Album For Chocolate City Records Was Titled, "Townsend, Townsend, Townsend & Rogers". Their 2 Hit Singles Were "Bring It Down To The Real" & "Playground Of Love."

SOLOMON BURKE

2008-09-30T16:02:00.000-07:00

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CORNELIUS BROTHERS AND SISTER ROSE

2008-09-29T12:35:00.000-07:00

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Biography by Ron Wynn
A Florida family group, Cornelius Brothers & Sister Rose had a brief moment in the sun in 1972, with their self-titled United Artists LP. They scored two pop hits in "Too Late to Turn Back Now" and "Treat Her Like a Lady," and the album cracked the pop LP chart at number 29. They actually fared better with general audiences than R&B and soul fans, who found their arrangements, harmonies, and style lacking grit and intensity. They enjoyed one more mild hit in "Don't Ever Be Lonely (A Poor Little Fool Like Me)." But their two hits are among the most requested songs of the early '70s that air on oldies stations.

CLIFFORD COULTER

2008-09-28T07:00:00.001-07:00

Boomp3.com
Review by Thom Jurek

Clifford Coulter was a soul-jazz and blues pianist who gradually moved more into urban R&B. His early recordings for the ABC label in the early '70s were full of a bright, sweet sound and were recommended listening for anybody interested in the funkier side of soul-jazz. This disc, cut in 1980 and produced by none other than Bill Withers, is a very commercial and radio-friendly set of funky soul. Coulter's writing and arranging are nice and tight and virtually full of singles -- it is a wonder he didn't score any with this. Music was as fickle a business coming out of the disc era as it is in the 21st century. Coulter's sound, while contemporary, is rooted in the soul balladry of an earlier time. His songwriting is top-notch and his session players, who include Withers, Russ Kunkel, Ronnie Beck, Jerry Perez, and others, are empathetic on tunes like the mellow grooving opener, "Don't Wanna See You Cry," and "Magic Carpet Ride" (not that one). On ballads such as "Nothing in the World Is Free," Coulter's own singing wrenches emotion out of a slick soul tune and puts it in the listener's breadbasket. This is as fine a specimen of urban soul as there was at the time. It should have been a smash.

GEORGE & GWEN MCCRAE

2008-09-28T06:43:00.000-07:00

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Gwen McCrae (born Gwen Mosley, 21 December 1943, Pensacola, Florida, United States) is an American R&B singer, best known for her 1975 hit "Rockin' Chair".

Gwen was the youngest of five children. She grew up singing in her pentecostal church and later discovered secular singers like Sam Cooke and Aretha Franklin. She began performing in local clubs as a teenager, and singing with local groups like the Lafayettes and the Independents. In 1963, she met a young sailor named George McCrae, whom she married within a week.

From 1963 she recorded as a duo with her husband George, and was first to receive a solo recording contract, with Henry Stone's TK Records. She found success on the R&B charts with "Lead Me On" in 1970, followed by "For Your Love".

George & Gwen were discovered in 1967 by singer Betty Wright, who helped get them signed to Stone's Alston record label. Their debut single, "Three Hearts in a Tangle," was released in 1969; the follow-up, "Like Yesterday Our Love Is Gone," marked the first time they worked with the writing team of Clarence Reid (who would later morph into the bawdy comic Blowfly) and Willie Clarke. Both were regional hits, as was third single, "No One Left to Come Home," although none of those records broke nationally; meanwhile, the McCraes and Wright were collectively earning a reputation as stellar session vocalists.

Following husband George’s unexpected solo success with "Rock Your Baby", Gwen went on to have a major hit of her own in 1975 with "Rockin' Chair", a #1 R&B hit which also reached the U.S. Top 10. The follow-up "Love Insurance" also made the R&B charts. By this time, the separate successes were taking their toll on the McCraes' marriage. Gwen has since alleged that her husband beat her frequently.[citation needed]

After Gwen and George divorced and TK Records collapsed, Gwen moved to New Jersey, and signed with Atlantic Records, having another hit with "Funky Sensation" in 1981. She continued to record, and the success of some of her earlier recordings on the UK’s Northern Soul scene maintained her popularity as a live act in Europe. In 2004 she released her first gospel album.

In 1999, french house music duo Cassius released the single "Feeling for You" which sampled the vocals of Gwen McCrae's "All this love that I'm giving", which was a top 40 hit on the UK Charts and is considered a classic dance track by many house enthusiast.

In 2008, Yung Ralph released the single, "I Work Hard," which samples "Rockin' Chair."

BOBBY WOMACK

2008-09-27T13:28:00.000-07:00

Boomp3.com

Biography by Steve Huey

A veteran who paid his dues for over a decade before getting his shot at solo stardom, Bobby Womack persevered through tragedy and addiction to emerge as one of soul music's great survivors. Able to shine in the spotlight as a singer or behind the scenes as an instrumentalist and songwriter, Womack never got his due from pop audiences, but during the late '60s and much of the '70s, he was a consistent hitmaker on the R&B charts, with a high standard of quality control. His records were quintessential soul, with a bag of tricks learned from the likes of Sam Cooke, Wilson Pickett, and Sly Stone, all of whom Womack worked closely with at one time or another. Yet often, they also bore the stamp of Womack's own idiosyncratic personality, whether through a lengthy spoken philosophical monologue or a radical reinterpretation of a pop standard. An underrated guitarist, Womack helped pioneer a lean, minimalist approach similar to that of Curtis Mayfield, and was an early influence on the young Jimi Hendrix. Additionally, his songs have been recorded by numerous artists in the realms of both R&B and rock, and the best of them rank as all-time classics.

Bobby Dwayne Womack was born in Cleveland on March 4, 1944. His upbringing was strict and religious, but his father Friendly also encouraged his sons to pursue music as he had (he sang and played guitar in a gospel group). In the early '50s, while still a child, Bobby joined his siblings Cecil, Curtis, Harry, and Friendly Jr. to form the gospel quintet the Womack Brothers. They were chosen to open a local show for the Soul Stirrers in 1953, where Bobby befriended lead singer Sam Cooke; following this break, they toured the country as an opening act for numerous gospel groups. When Cooke formed his own SAR label, he recruited the Womack Brothers with an eye towards transforming them into a crossover R&B act. Learning that his sons were moving into secular music, Friendly Womack threw them out of the house, and Cooke wired them the money to buy a car and drive out to his Los Angeles offices. The Womack Brothers made several recordings for SAR over 1960 and 1961, including a few gospel sides, but Cooke soon convinced them to record R&B and renamed them the Valentinos. In 1962, they scored a Top Ten hit on the R&B charts with "Lookin' for a Love," and Cooke sent them on the road behind James Brown to serve a boot-camp-style musical apprenticeship. Bobby eventually joined Cooke's backing band as guitarist. The Valentinos' 1964 single "It's All Over Now," written by Bobby, was quickly covered by the Rolling Stones with Cooke's blessing; when it became the Stones' first U.K. number one, Womack suddenly found himself a rich man.

Cooke's tragic death in December 1964 left Womack greatly shaken and the Valentinos' career in limbo. Just three months later, Womack married Cooke's widow, Barbara Campbell, which earned him tremendous ill will in the R&B community; many viewed him as a shady opportunist looking to cash in on Cooke's legacy, especially since Campbell was significantly older than Womack. According to Womack, he was initially motivated to look after Campbell in an unstable time, not to tarnish the memory of a beloved mentor. Regardless, Womack found himself unable to get his solo career rolling in the wake of the scandal; singles for Chess ("I Found a True Love") and Him ("Nothing You Can Do") were avoided like the plague despite their quality. The Valentinos cut a couple of singles for Chess in 1966, "What About Me" and "Sweeter Than the Day Before," which also failed to make much of a splash. To make ends meet, Womack became a backing guitarist, first landing a job with Ray Charles; he went on to make a valuable connection in producer Chips Moman, and appeared often at Moman's American Studio in Memphis, as well as nearby Muscle Shoals, AL. In the process, Womack appeared on classic recordings by the likes of Joe Tex, King Curtis, and Aretha Franklin (Lady Soul), among others. He recorded singles for Keymen and Atlantic without success, but became one of Wilson Pickett's favorite songwriters, contributing the R&B Top Ten hits "I'm in Love" and "I'm a Midnight Mover" (plus 15 other tunes) to the singer's repertoire.

Womack had been slated to record a solo album for Minit, but had given Pickett most of his best material, which actually wound up getting his name back in the public eye in a positive light. In 1968, he scored the first charting single of his solo career with "What Is This?" and soon hit with a string of inventively reimagined pop covers -- "Fly Me to the Moon," "California Dreamin'," and "I Left My Heart in San Francisco," the former two of which reached the R&B Top 20. A songwriting partnership with engineer Darryl Carter resulted in the R&B hits "It's Gonna Rain," "How I Miss You Baby," and "More Than I Can Stand" over 1969-1970. A series of label absorptions bumped Womack up to United Artists in 1971, which proved to be the home of his greatest solo success; in the meantime, he contributed the ballad "Trust Me" to Janis Joplin's masterpiece Pearl, and the J. Geils Band revived "Lookin' for a Love" for their first hit. He also teamed up with jazz guitarist Gabor Szabo on the LP High Contrast, which debuted Womack's composition "Breezin'" (which, of course, became a smash for George Benson six years later). Most importantly, however, Womack played guitar on Sly & the Family Stone's There's a Riot Goin' On, a masterpiece of darkly psychedelic funk that would have an impact on Womack's own sound and sense of style.

Womack issued his first UA album, Communication, in 1971, which kicked off a string of excellent releases that ran through the first half of the decade. In addition to several of Womack's trademark pop covers, the album also contained the original ballad "That's the Way I Feel About 'Cha," which climbed all the way to number two on the R&B chart and became his long-awaited breakout hit. The 1972 follow-up Understanding spawned Womack's first chart-topper, "Woman's Gotta Have It," co-written with Darryl Carter and stepdaughter Linda (Womack divorced Barbara Campbell in 1970). The follow-up "Harry Hippie," a gently ironic tribute to Womack's brother, also hit the R&B Top Ten. Later that year, Womack scored the blaxploitation flick Across 110th Street; the title cut was later revived in the 1998 Quentin Tarantino film Jackie Brown. 1973's The Facts of Life had an R&B number two hit in a rearrangement of the perennial "Nobody Knows You When You're Down and Out," and the following year's Lookin' for a Love Again found Womack revisiting his Valentinos hit; the re-recorded "Lookin' for a Love" became his second number one R&B single and his only Top Ten hit on the pop charts. Follow-up single "You're Welcome, Stop On By" made the R&B Top Five.

Womack was by this time a seasoned veteran of the rock & roll lifestyle, having befriended the likes of the Rolling Stones, the late Janis Joplin, and Sly Stone. After his brother Harry was murdered by a jealous girlfriend in 1974 (in Bobby's own apartment), the drug usage began to take a more serious turn. Womack scored further R&B Top Ten hits with 1975's "Check It Out" and 1976's "Daylight," the latter of which seemed to indicate a longing for escape from the non-stop partying that often masked serious depression. Despite Womack's new marriage to Regina Banks, the song was a sign that things were coming to a head. Womack pushed UA into letting him do a full album of country music, something he'd always loved but which the label regarded as commercially inadvisable (especially under the title Womack reportedly wanted to use: Step Aside, Charley Pride, Give Another Nigger a Try). They eventually relented, and when BW Goes C&W met with predictably minimal response, UA palmed the increasingly difficult Womack off on Columbia. A pair of albums there failed to recapture his commercial momentum or reinvent him for the disco age, and he moved to Arista for 1979's Roads of Life, which appeared not long after the sudden death of his infant son.

