Gotta Hear Something Positive About JB!

James Brown - Sexy, Sexy, Sexy

James Brown's body is not yet moldin' in his grave, as the squabble between his family and widow/partner (depending on who you believe) continues. Only the death of Anna Nicole Smith and the mayhem about her burial has spared soul fans from having this story plastered all over the media. Supposedly, all have agreed on a "where," but now it's a question of "when," since DNA testing is now in order to establish JB's paternity of James Brown III. In the midst of such negative news I must do a JB post to remind me of happier times, when his death was a moment for us all to honor him!

As I mentioned in my "Mind Power" post, JB wasn't as successful as a blaxploitation auteur as his contemporaries Isaac Hayes and Curtis Mayfield because he believed that recycling tracks already recorded was sufficient to score films. Today's selection is an example of this approach. "Sexy, Sexy, Sexy" was part of the soundtrack to Slaughter's Big Rip-Off, but it was nothing but a reworking of Brown's 1966 hit "Money Won't Change You" with new lyrics. JB leers away at the "sexy, sexy, sexy" woman, admiring her curvy shape (check out his advice about not dieting - "the more you get, the more I want") and having fun. Frankly, I prefer the new lyrics over the original, as they seem to make more out of the great groove. Surprisingly, the recycled 1966 sound was able to ride JB's 1973 momentum, so the song garnered 45 release and it was a hit! Now that's mind (and chart) power!

Tuff Stuff!

Roscoe Robinson - What Makes a Man Do Wrong

Gospel and soul singer Roscoe Robinson has been a busy guy lately, doing gigs organized by John Ciba (compiler of the Birmingham CD that I have praised relentlessly on this blog and on the podcast). A short article about his amazing career and an interview with Robinson can be found here. When Robinson released his first secular sides in the mid-60s he had already been all over the gospel highway as a sighted member of the Blind Boys of Mississippi and the Blind Boys of Ohio (Robinson would also work with the Blind Boys of Alabama), and so it's a natural that his gospel intensity would grace one of his first soul 45s, the great "What Makes a Man Do Wrong," released on Tuff. Over a strong beat and soaring background vocals, Robinson lays out the anguish of a man who knows he's in the wrong and wishes he could do better. It's a killer, but it went nowhere when released. Shortly thereafter Robinson created his own Gerri label, and his awesome "That's Enough" was picked up by Wand, which released other great 45s. Later releases on Sound Stage Seven, Atlantic, FAME and Paula didn't fare as well, and Robinson would return to gospel, where he remains save for the occasional gig. At his advanced age, Robinson is still tough enough!

Going Back To The Deep Soul Well

Gloria Walker - Walking With My New Love

Gloria Walker is best known for the deep soul classic "Talking About My Baby" (a monologue-heavy reworking of "I'd Rather Go Blind") on Flaming Arrow (funk fans prefer the flip, "The Gallop" by The Chevelles) and the funky 45 "Papa's Got The Wagon," one of the few King-distributed People singles. "Walking With My New Love" was the natural follow-up to the hit "Talking About My Baby," and here Walker mixes the "rap" of her earlier hit with singing, and it's a powerful, if derivative, tune.

The Gospel Truth!

Joshie Jo Armstead - Stumbling Blocks, Stepping Stones (What Took Me So Long)

Jo Armstead's career in music was truly multi-faceted. As a singer, she worked with the Ikettes and then had a few hits as a solo artist; as a songwriter, she co-wrote Ray Charles' "Let's Go Get Stoned" and "I Don't Need No Doctor" and Garland Green's "Jealous Kind of Fellow"; and she ran the Giant label and its affiliates with her then-husband Mel Collins. By the mid-'70s Armstead had divorced Collins and made her final stand as a recording artist with a handful of 45s on Stax's Gospel Truth label. "Stumbling Blocks, Stepping Stones" was a minor hit, and had Stax not been in its final days the song may have fared better. It certainly deserved to be more successful - Armstead's strong singing and powerful lyrics (which, although spiritual in nature, are not hit-over-the-head gospel) are very inspiring and make for an awesome record.

Get on Down With Big Al!

Big Al Downing - Gimme Some Loving

The interesting and varied career of Big Al Downing has been discussed in a prior post. Today's selection is a 1969 House Of The Fox single from his "soul period." Downing is really cooking on his cover of the Spencer Davis Group hit, and so is the funky funky backing track. You gotta get down on this one!

Here's #15!

Episode #15 of the podcast is now available in stereo and mono! Here's the (slightly more scattershot that usual) playlist:

1. James Brown & The Famous Flames - Shout and Shimmy
2. Marcell Strong - Trying to Make Up
3. Billy Joe Young - The Push
4. Carol Fran - I'm Gonna Try
5. Larry Williams & Johnny Watson - A Quitter Never Wins
6. Randolph Walker - Achin' All Over
7. The Stereos - Stereo Freeze
8. Otis Reddding - "Stay in School" PSA
9. Gwen Davis - My Man Don't Think I Know
10. Ray Bryant - Up Above the Rock
11. Marion Black - Who Knows
12. Deanie Parker & The Valadors - My Imaginary Guy
13. Josephine Taylor - What Is Love
14. The Rayons - I'm Giving Up Baby
15. Dori Grayson - Try Love
16. Carla Thomas - Coca-Cola Ad
17. Willie Parker - You Got Your Finger In My Eye
18. The Steelers - I'm Sorry
19. Steve Mancha - Just Keep On Lovin' Me
20. Earl King - Poor Sam
21. Curly Moore - Get Low Down (Pt. 1)
22. Roscoe Shelton - I Know Your Heart Has Been Broken
23. The Impressions - My Deceiving Heart
24. The Sons of Moses - Soul Symphony (closing theme)

Enjoy!