At a low point in his life, Womack took a bit of time off from music to gather himself. He appeared as a guest vocalist on Jazz Crusader Wilton Felder's 1980 solo album Inherit the Wind, singing the hit title track, and subsequently signed with black entrepreneur Otis Smith's independent Beverly Glen label. His label debut, 1981's The Poet, was a critically acclaimed left-field hit, rejuvenating his career and producing a number three R&B hit with "If You Think You're Lonely Now." Unfortunately, money disputes soured the relationship between Womack and Smith rather quickly. The Poet II was delayed until 1984, and featured several duets with Patti LaBelle, including another number three R&B hit, "Love Has Finally Come at Last." Beverly Glen released a final LP culled from Womack's previous sessions, Someday We'll All Be Free, in 1985, by which time the singer had already broken free and signed with MCA. Another hit with Wilton Felder, "(No Matter How High I Get) I'll Still Be Looking Up to You," appeared that year, and his label debut So Many Rivers produced a Top Five R&B hit in "I Wish He Didn't Trust Me So Much." 1986's Womagic reunited Womack with Chips Moman, and he also backed the Rolling Stones on their remake of "Harlem Shuffle." By the following year he'd christened himself The Last Soul Man, which proved to be his final recording for MCA.

In the years since, Womack has made high-profile returns to the music business only sporadically. 1994's Resurrection was recorded for Ron Wood's Slide label and featured an array of guest stars including Wood, Keith Richards, Rod Stewart, and Stevie Wonder. In 1999, he fulfilled a long-standing promise to his father (who passed away in 1981) by delivering his first-ever gospel album, Back to My Roots.

THE O'KAYSIONS

2008-09-26T01:13:00.000-07:00

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Biography by Ron Wynn (amg)

The O'Kaysions didn't have many hits, but the North Carolina sextet's energetic "Girl Watcher" remains a staple on the Carolina/Georgia/Florida beach circuit. The song actually did a bit better on the pop side, reaching number five there, as opposed to number six R&B. It was their only chart tune for ABC in 1968. Lead singer Donny Weaver, Ron Turner, Jim Spidel, Wayne Pittman, Jimmy Hennant, and Bruce Joyner began as the Kays.

The O'Kaysions
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The O'Kaysions are an American pop / blue-eyed soul group originally from Wilson, North Carolina. Today, they are known as Beach Music artists. The group first formed under the name The Kays, and scored a top ten hit in the U.S. in 1968 with the tune "Girl Watcher" (#5 Pop, #6 R&B).[1] The song was first released on a local record label under the production of John I Whitfield, North State, before being released nationally by ABC. It was their only major hit, and they never released a second full-length album. In 1987, the song was reworked as "I'm A Wheel Watcher" and was used to promote the TV game show, Wheel Of Fortune.

Since the song was recorded in a budget studio, the master tapes are unfortunately long gone so every copy is a dub from a 45 record. Best quality can be found from a mint "North State" 45.

The group still performs today with a different line-up. Wayne Pittman is the only original member remaining active in the band. He also serves as the manager of the group.
Band members (Classic Line-Up)

* Donnie Weaver - vocals, organ
* Wayne Pittman - guitar
* Ron Turner - trumpet
* Jim Spezialle - saxophone
* Jimmy Hinnant - bass
* Bruce Joyner - drums

"SWEET" CHARLES SHERRELL

2008-09-25T17:01:00.000-07:00

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Biography by Jason Ankeny (amg)

Although his successor, Bootsy Collins, receives most of the recognition, bassist "Sweet" Charles Sherrell was no less a pivotal figure in shaping James Brown's groundbreaking evolution from soul to funk. The much-copied "slap" technique and syncopated, thumping rhythms Sherrell introduced on such landmark records as "Say It Loud (I'm Black and I'm Proud)," "Mother Popcorn," and "Soul Power" remain the essence of the almighty groove. Born March 8, 1943, in Nashville, Sherrell began playing the trombone at age eight, later learning the trumpet and drums as well. While majoring in music at Tennessee State University, he played drums in an R&B band featuring then-unknown guitarist Jimi Hendrix and bassist Billy Cox. When rumor spread across Nashville that Queen of Soul Aretha Franklin was traveling to town to assemble a backing band for her upcoming U.S. tour, Sherrell bought his first bass at a pawnshop for 69 dollars, sufficiently mastering the instrument within three weeks to land the gig. After Brown's longtime bassist Tim Drummond contracted hepatitis in mid-1968, Sherrell was tapped as his replacement. Upon making his debut as a member of the J.B.'s with "I Can't Stand Myself (When You Touch Me)," he gradually honed the pioneering slap approach that remains his greatest contribution to contemporary music. "[Sherrell] hasn't gotten the credit as a bass player that he should have," Brown later admitted. "A lot of stuff that Bootsy Collins and some other bass players did later -- like thumping the strings -- 'Sweet' did first." As the decade drew to a close Brown issued a new record virtually every month, each further defining the basic formula of funk: bold, precise horns, repetitive rhythms, and a minimum of melodic embellishment. But the relentless pace, combined with Brown's infamously tight-fisted business practices, forced Sherrell to resign from the J.B.'s in January 1970. In the years to follow he played on sessions headlined by Al Green and others, and also attempted to mount a solo career. He returned to the J.B.'s in 1974, also cutting a solo LP, the superb For Sweet People from Sweet Charles for Brown's People label. Despite his appealingly honeyed vocal style, the album did not sell, and except for a handful of subsequent solo singles (including the 1976 novelty "Do the King Kong" and 1981's "If I Only Had a Minute") Sherrell confined the remainder of his career to sideman duties, assuming the title of Brown's musical director upon trombonist Fred Wesley's 1975 departure from the fold. Sherrell remained with Brown until October 1996, when internal friction again forced his exit. This time he teamed with another J.B.'s alumnus, the legendary saxophonist Maceo Parker, with whom he toured well into the next millennium.

THE REFLECTIONS

2008-09-24T16:39:00.001-07:00

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Biography by Ron Wynn (amg)

A New York City vocal group formed in 1971, the Reflections also served as Melba Moore's background vocalists during a 1972 tour. Herman Edwards, Josh Pridgen, and Edmund and John Simmons were the original members. They recorded for Capitol in the mid-'70s, and made one nice number, "Three Steps from True Love," in 1975. It was their lone Top Ten R&B hit.

(Not TO BE CONFUSED with the Detroit Doo-Wop group who were around in the '60's)

J. BLACKFOOT

2008-09-23T17:28:00.000-07:00

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Daddy B. Nice's #32 ranked Southern Soul Artist

Review by William Ruhlmann (amg)

J. Blackfoot's debut solo LP, City Slicker, is a concept album based on that age-old theme, the country boy's experiences when he comes to the city. Blackfoot isn't embarrassed to borrow heavily from Stevie Wonder's "Livin' for the City" for the album-opening "The Way of the City," and it's a good indication of what's to come: Blackfoot, with his gruff voice, is a forceful soul belter, but he's not exactly original. Nevertheless, in 1983 it was pleasant to hear someone hewing so closely to the soul sound of the late '60s and early '70s, and Blackfoot scored a Top Ten R&B hit with the smooth "Taxi" from this album, which also made a respectable showing on the R&B LP chart.

BOBBY WOMACK

2008-09-21T17:58:00.001-07:00

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Review by Quint Kik

Debut album from the self-proclaimed "Last Soul Man," who earned his credentials as writer and composer of the Rolling Stones' first U.K. number one. He was also one of the forces behind Sly & the Family Stone's sultry classic There's a Riot Going On. Derived from his 1987 album, this title of honor would have sounded pretentious employed by just anyone. However, with most of the true soul legends gone or lost in the '80s ozone of slick synthesized productions, Bobby Womack remained one of few who stayed true to their art. Like Bill Withers, Womack could be viewed as sort of a singer/songwriter by accident, who developed a genuine style of his own. His remarkable quality was brought back to memory through Quentin Tarantino's kind gesture of including him on the Jackie Brown soundtrack. Fly Me to the Moon (aka A Midnight Mover) is an impressive debut. It took Womack several years to come to the point of recording his own material, having first to shake off the untimely death of his mentor Sam Cooke. Based on the results, everything here sounds like he had been holding it back for this kind of raw soul explosion. A mere seven out of the ten tracks are Womack originals, two of which were written for ("I'm in Love") or with (the title track) Wilson Pickett. His authentic rasp of a voice, combined with a superb production by Chips Moman, lend to Fly Me to the Moon the overall feeling of a Stax release. "You Oughta Think It Over," "What Is This," and "The Time Is Now" are as good as anything by either Sam & Dave or Pickett himself, if not better. His stunning version of "California Dreamin'" tops this sublime effort. Womack makes the lyrics come alive in a way you can really smell those brown leaves and feel the chilly presence of a gray sky on a winters' day.

BARBARA LYNN

2008-09-20T01:27:00.000-07:00

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Biography by Steve Huey (amg)
Singer/guitarist Barbara Lynn was a rare commodity during her heyday. Not only was she a female instrumentalist (one of the very first to hit the charts), but she also played left-handed -- quite well at that -- and even wrote some of her own material. Lynn's music often straddled the line between blues and Southern R&B, and since much of her early work -- including the number one R&B hit "You'll Lose a Good Thing" -- was recorded in New Orleans, it bore the sonic imprint of the Crescent City. Lynn was born Barbara Lynn Ozen in Beaumont, TX, on January 16, 1942; she played the piano as a child before switching to guitar, inspired by Elvis Presley. In junior high, Lynn formed her own band, Bobbie Lynn and the Idols; at this point, her musical role models veered between bluesmen (Guitar Slim, Jimmy Reed) and female pop singers (Brenda Lee, Connie Francis). After winning a few talent shows and playing some teen dances, the still-underage Lynn started working the local clubs and juke joints, risking getting kicked out of school if she had been discovered. Singer Joe Barry caught her live act and recommended her to his friend, producer/impresario Huey P. Meaux, aka the Crazy Cajun.

With her parents' consent, Meaux brought Lynn to New Orleans to record at the legendary Cosimo's studio. Lynn cut a few singles for the Jamie label with the understanding that if none hit, she was to attend college instead of pursuing music right off the bat. In 1962, her self-penned ballad "You'll Lose a Good Thing" became a national hit, reaching the pop Top Ten and climbing all the way to number one on the R&B charts. Her first album (of the same name) was also released that year, featuring ten of her originals among its 12 tracks. Lynn continued to record for Jamie up through 1965, producing follow-up R&B hits like "You're Gonna Need Me" and "Oh Baby (We Got a Good Thing Goin')," the latter of which was recorded by the Rolling Stones in 1965. In 1966, Lynn switched over to Meaux's Tribe label and cut "You Left the Water Running," which became something of an R&B standard and was covered by the likes of Otis Redding. In 1967, she signed with Atlantic and had another R&B hit with "This Is the Thanks I Get" early the following year; she also issued another album, Here Is Barbara Lynn, in 1968. Lynn scored one last hit for Atlantic in 1972's "(Until Then) I'll Suffer," but by this point, she had several children to worry about raising; dissatisfied with her promotion anyway, she wound up effectively retiring from the music business for most of the '70s and '80s, though she did play the occasional low-key tour.

Lynn returned to music in the mid-'80s, touring Japan for the first time in 1984; she later cut a live album there, called You Don't Have to Go, which was eventually issued in the States by Ichiban. Lynn had managed to retain a cult following among connoisseurs of American soul and blues in several different pockets of the world, and toured internationally during the early '90s. In 1994, Bullseye Blues issued her first full-fledged studio album in over two decades, So Good; Until Then I'll Suffer followed in 1996. Lynn later caught on with the respected blues label Antone's, and in 2000 she cut Hot Night Tonight, which featured a couple of raps by her son Bachelor Wise.

Review by Ron Wynn (amg)

Barbara Lynn Ozen's smoky voice and fine guitar playing was one of the better blends of soul vocals and blues embellishment. Huey P. Meaux produced this early-'60s record, which featured the classic title track. Other Lynn numbers, like "I'll Suffer," were equally outstanding; Lynn was sometimes tough and confrontational, and tender, inviting or anguished at other times. Meaux didn't clutter the works with unnecessary firepower; his arrangements and charts were just enough to augment Lynn's sturdy vocals. Lynn also wrote ten of the 12 songs.

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BABY HUEY

2008-09-20T01:15:00.001-07:00

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Biography by Steve Huey

A locally beloved figure on the Chicago soul scene, Baby Huey never achieved quite the same renown outside of his hometown, despite an exciting live act and a record on Curtis Mayfield's Curtom label. Born James Ramey in Richmond, IN, in 1944, Baby Huey was literally an enormous stage presence: a glandular problem kept his weight around 350-400 pounds and beyond. He began performing in Chicago clubs in 1963 with his backing band the Babysitters and soon became a popular concert draw. As the '60s wore on, Baby Huey's sound moved from energetic R&B into a more psychedelic brand of soul, with a vocal style that drew comparisons to Otis Redding. He signed with Curtom and recorded a debut album, The Baby Huey Story: The Living Legend, that featured several Curtis Mayfield songs (most notably the oft-sampled "Hard Times" and "Mighty Mighty Children"), plus a cover of Sam Cooke's "A Change Is Gonna Come." Sadly, Baby Huey didn't live to see it released; his weight and substance-abuse problems were exacting a steep toll on his body, and on October 28, 1970, he suffered a drug-related heart attack in a hotel room in Chicago. The album was released early the next year, and the Babysitters attempted to carry on for a while with a new lead singer, the still-teenaged Chaka Khan (she would, of course, go on to fame as the frontwoman of funk band Rufus shortly thereafter). In the years since, Baby Huey's lone LP has become a sought-after collectible among soul fanatics.
Review by Wade Kergan

Baby Huey's only album, released after his untimely death, is titled The Living Legend with good reason. He was legendary in his appearance, a 400-pound man with a penchant for flamboyant clothing and crowned by a woolly Afro, a look that is best illustrated by one of several rare photos included in the Water Records edition that shows our man in a wide-lapeled polka-dot shirt with a lime-green jacket. Beyond his unusual appearance, though, he was graced with a stunning, fierce voice on par with Otis Redding and Howard Tate, wailing and howling one moment and oddly tender and sentimental the next. Nowhere on Living Legend is his range more apparent than the opening track, "Listen to Me," where listeners are introduced to both the enigma of Baby Huey and his diamond-tough psychedelic funk backing band, the Baby Sitters. The high-energy instrumental workout "Mama Get Yourself Together" is worthy of the J.B.'s and a hazy, spiraling ten-minute rendition of Sam Cooke's chestnut "A Change Is Going to Come" confirms that the Baby Sitters could hold their own with Blood, Sweat & Tears. Further lore that catapults The Living Legend from good to great: the production was helmed by Curtis Mayfield, reason enough to make it near essential, and is highlighted by three of his compositions, "Mighty Mighty," which Mayfield and the Impressions recorded a few years earlier; "Running," a classic Mayfield cut that can only be heard here ripped to glorious bits by a band that is trying to let every member solo; and "Hard Times," which Mayfield himself would revisit on his 1975 album There's No Place Like America Today, although Baby Huey's razor-edged reading remains the definitive version -- no small caveat considering Mayfield not only wrote the tune, but could rightfully be considered one of the architects of soul to boot.

NORMAN WHITFIELD - R.I.P.

2008-09-18T22:33:00.002-07:00

Norman Whitfield, who died on Tuesday aged 67, was a songwriter and producer and one of the principal architects of the Motown sound; he was responsible for many of the label's greatest hits, including such classics as Money (That's What I Want) and I Heard it Through the Grapevine, a chart-topper on both sides of the Atlantic in 1968 that became the biggest-selling record in the label's history.

Two of the four versions of I Heard it Through the Grapevine which Whitfield recorded with various Motown acts became hits. One, by Gladys Knight & the Pips, reached number two in the American charts in 1967; while the version by Marvin Gaye went to number one in both Britain and the United States in 1968. Gaye's brooding, experimental version ranks at number 80 on Rolling Stone magazine's list of its 500 Greatest Songs of All Time.

Having frittered away his teenage years in pool halls, Whitfield began writing for Motown when he was 19. Some of the classic songs he wrote for Berry Gordy's Motown artists were covered by some of the biggest acts in the world. The Beatles covered Money on their second album in 1963, and the Rolling Stones recorded a version of his Ain't Too Proud To Beg.

Norman Jesse Whitfield was born in Harlem, New York, on May 12 1941.

When he was in his teens the family moved to Detroit, where eventually Norman began pestering Berry Gordy for a job at the Motown offices known as Hitsville USA; the Motown founder agreed to give him a job in the quality control department, which selected the songs the label would release.

Having become a member of Motown's resident songwriting team, Whitfield had some minor successes, but made his name only when he started producing recordings of his own songs.

His big break came when he replaced Smokey Robinson as the Temptations' principal producer on Ain't Too Proud To Beg (1966). Whitfield's decision to highlight the rasping vocals of David Ruffin paid off, and he continued to foster a rougher sound in the group's subsequent hits, including Beauty Is Only Skin Deep and (I Know) I'm Losing You (both 1966).

After Ruffin's departure, Whitfield steered the Temptations into the realms of psychedelic soul with his controversial Cloud Nine (1969). At first Berry Gordy objected to the song on the ground that it appeared to promote drugs, but Whitfield convinced him otherwise, and the record earned Motown its first Grammy award.

With his songwriting partner, the lyricist Barrett Strong, Whitfield continued to supply the Temptations with such gritty classics as Psychedelic Shack, Ball Of Confusion (That's What the World Is Today) (both 1970), Just My Imagination (Running Away With Me) (1971) and Papa Was A Rolling Stone (1972).

I Heard it Through the Grapevine was another collaboration with Barrett Strong; and in 1969 Whitfield penned a follow-up hit for Marvin Gaye, Too Busy Thinking About My Baby. The following year he had another chart success with the uncompromising War, recorded by Edwin Starr.

Having left Motown in 1973 to form his own eponymous label, Whitfield had a smash hit three years later with Car Wash by Rose Royce, originally Edwin Starr's Motown backing group. The track was used as the theme song to the 1976 film of the same name, and the soundtrack album won Whitfield another Grammy in 1977.

His subsequent hit numbers for Rose Royce included I Wanna Get Next To You (1976), Wishing On A Star (1977) and Love Don't Live Here Anymore (1978).

He returned to the Motown label in the early 1980s and produced another hit single for the Temptations, Sail Away (1983), and the soundtrack to Berry Gordy's film, The Last Dragon (1985).

In 2005 Whitfield was convicted of tax evasion on income of more than $2 million. He was sentenced to six months' house arrest and fined $25,000. He was spared prison on account of his various health problems, notably his diabetes.

THE STYLISTICS

2008-09-18T22:33:00.001-07:00

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Biography by Stephen Thomas Erlewine

After the Spinners and the O'Jays, the Stylistics were the leading Philly soul group produced by Thom Bell. During the early '70s, the band had 12 straight Top Ten hits, including "You Are Everything," "Betcha by Golly, Wow," "I'm Stone in Love With You," "Break Up to Make Up," and "You Make Me Feel Brand New." Of all their peers, the Stylistics were one of the smoothest and sweetest soul groups of their era. All of their hits were ballads, graced by the soaring falsetto of Russell Thompkins, Jr. and the lush yet graceful productions of Bell, which helped make the Stylistics one of the most successful soul groups of the first half of the '70s.

The Stylistics formed in 1968, when members of the Philadelphia soul groups the Monarchs and the Percussions joined forces after their respective band dissolved. Thompkins, James Smith, and Airrion Love hailed from the Monarchs; James Dunn and Herbie Murrell were from the Percussions. In 1970, the group recorded "You're a Big Girl Now," a song their road manager Marty Bryant co-wrote with Robert Douglas, a member of their backing band Slim and the Boys, and the single became a regional hit for Sebring Records. The larger Avco Records soon signed the Stylistics, and single eventually climbed to number seven in early 1971.

Once they were on Avco, the Stylistics began working with producer/songwriter Thom Bell, who had previously worked with the Delfonics. The Stylistics became Bell's pet project and with lyricist Linda Creed, he crafted a series of hit singles that relied as much on the intricately arranged and lush production as they did on Thompkins' falsetto. Every single that Bell produced for the Stylistics was a Top Ten R&B hit, and several -- "You Are Everything," "Betcha by Golly, Wow," "I'm Stone in Love With You," "Break Up to Make Up," and "You Make Me Feel Brand New" -- were also Top Ten pop hits.

Following "You Make Me Feel Brand New" in the spring of 1974, the Stylistics broke away from Bell and began working with Van McCoy, who helped move the group towards a softer, easy listening style. In 1976, they left Avco and signed with H&L. The group's American record sales declined, yet they remained popular in Europe, particularly in Great Britain, where "Sing Baby Sing" (1975), "Na Na Is the Saddest Word" (1975), "Can't Give You Anything" (1975), and "Can't Help Falling in Love" (1976) were all Top Five hits. The Stylistics continued to tour and record throughout the latter half of the '70s, as their popularity steadily declined. In 1980, Dunn left the group because of poor health, and he was followed later that year by Smith. The remaining Stylistics continued performing as a trio on oldies shows into the '90s.

Review by Craig Lytle

This was the Stylistics' sophomore album and it spawned three Billboard R&B Top Ten singles: "I'm Stone in Love With You," "Break Up to Make Up," and "You'll Never Get to Heaven (If You Break My Heart)." The first two even cracked the Top Ten on the pop charts. Furthermore, there is much here to savor. The vocal quintet's version of the Carole King classic "It's Too Late" never soars or dips -- it just soothes in spite of the fateful lyric. "Children of the Night" imparts a similar mood but with a different lyrical content. The two selections "Peek-A-Boo" and "You're As Right As Rain" are Stylistics originals. First tenor Russell Thompkins Jr, who leads on all the aforementioned songs, seems to effortlessly reach each note and hold it as long as necessary. Although only the first three hit the charts, all of the songs referenced are radio favorites. As superb as the group was vocally, the production work of Thom Bell is commendable as well.

SAM & DAVE

2008-09-17T15:47:00.001-07:00

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Samuel David Moore (12 October 1935, Miami, Florida, USA) and David Prater (b. 9 May 1937, Ocilla, Georgia, USA, d. 9 April 1988). Sam And Dave first performed together in 1961 at Miami's King Of Hearts club. Moore originally sang in his father's Baptist church before joining the Melonaires, while Prater, who had worked with the Sensational Hummingbirds, was also gospel-trained. Club-owner John Lomelo became the duo's manager and was instrumental in securing their contract with Roulette. Five singles and one album subsequently appeared between 1962 and 1964, produced by R&B veteran Henry Glover, but it was not until Jerry Wexler signed Sam And Dave to Atlantic Records that their true potential blossomed. For political reasons, their records appeared on Stax Records; they used the Memphis-based house band, while many of their strongest moments came from the Isaac Hayes/David Porter staff writing team. "You Don't Know Like I Know", "Hold On I'm Comin'" (both 1966), "Soul Man" (1967) and "I Thank You" (1968), featuring Prater's gritty delivery and Moore's higher interjections, were among the genre's finest.

When Stax and Atlantic separated in 1968, Sam And Dave reverted to the parent company, but a disintegrating personal relationship seemed to mirror their now decaying fortune. The amazing "Soul Sister, Brown Sugar' (1969) delayed the slide, but the duo split briefly the next year when Sam Moore began his own career. Three solo singles followed, but the pair were reunited by a contract with United Artists Records. A renewed profile, on the strength of the Blues Brothers" success with "Soul Man", faltered when the differences between the two men proved irreconcilable. By 1981, Moore was again pursuing an independent direction, but his sole chart success came when he was joined by Lou Reed for a remake of "Soul Man" six years later. Prater found a new foil in the "Sam" of Sam And Bill, but before they were able to consolidate this new partnership, Prater died in a car crash on 9 April 1988. Sam Moore, in the meantime, carried on working consistently all over the world, notably on luxury cruise-liners. In 2001, some master tapes of solo material recorded in 1970 were discovered and issued the following year. A fully-fledged solo album, Overnight Sensational, followed in 2006.

The best duo in the history of soul music, Sam And Dave released records that combined urgency with an unbridled passion.

THE CONTROLLERS

2008-09-16T17:15:00.000-07:00

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Biography by Ron Wynn (amg)

Alabama soul belters the Controllers began as the Epics in 1965. They became the Soul Controllers in 1970, and finally the Controllers. Reginald and Larry McArthur, Lenard Brown, and Ricky Lewis formed the lineup, and were especially effective on heartache ballads, though they also did competent up-tempo dance numbers. They relocated to Miami in the late '70s and began recording for Juana. Frederick Knight produced some of their material, including the 1977 debut LP Somebody's Gotta Win, Somebody's Gotta Lose. They enjoyed moderate success with other Juana singles and LPs, though both "Heaven Is Only One Step Away" and "We Don't" were outstanding performances. They moved to MCA in 1984. Stevie Wonder made a guest appearance on harmonica for their first MCA single, "Crushed," which reached number 30 on the R&B charts. Their biggest MCA hit was "Stay," which peaked at number 12 in 1986. They moved to Capitol in 1988, issuing Just in Time that year.

PROBLEMS WITH SOME OF MY UPLOADS:

2008-09-14T14:05:00.000-07:00

I have email from 2 people have who downloaded some stuff from me and are having problems with them.

I don't know what the problem is - there is no special encoding that I know about.

I know nothing about ITUNES - never have used it myself.

There is nothing in the files when I look at them that makes them look any different than any other music files I have put up. I have been able to change the titles, numbers, group names with no problem - I use a program called MP3 Tag to do it.

I AM SURE IF THERE WAS A PROBLEM WITH THE FILES THEY WOULD HAVE BLOWN UP MY MACHINE ALREADY - AS I HAVE HAD THE FILES SINCE 2006! They have been on 2 of my computers and moved to at least 4 different hard drives.

So here is a copy of one of the emails:
What a beautiful compilation this is! I like it a lot - just - the files are acting out.

Just like Patterson Twins, People's Choice and Five Du-Tones, there must be a hidden encoding (or something else), that prevents me from filling the fields in my playlists.

I cannot fill in name and album titel, the fields are empty, and the picture cannot be put in either.

Weird: for half a second the cover photo appears (by itself) in its window, before vanishing into nowhere.
When I try to put it back in, it will not stay. Just like all names and album titles will not stay in their fields, after I have written them in.

I don't get it! I have almost 30.000 mp3s now, and this is new to me.
I have no idea what this is. I assume it is some type of hidden encoding, but of course I don't know it really.

Does anybody else have any problems like that?

I am playing my files in itunes, and usually find that perfect.
Now, in the last album (this one), itunes even decided to close the player automatically. That NEVER hapened before - EVER!!

Should I rather delete the files? Is there a safety hazard? I am confused and a bit nervous now.
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CAN SOMEONE HELP PLEASE???

TIMI YURO

2008-09-13T22:55:00.000-07:00

Now that I have crossed the Mason - Dixon Line (so to speak) with yesterday's extravaganza (LOL) - it brings to my mind another southern type singer - from a different era ....

NOW not everyone would consider Timi a soul singer. For such a little thing, she sure had a powerful voice. I'm not really sure I consider her a soul singer myself ....
But you either love her or hate her. There are a couple of great Timi albums at Funk My Soul blog.
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THE LOST VOICE OF SOUL

"The little girl with the big voice," Timi Yuro was America's finest white soul singer of the 1960s. Her million-selling debut single, "Hurt," introduced a performer of such profound poignancy and depth that many listeners assumed she was a man, an African-American, or both, and while Yuro never again achieved the same commercial heights, her finest records deserve mention in the same breath as Aretha Franklin, Irma Thomas, and the other soul queens of the era. Born Rosemarie Timotea Aurro in Chicago on August 4, 1940, she was the product of an Italian-American family that owned a local restaurant; as a child she received voice lessons, and according to legend, her nanny also snuck her into the Windy City's legendary blues clubs, where Timi (a childhood nickname) witnessed life-altering live appearances by singers Dinah Washington and Mildred Bailey. After adopting the phonetic spelling of their surname, the Yuro family relocated to Los Angeles in 1952, where Timi studied under voice coach Dr. Lillian Goodman. By the middle of the decade, Yuro was performing in nightclubs, much to the chagrin of her parents. However, her subsequent performances at their Hollywood restaurant Alvoturnos would not only pull back the eatery from the brink of bankruptcy, but vault it into the ranks of Tinseltown's hottest destinations.

A late 1959 Alvoturnos performance convinced Liberty Records talent scout Sonny "Confidential" Knight to recommend Yuro to label head Al Bennett, who immediately offered the singer a recording contract. But Yuro found Liberty's choice of material so frustrating that after months of recording lightweight demos ill-matched to her resonant, commanding voice, she crashed a 1961 label board meeting, vowing to Bennett and his colleagues to tear up her contract if they did not let her cut more appropriate material. She then performed an a cappella reading of the 1954 Roy Hamilton R&B hit "Hurt," so impressing the Liberty brass that in June 1961 Yuro entered the studio with producer Clyde Otis to record the song for posterity. A remarkably mature and assured debut record, "Hurt" peaked at number four on the Billboard pop charts that autumn, in addition to reaching number 22 on the R&B charts. No doubt viewers on both sides of the color line were shocked when Yuro's accompanying television appearances revealed this deeply emotional ballad was the work of a 20-year-old white woman less than five feet tall. Her follow-up single, a cover of the Charlie Chaplin composition "Smile," climbed to the number 42 spot in late 1961, and Liberty wrapped up the year with the release of "I Believe," a one-off effort pairing the singer with pop heartthrob Johnnie Ray.

Yuro spent early 1962 opening for Frank Sinatra on a brief tour of Australia. While the exposure no doubt boosted her profile, it was instrumental in crystallizing the growing public perception that she was more a cabaret performer than a soul singer, an image that was further established with her fourth single, a revival of "Let Me Call You Sweetheart" that went only as high as number 66 on the pop charts but cracked the easy listening Top 20. And despite its title, Yuro's sophomore LP, Soul!, proved to be a collection of standards, although she returned to her R&B roots with the superb Drifters homage "Count Everything." During sessions for her next effort, "What's a Matter Baby," producer Otis abruptly quit Liberty, and the masters were handed to his interim replacement, Phil Spector. The completed single bears all the hallmarks of the classic Spector sound, from its elegant string arrangement to its insistent rhythm to Yuro's righteously indignant vocal, and would prove her biggest hit since "Hurt," reaching number 12 on the pop charts and number 16 on its R&B counterpart. The team of Burt Bacharach and Hal David penned Yuro's next single, "The Love of a Boy," which climbed to number 44 in early 1963. Its follow-up, "Insult to Injury," went no higher than number 81 when it hit radio a few months later.

Following Ray Charles' successful embrace of country & western material, Yuro next covered Hank Cochran's "Make the World Go Away," scoring her last significant U.S. chart hit when the single reached number 24 on the pop charts and number eight on the easy listening chart. An album of country covers, also titled Make the World Go Away, yielded two more minor hits -- "Gotta Travel On" and "Permanently Lonely" -- and in the wake of 1964's "Should I Ever Love Again," Yuro cut ties with Liberty, signing to Mercury to release "If," which stalled at number 120. Her third Mercury effort, a rendition of Roy Hamilton's "You Can Have Him," was her only release on the label to crack the Hot 100, limping to the number 96 slot in early 1965. Teddy Randazzo authored Yuro's next release, the sublime "Get Out of My Life," and while the record was a commercial stiff, its flip side, "Can't Stop Running Away," would later resurface as a favorite of Britain's Northern soul community. Yuro returned to her Italian origins with the 1965 release "Ti Credo," recorded for entry in Italy's annual San Remo Festival. Her profile back home in the U.S. was by now virtually nonexistent, however, and subsequent Mercury releases including 1966's "Don't Keep Me Lonely Too Long" and the next year's bluesy cover of Johnny "Guitar" Watson's "Cuttin' In" went nowhere.

Yuro finally returned to Liberty in early 1968, traveling to Britain to cut her proposed comeback single, "Something Bad on My Mind." The finished product was her strongest release in some time, but went nowhere. Her breathtaking theme song to the Douglas Sirk film Interlude followed, and met a similarly grim fate (although Morrissey and Siouxie Sioux covered the tune a quarter century later); "It'll Never Be Over for Me" also stiffed, but also became a Northern soul perennial, with original copies changing hands for over 100 pounds a copy. A concert LP, Live at PJ's, was scheduled for release in the summer of 1969, but withdrawn just days prior to hitting retail. Yuro again left Liberty soon after, this time relocating to Las Vegas and starting a family. She performed only sporadically in the decade to follow, briefly resurfacing in 1975 on the short-lived Playboy label with "Southern Lady," which stalled at the number 108 spot. For Willie Mitchell's Frequency imprint, Yuro cut a stunning cover of Toussaint McCall's "Nothing Takes the Place of You" in 1979. A year later, she was diagnosed with throat cancer, but recovered to cut several LPs for the Dutch market as well as 1982's Timi Yuro Today, produced and financed by longtime friend Willie Nelson. Two years later she was forced to undergo a tracheotomy operation, effectively ending her singing career. She died March 30, 2004, at the age of 63.
Biography by Jason Ankeny (Allmusic)

RICK LAWSON

2008-09-12T15:33:00.001-07:00

Daddy B. Nice's #68 ranked Southern Soul Artist

The fourteenth of fifteen children born near Raymond, Mississippi, Rick Lawson was a musical child prodigy whose uncle, Willie Banks, was known as "The Godfather of Gospel." Rick Lawson recorded his first single, a gospel song, at the age of ten, and by the age of sixteen had recorded his first album with his own gospel group, the Gospel Carriers.

Lawson began singing R&B professionally with the Jackson-area Mighty Upsetters Dance Band in the early 90's, and in 1994 was proclaimed Jackson's "Most Outstanding New Artist Of The Year." His first CD, 24/7, debuted in 2001 on Ecko Records. The title track was a cover of Tyrone Davis's "Kiss You (Where I Miss You)."

Lawson, known as the "The Babe Of The Blues," followed up with Pride & Joy in 2002, I Wanna Have Some Fun in 2003, and Ladies Night in 2004.

All were produced at Ecko Records by Southern Soul's prolific hit-maker, John Ward. Another Ecko label mate, O. B. Buchana, recorded "Both In The Wrong," a Raymond Moore/John Ward composition first recorded by Lawson on his 24-7 CD, on Buchana's 2004 Ecko release, Shake What You Got. A new Rick Lawson album, Sexified is anticipated.

Song's Transcendent Moment

"This is the party.
This is the place.
Everywhere I turn,
There was booty shaking in my face."

Tidbits

Dec. 7, 2005. Sexified (Ecko), Rick Lawson's newest CD, came out in the fall of 2005. "Freak Cowboy" entered playlists across the chitlin' circuit as the disc's favored radio single.

Nov. 26, 2006. Rick Lawson's Sexified has been a veritable Thanksgiving feast of radio singles. In the year since its release the LP has spawned at least three solid chitlin' circuit singles in roughly this sequence: "Freak Cowboy," "If You Hit It," and "She Was Cheating Better Than Me."

A couple of Reviews:
If it ain't broke don't fix it. Lawson is back serving up smooth Southern Soul and booty-wigglin' dance. "Slow Walk" was a huge hit down South. "It's Party Time" pops up again (seems to be a bad habit carrying a song over from a previous album). "I Don't Wanna Be Here" is a moody slow grinder about a breakup and "You Are My Friend" is a sweet slowie.

"Ladies Night" (Ecko 2004)

*** Ecko Records out of Memphis, Tennesee has been producing some of the best party soul & blues on the chitlin circuit since 1997 and the latest release by Rick Lawson proves they still have life left in the formula of mostly programmed uptempo dance tracks, upbeat southern soul and slow jams. Out of all the many Tyrone Davis imitators perhaps Rick Lawson is the most obvious- even using Tyrone's favorite vocal filler ("well"). LADIES NIGHT makes its intentions known right from the opening head-bobber "This Is The Party", one of three songs with the word "party" in the title. (also "Juke Joint Party" & "All Night Party Mood"). As is custom in the genre several of the songs are derivative of other southern soul songs, The great "I Found Me A Sure Thing" is a kissing cousin to "I Got A Sure Thing" and "I'm In A Steppin' Mood" is nearly identical to R. Kelly's "Step In The Name Of Love". Quinn Golden's recent hit "Bottoms Up" is reworked as "Bottoms Up Again". The dilemma of having "a girlfriend, a woman and a wife" crops up again on "Too Tight Too Close". Despite the formulaic sound and spirit- (and typical "cheating" subject matter)-thi
s new Ecko release it still feels fresh and keeps the party going.

"Sexified" (Ecko 2005)

*** There are two types of Southern Soul/Urban Blues: "Organic" (live musicians) and "Synthetic" (programming, sequencing). While Organic is normally to be preferred, the Synthetic sound has a life on it's own. I used to be a snob- reticent to programming but now I like it equal. This new Ecko Records release is actually a combination of live players and programming and it is excellent. Lawson is a good Tyrone Davis-disciple and has the benefit of a big production. "Sexified" is his fifth disc and may be his best. This is party soul exemplified like the shuffle bumpin' radio candy "I'm Your Man In The Streets" that opens the disc. Next up is the funky "Freak Cowboy" with Rick saying he needs a real horse not just a "pony" (you hear that Sheba Potts-Wright?). The retro-disco "Heavenly Lady" evokes the spirit of Barry White and the Love Unlimited Orchestra and is one of the brightest spots. A yearning vocal and sweet refrain. One of the key ingredients on this project is Morris J. Williams- giving mo' flavor to the aging Ecko sound. Williams plays synthesizer, sings backing vocals and creates some of the rhythm tracks on this release- he even co-wrote 8 of the 11 cuts here- most notably the grinding booty shaker "Shake What You Got" (not the O.B. Buchana hit) and "Baby Mama Drama". On The latter Lawson complains he's got 5 babies by three different women..but wait! There's two more on the way! I think he should take Frankie Lee's advice from "The Ladies And The Babies"! ("If you can't afford to help support the babies/You better think twice before you grab the lady!") More woman issues crop up on "That Boogie Bear". Even though his woman is playing him for a fool he sho'nuff can't resist that "booger bear". The cut also features some tight drums via Curtis Steele. "She Was Cheatin' Better Than Me" borrows the "Booty Scoot" bassline and is a potential hit single on an album with commercial appeal. Yep, "Just Another Juke Joint Party" indeed.

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Sexified: Review

Rick Lawson has the sweet Motown-inspired vocal style of one of the great soul groups of the late '60s and early '70s, not at all unlike Cuba Gooding of the Main Ingredient or General Johnson of the Chairmen of the Board. Unlike the comparatively chaste lyrical stance of those groups, however, Lawson is not at all above singing choruses like "I'm your freak cowboy" or delivering an R. Kelly-style wry psychodrama like "Baby Mama Drama." The tunes on Sexified don't have a bit of hip-hop influence other than the unabashedly frank (but never cheaply vulgar) lyrical topics, however. Although the arrangements feature modern synths as much as they do vintage wah-wah guitar, this is proudly retro-soul, providing richly melodic settings as well as deep grooves. The closing "She Was Cheatin' Better Than Me" is a particularly choice near-classic of the style, but there's not a dud to be found on this album. ~ Stewart Mason, All Music Guide All Music Guide

LEST THE WORLD FORGETS

2008-09-11T16:05:00.001-07:00

24 CANADIANS KILLED IN THE TOWERS ON SEPTEMBER 11TH.

ALMOST 100 CANADIAN PEACEKEEPERS have died ...

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OVER 200 people come out Saturday on a Whitby, Ontario, bridge to pay respects to a convoy for three of our fallen soldiers.

The ritual is repeated every time a fallen soldier returns to Canada.

On Saturday night, as three bodies moved down the 100-mile-long section of Highway 401 that connects the military base in Trenton, Ontario, to the morgue in Toronto, dozens of bridges along the way were packed with people.

RASPUTIN STASH

2008-09-10T16:11:00.000-07:00

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Biography by Andy Kellman (AMG)
The brainchild of session musician Martin Dumas Jr., Rasputin's Stash was a '70s soul/funk ensemble from the Windy City of Chicago, IL. In the early '70s, Dumas assembled an eight-piece group out of fellow session regulars from the city. Signed early on to the Cotillion label, the group released a self-titled album in 1971 and gradually lost half of their members by the time they recorded their second album for Gemigo, a subsidiary of Curtis Mayfield's Curtom imprint. The quartet -- Dumas, Ernest Frank Donaldson, Bruce Butler, and Paul Coleman -- shed the possessive of their band name for another self-titled album, released in 1974. Gemigo eventually went under, and the group was shifted over to Curtom proper for a pair of singles released in the latter part of the decade: "Dance With Me" was released as r-Stash in 1977, and "Booty March" was released as Stash the year following. In a distribution switch that saw Curtom move from Warner Bros. to RSO, the label's roster was gutted and Stash was one of the victims. After that, the group opted to quit, but not before they did plenty of shows in New York and their hometown, where they were most appreciated. Throughout the years, Rasputin's Stash and all its following incarnations endured as rare groove favorites. In 2000, the U.K.-based Sequel label issued The Devil Made Me Do It, a CD compilation of the group's Gemigo material, including several unreleased cuts that were intended for their third album.

Review by Andy Kellman (AMG)

This disc, released with the help of Castle Music U.K. in 2000, compiles all of Rasputin Stash's Gemigo-era material and adds some previously unreleased material to sweeten the deal. The group featured experienced session musicians who knew how to lay down some loose soul/funk in the vein of early Kool & the Gang, the Meters, and the J.B.'s, while remaining true to their Chicago roots. The lyrical content is limited to getting high and making love, but there's plenty within the grooves -- full of slick keyboard work, down-and-dirty basslines, nimble percussion, and the occasional accent of strings -- to keep the mind from wandering. Devout fans of all things '70s Chicago would no doubt enjoy this.

PEOPLE'S CHOICE

2008-09-10T16:04:00.000-07:00

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Biography by Ron Wynn (AMG)
Vocalist/keyboardist Frank Brunson formed People's Choice in Philadelphia in the early '70s. Drummer/percussionist David Thompson, vocalists Valerie Brown and Marc Reed, guitarists Darnell Jordan and Johnnie Hightower, keyboardists Clifton Gamble and Bill Rodgers, and bassist/vocalist Stanley Thomas were in the original lineup. Despite the vocalists, the group's biggest hits were instrumentals. They were signed to Philadelphia International and worked with Leon Huff on the funk and disco gem "Do It Any Way You Wanna," among the great pieces of '70s Philly dance music. It was their lone R&B chart-topper, and it peaked at number 11 on the pop charts in 1975. They previously recorded for Phil-L.A., and "I Likes to Do It" had reached number nine in 1971. They remained on Philadelphia International until 1982, when they recorded for TPC. They also issued one LP on Mercury, Strikin', in 1984.

Review by Alex Henderson

If you asked five different R&B experts what the first disco songs were, you might get five different answers. It has been argued that the disco beat was born in Philadelphia in 1972, when Jerry Butler recorded his fast, ultra-danceable version of the Kenny Gamble/Leon Huff classic "One Night Affair" (which had been previously recorded by the O'Jays in 1969). Even if Butler's hit wasn't the very first disco single, it was definitely among the first. It's inaccurate to give Philly all the credit for disco's birth -- Isaac Hayes and Barry White, neither of whom are Philadelphians, have been exalted as two of disco's early architects -- but the city deserves some of the credit. When Philly soul gave way to Philly disco-soul, one of the groups that got in on the action was the People's Choice. The group's 1975 smash "Do It Any Way You Wanna" is a definitive example of Philly dance music, as are several other disco-funk gems on Boogie Down U.S.A., including "Party Is a Groovy Thing" and the clever "Nursery Rhymes." However, not everything on this 1975 LP (which was produced by Gamble & Huff at Philly's legendary Sigma Sound Studios) is dance-oriented. The playful "Are You Sure" and the ballad "Don't Send Me Away" are pure Philly soul, and the instrumental "Mickey D's" contains jazz overtones. Without question, Boogie Down U.S.A. is the most essential LP that the People's Choice recorded in the '70s.

THE ETHICS

2008-09-10T01:08:00.001-07:00

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Biography by Steve Leggett
Formed in 1967 in Philadelphia by Ron Tyson, Joe Freeman, Carl Enlow, and Andrew Collins, the Ethics combined Motown-styled songs with sweeping string and horn arrangements in a nascent version of what would come to be known as the Philly sound. Led by Tyson's considerable songwriting skills and Eddie Kendricks-like tenor, the group recorded for independent labels Wale, Kent, and Golden Fleece, turning out songs like "Standing in the Darkness" and "I Want My Baby Back" that certainly deserved a wider audience than they received. Working with Vince Montana's rhythms and Thom Bell's sophisticated horn and string arrangements, the Ethics were truthfully just a little ahead of their time. The Ethics had split by the time the 1970s dawned, and they watched from the sidelines while newer Northern soul groups like the O'Jays followed the same template to massive success. Tyson later joined the reconstituted Temptations put together by Otis Williams.

Review by Andrew Hamilton

Ronald Tyson-Presson, Joe Freeman, Carl Enlow and Andrew Collins were the Ethics, a quartet of lead singers with Philly roots. Tyson-Presson went on to sing with Love Committee before striking gold with the Temptations, where's he's the longest running member next to Otis Williams. The versatile falsetto is also a noted songwriter with eight pages of titles listed with Broadcast Music Incorporated. "Sad Sad Story," led by Tyson-Presson's delicate falsetto is a heart tugger that did well in Philly and along the East Coast. The clattering "I Want My Baby Back" and "Standing in the Darkness" features a rough tenor. A classy tenor/baritone is out front on "Nothing Too Good for My Baby" (a lilting, midtempo floater) and "Every Night and Day." "Tell Me," their biggest record, is choice sweet Philly soul; each Ethic sings some lead lines on a song that may well have inspired Blue Magic's sound. The subtle grace of "Searching" grows on you. The Ethics excel when Tyson-Presson leads, and "That's the Way Love Goes" is no exception -- the beat ballad has heavy doo wop influences. Tyson-Presson sounds like an innocent adolescent on the lilting "Think About Tomorrow," whose lyrics were obviously motivated by the Temptations' "Fading Away." In the skittish "Closer and Closer," a tenor testifies against sparse instrumentation and rah rah backing vocals. "Look at Me Now" hooks you from the start; a tenor convincingly sings of how his life has improved since finding his Boo. They close with the appropriate "Farewell," a killer ballad that Tyson-Presson juices along with a tenor a la Eddie Kendricks and David Ruffin. While some material is weak, their singing abilities are unquestionable. Unfortunately, Collectables Records did a miserable packaging job, there are no songwriters' credits and the bio is skimpy.

THE FOUR TOPS

2008-09-09T22:35:00.000-07:00

One of my friends really likes the song Indestructible - so here's 20 other tunes to go with it!! LOL

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Biography by Steve Huey

The Four Tops' story is one of longevity and togetherness: these Motown legends teamed up in high school and spent over four decades without a single personnel change. In between, they became one of the top-tier acts on a label with no shortage of talent, ranking with the Temptations and the Supremes as Motown's most consistent hitmakers. Where many other R&B vocal groups spotlighted a tenor-range lead singer, the Four Tops were fronted by deep-voiced Levi Stubbs, who never cut a solo record outside of the group. Stubbs had all the grit of a pleading, wailing, gospel-trained soul belter, but at the same time, the Tops' creamy harmonies were smooth enough for Motown's radio-friendly pop-soul productions. From 1964-1967, the Four Tops recorded some of the Holland-Dozier-Holland team's greatest compositions, including "Reach Out, I'll Be There," "I Can't Help Myself (Sugar Pie, Honey Bunch)," "Standing in the Shadows of Love," "Bernadette," and "Baby I Need Your Loving." The group's fortunes took a downturn when their chief source of material left the label, but they enjoyed a renaissance in the early '70s, which saw them switching to the ABC-Dunhill imprint. Regardless of commercial fortunes, they kept on performing and touring, scoring the occasional comeback hit.

The Four Tops began life in 1953 (some accounts say 1954), when all of the members were attending Detroit-area high schools. Levi Stubbs and Abdul "Duke" Fakir went to Pershing, and met Northern students Renaldo "Obie" Benson and Lawrence Payton at a friend's birthday party, where the quartet first sang together. Sensing an immediate chemistry, they began rehearsing together and dubbed themselves the Four Aims. Payton's cousin Roquel Davis, a budding songwriter who sometimes sang with the group during its early days, helped them get an audition with Chess Records in 1956. Although Chess was more interested in Davis, who went on to become Berry Gordy's songwriting partner, they also signed the Four Aims, who became the Four Tops to avoid confusion with the Ames Brothers. The Four Tops' lone Chess single, "Kiss Me Baby," was an unequivocal flop, and the group moved on to similarly brief stints at Red Top and Riverside. They signed with Columbia in 1960 and were steered in a more upscale supper-club direction, singing jazz and pop standards. This too failed to break them, although they did tour with Billy Eckstine during this period.

In 1963, the Four Tops signed with longtime friend Berry Gordy's new label, specifically the jazz-oriented Workshop subsidiary. They completed a debut LP, to be called Breaking Through, but Gordy scrapped it and switched their style back to R&B, placing them on Motown with the Holland-Dozier-Holland songwriting team. After a full decade in existence, the Four Tops finally notched their first hit in 1964 with "Baby I Need Your Loving," which just missed the pop Top Ten. Early 1965 brought the follow-up ballad hit "Ask the Lonely," and from then on there was no stopping them. "I Can't Help Myself (Sugar Pie, Honey Bunch)" went all the way to number one that spring, and the follow-up "It's the Same Old Song" reached the Top Five. The hits continued into 1966, with "Something About You" "Shake Me, Wake Me (When It's Over)," and "Loving You Is Sweeter Than Ever" all coming in succession. The fall of 1966 brought the group's masterpiece in the form of the virtual soul symphony "Reach Out, I'll Be There"; not only did it become their second number one pop hit, it also wound up ranking as the creative peak of the group's career and one of Motown's finest singles ever. During this period, the Tops also earned a reputation as one of Motown's best live acts, having previously honed their performances for years before hitting the big time.

The Four Tops kicked off 1967 with the dramatic Top Ten smash "Standing in the Shadows of Love," which was followed by the Top Five "Bernadette." "7-Rooms of Gloom" and "You Keep Running Away" reached the Top 20, but toward the end of the year, Holland-Dozier-Holland left Motown over a financial dispute, which didn't bode well for the Four Tops' impressive hit streak. Their next two hits, 1968's "Walk Away Renee" and "If I Were a Carpenter," were both covers of well-known recent songs (by the Left Banke and Tim Hardin, respectively), and while both made the Top 20, they heralded a rough couple of years where top-drawer material was in short supply. They enjoyed a resurgence in 1970 under producer Frank Wilson, who helmed a hit cover of the Tommy Edwards pop standard "It's All in the Game" and a ballad co-written by Smokey Robinson, "Still Water (Love)." The Tops also recorded with the post-Diana Ross Supremes, scoring a duet hit with a cover of "River Deep-Mountain High" in 1971.

When Motown moved its headquarters to Los Angeles in 1972, the Four Tops parted ways with the company, choosing to remain in their hometown of Detroit. They signed with ABC-Dunhill and were teamed with producers/songwriters Dennis Lambert and Brian Potter, who did their best to re-create the group's trademark Motown sound. The immediate result was "Keeper of the Castle," the Four Tops' first Top Ten hit in several years. They followed it in early 1973 with "Ain't No Woman (Like the One I've Got)," a gold-selling smash that proved to be their final Top Five pop hit. That year they also recorded the theme song to the film Shaft in Africa, "Are You Man Enough." Several more R&B chart hits followed over the next few years, with the last being 1976's "Catfish"; after a final ABC album in 1978, the Tops largely disappeared from sight before resurfacing on Casablanca in 1981. Incredibly, their first single, "When She Was My Girl," went all the way to number one on the R&B charts, just missing the pop Top Ten. The accompanying album, Tonight!, became their last to hit the Top 40.

The Four Tops rejoined Motown in 1983, the year of the company's 25th anniversary, and toured extensively with the Temptations. They also recorded a couple albums of new material that failed to sell well, and wound up leaving Motown amid confusion over proper musical direction. Meanwhile, Levi Stubbs provided the voice for Audrey the man-eating plant in the film version of Little Shop of Horrors. The Four Tops next caught on with Arista, where in 1988 they scored their last Top 40 pop hit, the aptly titled "Indestructible." The Four Tops were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1990, and continued to tour the oldies circuit. In 1997, Lawrence Payton passed away due to cancer of the liver, which proved to be the only thing that could break up the Four Tops. After some consideration, the remaining members hired Theo Peoples to take Payton's place on tour.

THE SPINNERS

2008-09-08T20:13:00.001-07:00

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Biography by Stephen Thomas Erlewine

The Spinners were the greatest soul group of the early '70s, creating a body of work that defined the lush, seductive sound of Philly soul. Ironically, the band's roots lay in Detroit, where they formed as a doo wop group during the late '50s. Throughout the '60s, the Spinners tried to land a hit by adapting to the shifting fashions of R&B and pop. By the mid-'60s, they had signed with Motown Records, but the label never gave the group much consideration. "It's a Shame" became a hit in 1970, but the label continued to ignore the group, and dropped the band two years later. Unsigned and featuring new lead singer Phillipe Wynne, the Spinners seemed destined to never break into the big leagues, but they managed to sign with Atlantic Records, where they began working with producer Thom Bell. With his assistance, the Spinners developed a distinctive sound, one that relied on Wynne's breathtaking falsetto and the group's intricate vocal harmonies. Bell provided the group with an appropriately detailed production, creating a detailed web of horns, strings, backing vocals, and lightly funky rhythms. Between 1972 and 1977, the Spinners and Bell recorded a number of soul classics, including "I'll Be Around," "Could It Be I'm Fallin in Love," "Mighty Love," "Ghetto Child," "Then Came You," "Games People Play," and "The Rubberband Man." Wynne left in 1977 and the Spinners had hits for a few years after his departure, but the group will always be remembered for its classic mid-'70s work.

Originally, called the Domingoes, the Spinners formed when the quintet were high school students in the Detroit suburb of Ferndale in 1957. At the time, the group featured Bobbie Smith, Pervis Jackson, George W. Dixon, Billy Henderson, and Henry Fambrough. Four years later, they came to the attention of producer Harvey Fuqua, who began recording the group -- who were now called the Spinners -- for his Tri-Phi Records. The band's first single, "That's What Girls Are Made For," became a Top Ten R&B hit upon its 1961 release and featured Smith on vocals. Following its release, Dixon was replaced by Edgar "Chico" Edwards. Over the next few years, the group released a series of failed singles, and when Tri-Phi was bought out by Motown in the mid-'60s, the Spinners became part of the larger company's roster. By that time, Edwards had been replaced by G.C. Cameron.

Though the Spinners had some R&B hits at Motown during the late '60s, including "I'll Always Love You" and "Truly Yours," they didn't have a genuine crossover success until 1970, when Stevie Wonder gave the group "It's a Shame." Motown never concentrated on the Spinners, and they let the group go in 1972. Before the band signed with Atlantic Records, Phillipe Wynne replaced Cameron as the group's lead vocalist. Wynne had previously sung with Catfish and Bootsy Collins.

At Atlantic Records, the Spinners worked with producer Thom Bell, who gave the group a lush, seductive sound, complete with sighing strings, a tight rhythm section, sultry horns, and a slight funk underpinning. Wynne quickly emerged as a first-rate soul singer, and the combination of the group's harmonies, Wynne's soaring leads, and Bell's meticulous production made the Spinners the most popular soul group of the '70s. Once the group signed with Atlantic, they became a veritable hit machine, topping the R&B and pop charts with songs like "I'll Be Around," "Could It Be I'm Falling in Love," "One of a Kind (Love Affair)," "Ghetto Child," "Rubberband Man," and "You're Throwing a Good Love Away." Not only were their singles hits, but their albums constantly went gold and charted in the Top 20.

Wynne left the band to pursue a solo career in 1977; he was replaced by John Edwards. Though none of Wynne's solo records were big hits, his tours with Parliament-Funkadelic were well-received, as were his solo concerts. In October 1984, he died of a heart attack during a concert in Oakland, CA. The Spinners, meanwhile, had a number of minor hits in the late '70s, highlighted by their disco covers of "Working My Way Back to You" and the medley "Cupid/I've Loved You for a Long Time." During the early '80s, they had several minor hits before fading away from the charts and entering the oldies circuit, reprising their earlier material for 1999's new studio effort At Their Best.

THE O'JAYS

2008-09-05T09:30:00.000-07:00

Soul Sounds

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Review by Andrew Hamilton

Some classic early O'Jays when the Canton, OH natives were a quintet. Most of these recordings were big hits in Cleveland and certain other localities, but never achieved mass appeal. "How Does It Feel" and its flip "Crack Up Laughing" were number one on Cleveland's WJMO for nearly two months. "Lonely Drifter" and "Stand In For Love" were also huge. I witnessed a live recording of "Stand In For Love" at the now-defunct Leo's Casino in the '60s; Minit released both versions, but the studio version achieved more play. "Lipstick Traces," with Walter Williams leading (Ed Levert hated the song and refused to do it), is the best-known recording on this set; Walt sings the country-flavored offering in a straight baritone reminiscent of Johnny Cash. William Powell displays his babe-magnet falsetto on the uptempo "Working On Your Case" and the dreamy, aching "Oh How You Hurt Me" -- both were very popular in the Cleveland area. For many, these are the O'Jay sides to kill for.

CONDOLENCES

2008-09-03T23:56:00.000-07:00

As many of you already know Chris Rich's (a brotha' blogger) - Grandma has been very ill.

Unfortunately, she has passed away.

I would like to offer my heartfelt condolences to him and his family at this very sad and difficult time.
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THUMP - OLD SCHOOL LOVE SONGS

2008-09-03T22:20:00.000-07:00

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*This is not my rip." This ia a 7 cd set - that has drifted around the 'net off and on for a few years. But if you like 'old school' - nice to have in your collection.

STAX - DOES THE BEATLES

2008-09-03T14:40:00.001-07:00

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The interplay of music and race in the Sixties is usually perceived as a one-way street — white musicians drawing on (or, worse, ripping off) the songs and styles of black artists. Stax Does the Beatles demonstrates that the influence occasionally ran in the other direction, to delightful effect.

A hotbed of funk intensity, the Memphis-based Stax label housed a stable of hit-makers who wrote and produced their own material, but were also keen interpreters. In the Beatles, artists like Otis Redding, Booker T. Jones and Isaac Hayes heard terrific songs that they could put their own imprint on. They also heard a route to musical experimentation and a potentially larger audience.

Redding's combustible version of "Day Tripper" (a 1966 single included here in an alternate version) dispenses with verses and choruses, while supercharging the song's killer riff. Hayes, meanwhile, transforms George Harrison's "Something" into an eleven-minute psychedelic extravaganza. Booker T. and the MG's combine soul and mystery in their instrumental readings of "Eleanor Rigby," "Lady Madonna" and "Michelle." MG's guitarist Steve Cropper takes "With a Little Help From My Friends" as the occasion for both melodic, jazz-style exploration and roaring fuzz-tone leads.

Beatles songs, alas, could also be seen as the route to lucrative supper-club bookings, an ambition evident in Carla Thomas's overwrought version of "Yesterday." But Stax Does the Beatles documents the meeting of world-class talents. The whole may not be greater than the sum of its incomparable parts, but it's certainly worthy of them.

RALPH GRAHAM

2008-09-02T19:52:00.000-07:00

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The history of Soul Music over the past 40 years is full of stories of talented artists like Ralph Graham having brief moments of popularity, but never reaching the level of success to make a lifelong career of music.
Fortunately, there are stories of second chances where talent ultimately found an audience, and that is the developing story of Ralph Graham.

Known more as a songwriter than as a singer, Graham had three moderately successful albums on RCA in the early 70s. However, other artists, from Thelma Houston to Patti LaBelle found meaning in the subtle melodies and deep, introspective
lyrics of Graham's work, with a half dozen artists covering his biggest song, "Differently." Unfortunately, tragedy struck Graham's family, as the death of his wife led him to give up the music business to raise his children. That appeared to be the last we'd hear of Ralph Graham.

Buoyed by friends and fans, after a 15 year absence, Graham returned to music. He began again playing various nightclubs in New England over the course of the last few years, and has since started to write and record again.
by Chris Rizik - Soul Tracks

Dusty Groove Says:

Very interesting soul material from this enigmatic singer. Ralph had a righteous approach that mixed larger arrangements with a folksy style -- in an overall effect that was a few parts Terry Callier, a few parts late Jerry Butler, and a few parts Grady Tate -- but which had an approach that was really all its own. The record is almost heading into the folk-funk realm, but the orchestrations are a bit too lush -- although nice! Some tracks were produced by Clayton Ivey, and titles include "Stay On The Good Side", "Differently", "I Don't Want To Play This Game", "My Love Goes With You", and "Ain't No Need".
© 1996-2008, Dusty Groove America, Inc.

JIMMY LEWIS

2008-09-01T13:12:00.001-07:00

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Jimmy Lewis
Daddy B. Nice's #41 ranked Southern Soul Artist
Portrait of Jimmy Lewis by Daddy B. Nice

(90's – 00's)

Like the recording artist and songwriter Bob Dylan, Jimmy Lewis has only occasionally been the best performer of his own work. Routinely beginning with an almost lazy-sounding rhythm, Lewis-arranged tracks tend to be easy-going exercises more akin to demos than impressive finished product. And anyone who follows Southern Soul knows that the quality of a Jimmy Lewis vocal won't soon have O.B. Buchana or Robert "The Duke" Tillman casting paranoid looks over their shoulders.

But with those warts on the table, it bears saying that Jimmy Lewis is arguably the most prolific composer in Southern Soul. He wrote Peggy Scott-Adam's one-of-a-kind secular sermonette, "I'm Willing To Be A Friend," not to mention "Bill," the early-nineties crossover hit that made Scott-Adams a household name throughout the South.

Poonanny, the renowned folklorist of the chitlin' circuit, wasted no time putting out a cover of Lewis' 2001 song "That Baby Ain't Black Enough."

"That baby ain't black enough.
The baby's eyes are green.
See if you got another baby back there,
Nice and dark like me."

Poonanny didn't just go through the motions with "That Baby Ain't Black Enough," either. He grabbed the Jimmy Lewis song by the throat and shook it.

"Ain't nobody in my family ever had green eyes. Both my eyes are brown.
They may be bloodshot, but they're brown.
The more I think about it,
That old mailman of mine
Is light-skinned with curly hair and green eyes
And when I came home one day
He had his shoes off."

The virtue of a Jimmy Lewis song is its willingness to go where other songwriters are too timid or politically correct to venture. This, after all, is the composer who wrote for Peggy Scott-Adams to sing:

"Don't care how he looks,
But he got to be clean.
No dirty bottoms.
Girls, you know what I mean."
(From Scott-Adams' "Sweaty Men")

Jimmy Lewis compositions attract material-hungry artists like kittens to catnip. This was never more evident than with "(Lies) You Said It, No I Didn't." First issued on Lewis' 2002 CD Communication (Mardi Gras Records), the original featured a duet with Natisse "Bambi" Jones that, predictably, few people noticed. But less than a year later The Love Doctor, aided by Thomisine Anderson, re-tooled the song into a passionate masterpiece of Southern Soul that dominated chitlin' circuit airwaves for months.

Another Lewis song, "Don't Send A Girl To Do A Woman's Job" (from the CD Soupbone, Mardi Gras, 2003) displays the give-and-take between a brazen girl and a skeptical older man. She wants to borrow a hundred dollars and when Lewis demurs, she says, "Why Mr. Jimmy, don't I look like I have enough assets and collateral? You'll get your money back, one way or the other."

He tells her he'd prefer to get it in cash, and besides, he says, "You ain't ready for prime time. . .I got my eye on your momma. . . I prefer experience over youth."

"Just because there's snow on the roof,
That don't mean there's no fire in the furnace."

Lewis is nothing if not prolific. The number of songs he's composed must number in the hundreds. "Still Wanna Be Black Again" (from Best of Miss Butch, 1999) is a worthy successor to Syl Johnson's Southern Soul classic, "Is It Because I'm Black."

Lewis has even done Christmas classics, most notably the funny "Wild Horses, Two Mules And A Tractor," in which Jimmy and longtime peer Billy Ray Charles are jailed for a 'DWB'--"driving while black."

In "Betty This And Betty That" a guy warns his lady that her girlfriend isn't what she thinks:

"It's Betty this and Betty that.
When you leave the room,
Betty pulls up her dress.
It's Betty this and Betty that.
When you turn your back,
Betty shows me her breast."

Musically, it may be the best of Lewis' songs. It has a good melody, and the arrangement is about as perfect as a Jimmy Lewis song gets. "That Baby Ain't Black Enough," however, remains Lewis's most outrageous and memorable. It's virtually impossible to listen to without smiling.

One word of caution. Pull out the rocking chair when you listen to Lewis. If you need energy, power, and speed in your music, listen to Peggy Scott-Adams doing Jimmy Lewis compositions. But if you're in a laid-back mood, and especially if you're into contemporary black folk "ways," you've hit the jackpot.

--Daddy B. Nice

About Jimmy Lewis

Jimmy Lewis was born in 1939 in Nashville, Tennessee. He recorded a dozen singles in the 1960's, including a duet with Ray Charles, but he soon found that his compositional skills were much more in demand. Based in Los Angeles, he continued composing for Ray Charles and other artists. In the 80's he wrote many of Z.Z. Hill's best songs for Mississippi's Malaco Records. He reunited with Ray Charles again in the 90's.

It was also in the 90's that Lewis began his stint as primary writer, arranger and producer for Peggy Scott-Adams. His easy-going style meshed perfectly with Scott-Adams' hard-hitting style, and the collaboration resulted in a string of Southern Soul hits that as much as any other song-producing team defined the sound of Southern Soul from the mid-nineties into the new millennium.

As a musical entrepreneur, Lewis has been a human dynamo. Besides writing, arranging and producing Scott-Adams and other artists for his Miss Butch label, Lewis has cranked out solo Jimmy Lewis CD's regularly through the 90's and 00's.

Despite limited "pipes," Lewis has won over chitlin' circuit deejays and fans by composing colorful, culturally "incorrect" portraits of real life, and novelty songs enriched with modern-day folklore. Today he's regarded as perhaps the foremost storyteller in contemporary Southern Soul rhythm and blues.

Song's Transcendent Moment

"I should be a happy guy,
But when they showed me the baby,
I wanted to cry."

Tidbits
Towards the end of 2004, Southern Soul deejays began using the phrase "the late great Jimmy Lewis." Jimmy Lewis entered "Soul Heaven" on September 10, 2004. May he rest (and play) in peace.

SAM DEES

2008-08-31T16:58:00.000-07:00

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Sam Dees (born December 17, 1945 in Birmingham, Alabama USA) is a soul singer, songwriter and producer.

Dees was born into a large family and quickly distinguished himself with his voice. At the age of 9, already champion of several singing contests, he founded his own vocal group, the "Bossanovians". As a teenager he traveled to perform and, in 1968 he recorded his first single at Nashville, Tennessee's SSS International. He put out his next few singles on Birmingham-based Lolo Records. At the same time he was beginning to earn respect as a writer and producer. Chess Records producer Lenny Sachs gave him an opportunity to self-produce two singles on the Chess label, which Dees recorded in a former church in Birmingham. From there he began recording for Atlantic, which released his landmark album The Show Must Go On in 1975.

Since then, Dees recording career moved to the back burner while he wrote hits for other singers, such as "Am I Dreaming" (Atlantic Starr), "One in a Million You" (Larry Graham), "Save the Overtime (For Me)" (Gladys Knight), "Love All the Hurt Away" (George Benson and Aretha Franklin), and "Lover for Life" (Whitney Houston). He released a solo single titled "After All" in 1989, but it only peaked at #95 in the UK.

Dees continues to write and produce. He released recordings on his own Pen Pad label and also recorded for Ardent Records in England - not to be confused with Ardent Records of Memphis, Tennessee. Another English label, Kent Records, has released early unissued recordings which earned high reviews in the European market.

Other previously unissued recordings from the early 1970s are planned for release by Selecta Records whose parent company Millbrand Music control the copyrights to many of Sam's early songs.

His song ‘Lonely for you baby’ was used and referenced in the cult British surf movie, Blue Juice.

"Sam Dees is something else, A prolific writer who has turned out hits for ZZ Hill, Clarence Carter, and the Persuaders, to name a few, he has now decided to do a
few himself. Not since Jerry Butler have I heard anyone handle ballads with such feeling, such empathy. When he sings of the pangs of unrequited love, it's an emotion
with which all of us can identify, and his great talent which will guarentee him longevity and stardom."
- G.Fitz Bartley (East Coast Editor, Soul Publications
Swing Magazine)

ROSIE & THE ORIGINALS

2008-08-31T14:12:00.000-07:00

Time to change it up a little - after all it's the long weekend - so here for you doo-woppers:

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Biography by Richie Unterberger (amg)
Rosie & the Originals are one of the best-remembered one-shot artists of the early rock era, getting to number five with their 1960 single "Angel Baby." A slow, simple, and primitively recorded and executed doo wop-shaded ballad, it was distinguished from countless other records of the sort by 15-year-old Rosie Hamlin's unnaturally high, thin voice, which got higher-than-high on the periodic wordless "ooh, ooh-oohs" that served as the record's primary hooks.

The single's gotten more notoriety than might be expected considering that the group never had another Top 40 hit. John Lennon cited Rosie as one of his favorite singers in a 1969 interview in Life magazine, and recorded the song in the mid-'70s for his Rock 'n' Roll oldies collection, although that track wasn't issued until the mid-'80s. In an essay in Rock Almanac, Mark Sten even described the song as "generating a robot mantra devoid of embellishment or variation, the perfect underpinning for Rosie's piercing, disembodied-siren vocal. With 'Angel Baby,' rock had regressed as far as it could, some nameless dread loosed within the collective Top 40 mind had run its course and spent itself in a lost mournful wail. 'Angel Baby' was the final moonlit flowering of rock's medieval phase, paean to a purity and innocence on longer possible in the real world."

The band certainly had no thoughts of inviting such intellectual commentary when they formed in San Diego in 1960. Unable to find a recording studio in San Diego, they cut "Angel Baby" in a barn-like building in the farming town of San Marcos, with a radically different B-side, "Give Me Love," with a vocal by Bluford D. Wade. The group had trouble interesting Los Angeles labels in the song (a Hamlin original) until they convinced a department store manager in San Diego to play it. This attracted attention from kids in the store and a record distributor that happened to be there at the time. Through him they got the single "Angel Baby" released on Highland, and at the end of 1960 it shot up the national charts.

Although Rosie & the Originals recorded a few more tracks, they broke up almost immediately after "Angel Baby" made the charts, in a dispute over the terms of a recording contract they were considering signing. In 1961, Jackie Wilson's manager, Nat Tarnopol, got Rosie a contract with Wilson's label, Brunswick. Brunswick did put out a follow-up single, "Lonely Blue Nights," which made number 66, as well as an album and another single, billing the artist solely as Rosie for all the releases. In the meantime Highland put out a couple of Rosie & the Originals 45s with tracks to which they had the rights.

"Angel Baby," however, was one of those accidents of timing and unique material that couldn't be repeated, and none of Rosie's subsequent recordings -- which, like "Angel Baby," were usually simple pop/rock ballads with a doo wop feel -- could recapture the magic. Hamlin did make another single for the Globe label before leaving the music business to raise a family with her husband, Noah Tafolla, who had been leader and lead guitarist of the Originals. She did some tracks with producer Doug Salma in 1969 in a more updated doo wop/girl-group style that remained unreleased until 1999, when the Ace compilation The Best of Rosie & the Originals was issued.

SAM & DAVE

2008-08-31T09:27:00.000-07:00

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Biography by Colin Escott & Stephen Thomas Erlewine

Perhaps no act epitomized soul music as the secularization of gospel more than Sam & Dave. The original pairing of Sam Moore and Dave Prater met in Florida in 1961, and they recorded unsuccessfully for several years before being signed to Atlantic Records in 1965. Atlantic persuaded their Memphis affiliate Stax Records to produce them, and in December that year the writing and production team of Isaac Hayes and David Porter delivered the crisply soulful "You Don't Know Like I Know." Hayes and Porter became the éminence grises behind Sam & Dave, much as Holland-Dozier-Holland pulled the strings behind the Supremes. They wrote, they produced -- and the result was a string of hits, including "Soul Man," "Hold On! I'm Comin'," and "I Thank You," songs that survive as the very epitome of Southern soul. Certainly, Sam & Dave's hits are among the most soulful ever to crack the Hot 100. Their albums often bore the hallmarks of hasty execution, though. The dissolution of the partnership between Stax and Atlantic virtually sealed the fate of Sam & Dave; there were a few more hits (and, later, a revival of interest thanks to the Blues Brothers), but the glory days were over.

Samuel Moore and David Prater were both raised in the South, where they sang in church as children. During the '50s, they performed in soul and R&B clubs before meeting each other in at the King of Hearts club in Miami in 1961. Moore was hosting an amateur-night contest where Prater was singing. Once Dave forgot the lyrics to Jackie Wilson's "Doggin' Around," Sam coached him through the song. Following that night, the singers became a duo and soon became a popular local Miami act and signed with Roulette Records, releasing a handful of singles. In 1965, they signed with Atlantic Records, but producer Jerry Wexler moved the band to the label's Stax subsidiary.

Working with Stax's house band and songwriters/producers Isaac Hayes and David Porter, Sam & Dave created a body of sweaty, gritty soul that ranks among the finest and most popular produced in the late '60s. The duo's 1966 debut, "You Don't' Know Like I Know," kicked off a series of Top Ten R&B hits that included "Hold On! I'm Comin'" (1966), "You Got Me Hummin'" (1966), "When Something Is Wrong With My Baby" (1967), "Soul Man" (1967), and "I Thank You" (1968). However, the duo's career began to unravel in 1968, when Stax's distribution deal with Atlantic ended. Since Sam & Dave were signed with Atlantic, not Stax, they no longer had access to the production team of Hayes and Porter or the house band of Booker T. & the MG's, and their recorded work took a slight dip in quality. Though the switch of labels was unfortunate, what really caused the duo's demise was their volatile relationship. While the duo had enormous creative energy, they frequently fought off-stage. Nicknamed "Double Dynamite," Sam & Dave became famous for their energetic, infectious live performances during the late '60s, which complemented the overall high quality of their studio work. They may have communicated on-stage, but behind the scenes, it was reported that the duo could hardly stand each other's presence. The tension caused Sam & Dave to part ways in 1970, just a few years after their heyday.

During the '70s, Sam & Dave reunited several times to little attention. At the end of the decade, John Belushi and Dan Aykroyd's Blues Brothers routine -- which borrowed heavily from Sam & Dave -- sparked a resurgence of interest in the duo, and the pair performed a number of concerts during 1980. However, their personal animosity had not faded, and they separated after a performance on New Year's Eve 1981. For the next few years, Prater toured as Sam & Dave with vocalist Sam Daniels. During the mid-'80s, Moore revealed the sources of the duo's tensions in a series of interviews. He disclosed that he had been addicted to drugs during the '70s. Prater was arrested in 1987 for selling crack to an undercover policeman. A year later, he died in a car accident. Moore continued to perform sporadically, most notably on Bruce Springsteen's 1992 album Human Touch album. Sam & Dave were inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame that same year.

Review by Mark Deming

Arguably soul music's greatest tag-team combination, Sam Moore and Dave Prater are best remembered for jumping up-tempo numbers like "Hold On, I'm Coming" and "Soul Man," but they could also slow down and pull the heartstrings with "When Something Is Wrong with My Baby" and "I've Seen What Loneliness Can Do," in which they let their gospel influences take center-stage. While Sam & Dave could harmonize beautifully when they were of a mood, what made their act click was the call and response between Sam's dynamic upper register vocals and Dave's rougher, deeper voice, which complemented one another perfectly while prodding each into pushing the energy level as high as it would go. Sam & Dave also had a secret weapon in the songwriting team of Isaac Hayes and David Porter, who wrote the bulk of the group's hits and gave them material that perfectly suited their back-and-forth delivery (and having the Stax Records session band backing them up didn't hurt, either). The Platinum Collection features 20 of Sam & Dave's greatest songs in fine audio quality, and while this doesn't dig as deep as Rhino's two-disc collection Sweat 'n' Soul: Anthology or boast fine liner notes like their single-disc The Very Best of Sam & Dave, it has four more tunes than the latter set, and is as good an introduction to this duo as you're likely to find. Crank this up and your party will definitely be started.

STAX GOLD HITS 1968 - 1974

2008-08-30T04:46:00.001-07:00

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Stax Records is an American record label founded in 1957, originally based out of Memphis, Tennessee. The label was a major factor in the creation of the Southern soul and Memphis soul music styles, also releasing gospel, funk, jazz, and blues recordings. While Stax almost exclusively produced African-American music, the label was founded by two white businesspeople, Jim Stewart and his sister Estelle Axton, and featured several popular ethnically-integrated bands, including the label's house band, Booker T. & the MG's.

Following the death of Stax's biggest star, Otis Redding, in 1967 and the severance of the label's distribution deal with Atlantic Records in 1968, Stax continued primarily under the supervision of a new co-owner, Al Bell. Over the next five years, Bell expanded the label's operations significantly, in order to compete with Stax's main rival, Motown Records in Detroit. During the mid-1970s, a number of factors caused the label to slide into insolvency, resulting in its forced closure in late 1975.

Fantasy Records acquired the post-1968 Stax catalog in 1978, and reissued the material in various formats for several decades. After Concord Records acquired Fantasy in 2004, the Stax label was reactivated, and is today used to issue both the 1968–1975 catalog material and new recordings by current R&B/soul performers.

24 GOLD HITS - SEE COMMENTS FOR LIST

THE STAX VOLT REVUE LIVE IN PARIS (1967) VOL. 02

2008-08-30T02:33:00.000-07:00

I know there are alot of Stax Volt Fans out there. And I don't want to step on any toes - but I do have quite a few various artist collections. I'll start putting them up - if they are/were on other blog sites, I haven't seen them. My blog knowledge only goes as far back as April when I discovered the music blogs.
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THE EMOTIONS

2008-08-29T23:40:00.000-07:00

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Biography by Bill Dahl and Ron Wynn (amg)

A trio of sisters with a strong gospel base, the Emotions (based in Chicago) were one of the leading female R&B acts of the '70s. Lead singer Sheila Hutchinson and her sisters Wanda and Jeanette were only teenagers when they crashed the soul charts in 1969 with the engaging "So I Can Love You," but they sang gospel as children and enjoyed secular fame locally before signing with Memphis-based Volt and working with producers Isaac Hayes and David Porter. When Stax folded in 1975, the group hooked up with Maurice White of Earth, Wind & Fire, an association that led to the number one pop/R&B hit "Best of My Love" in 1977.

Two years after Best of My Love, Maurice White and the Emotions collaborated on "Boogie Wonderland," which was both a number two R&B and number six pop hit. They issued three more albums on White's ARC label from 1979 to 1981, but were unable to duplicate their earlier success. They moved to the Red label for the 1984 LP Sincerely, which included the single "All Things Come in Time." They issued three other singles from the album, but none made much impact, though each one charted. They then signed with Motown, but issued only one album, If I Only Knew. Sheila Hutchinson was a featured vocalist on Garry Glenn's "Feels Good to Feel Good" in 1987. Pam and Jeanette Hutchinson did background vocals on Helen Baylor's gospel song "There's No Greater Love" in 1990. Wanda Hutchinson and Jeanette sang on Earth, Wind & Fire's Heritage in 1990.

Review by Craig Lytle

Rejoice featured two singles, and both rendered Top Ten action. The first was the rapidly paced R&B number one "Best of My Love." This spirited cut is seasoned with a fierce arrangement, in particular the horns, and incomparable vocals. In addition, it claimed the number one position on the pop charts for five straight weeks. The second single, "Don't Ask My Neighbor," came on a mellower note. This album, the second under the tutelage and production of Maurice White of Earth, Wind & Fire, could have continued with several more chart-successful releases. The radiance the Emotions impart is heartwarming and uplifting. Their gospel roots bring a welcome spiritual feel to this album, which is a superb effort.

SOULSVILLE SINGS HITSVILLE (STAX SINGS MOTOWN)

2008-08-28T18:33:00.000-07:00

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Review by Steve Leggett

This delightful and often revelatory collection features Southern soul makeovers of Motown hits by the musicians and producers at Stax Records, a sort of Memphis meets Detroit knock down that pretty much reveals that soul is soul wherever it's found, whether north or south. Here the elegant pop veneer of several Motown hits are given a layer of grit, grease and gospel fire, and while these renditions don't replace the classic originals, they certainly augment them, revealing new grooves and pockets. Among the highlights are the Staple Singers' 1971 version of the Temptations' "You've Got to Earn It" which morphs the song into revival meeting territory, a blistering "Reach Out (I'll Be There)" by the Mar-Keys, also from 1971, a sparse and striking (and brief) take on "I Hear a Symphony" by Booker T. & the MG's, a country soul make over of "I Wish It Would Rain" by O.B. McClinton, and an epic, 12-minute horn-driven instrumental (and previously unreleased) rave-up of the ominous riff and rhythm of "I Heard It Through the Grapevine" by the Bar-Kays from 1973. The end result of all this is the sound of Motown plunged into deep soul territory, and it underscores the solid, brilliant songwriting that Motown Records stood for in its prime, because nothing here suffers one bit for the restructuring. Oh, and it makes for one hell of a party record.