The Knight of Birmingham!

Frederick Knight - You've Never Really Lived



Frederick Knight scored an oddball hit in 1972 on Stax with "I've Been Lonely For So Long," which was recorded in Birmingham, Alabama with the crew at Neal Hemphill's Sounds of Birmingham studio. In keeping with the "Hemphill sound," among the percussion on the record is a drum stool being hit by a two-by-four! Knight revisited the quirky groove of his biggest hit on the 45 "Trouble," a nice reggae-tinged tune that Ry Cooder would later cover. Although Knight's more unconventional songs are best known today, he was also a very strong singer and writer of straight-ahead '70s Southern soul, as demonstrated by his last Stax hit, "I Betcha Didn't Know That" (also a hit for K.C. & The Sunshine Band in its latter days) and today's selection, an unreleased track that saw the light of day on the great The Birmingham Sound comp. "You've Never Really Lived" is as warm as a down comforter, with rich electric horn lines and a nice slide guitar line in the intro. Knight's falsetto tenderly addresses the great lyrics. This really should've been released, but thanks to John Ciba for getting it out there!

King Biscuit Time with Sonny Boy and Daddy G

Sonny Boy Williamson - One Way Out



Bluesman Sonny Boy Williamson (Aleck "Rice" Miller, not be confused with John Lee "Sonny Boy" Williamson, the 1940s bluesman) was the last of the "big four" Chess blues acts (Muddy Waters, Howlin' Wolf and Little Walter being the other three), having joined the label in 1955 when Lillian McMurtry's Trumpet concern was sold to the Chess brothers. Williamson, a bit older than the other Chess bluesmen, had traveled with the legendary Robert Johnson (he claimed that he had warned Johnson not to drink from the bottle which poisoned him, and claimed that Johnson died in his arms), had taught his then-brother-in-law Chester Burnett (Howlin' Wolf) harmonica, and had hosted the immensely popular "King Biscuit Time" radio program on Helena, Arkansas radio station KFFA, where he not only plugged the show's sponsor, King Biscuit Flour, but also served as the namesake and logo of their cornmeal! (See the official King Biscuit Time website for a history of the show and its continuing legacy, and seek out the Arhoolie CD King Biscuit Time to hear an aircheck of a 1965 broadcast made shortly before Williamson's death.)

At Chess, Williamson's virtuosity on the harmonica, coupled with Williamson's clever lyrics and sly vocals (Williamson was less dependent on Willie Dixon's songs than Waters and Wolf, although records like "Help Me" and "Bring It On Home" are awesome) made Williamson a hit on the Checker label, and he took Europe by storm via the American Folk Blues Festival and other events. Although Williamson didn't live to see the ultimate "modernization" projects that would be foisted on Waters and Wolf at the end of the decade, his sound was adjusted in the '60s to add horns and a more soulful beat. Although "One Way Out" was released on Checker in 1962 as a rocking and rolling blues, a re-recording was done featuring a more modern sound. The latter version is today's selection. While "Daddy G" (Gene Barge) and the Chess horn section hunches along, Williamson has fun with the lyrics (which clearly inspired G.L. Crockett's Chicago soul classic "It's a Man Down There") and does some good harmonica blowing.

Get on Down With James Phelps!

James Phelps - Walking The Floor Over You

James Phelps was the last of the great Soul Stirrers lead singers to make the transition from gospel to R&B, and the handful of 45s he made between 1965 and 1972, of which only the first two were hits ("Love Is A Five-Letter Word" and "La De Da, I'm A Fool In Love," both on Argo), are all great records, showing off Phelps' great vocals, aptly described by Barry "Soul Brother" Fowden as being "akin to an earthier Sam Cooke." (Speaking of the Soul Brother, check out this great discography and Phelps interview that Barry has on his Soul Cellar website.) I've featured "The Look On Your Face," James' great 1971 mid-tempo mover, on a previous podcast, and today's feature is a great Northern classic that James recorded for Fontana. "Walking The Floor Over You," an old Ernest Tubb country tune, is given a stomping groove and great female background singers, and Phelps is on fire from the get-go, building in intensity as the song rushes along. It's a soul stirrer!

(EDITOR'S NOTE - I will be traveling this weekend and may not have internet access, so posts will probably resume on Monday or Tuesday.)

Speaking Of The Brothers Of Soul ...

Ruby Andrews - Gotta Break Away

Yesterday's postscript to the Valentine's Day post provided an excellent segue into today's post. The Brothers of Soul were far more prolific as writers than as performers, penning over 40 tunes for Detroit and Chicago productions on various artists. Ruby Andrews benefited most from their songs, which she recorded prolifically for Ric Williams' Zodiac label, which was affiliated with Joshie Jo Armstead and her Chicago-based Giant Productions. Andrews, who had made a big splash with the soul classic "Casanova (Your Playing Days Are Over)," stayed active in the charts throughout the late '60s and early '70s, mainly on the strength of the material the Brothers of Soul kept providing. "Gotta Break Away" was the flip to "You Ole Boo Boo You." There's something off-center about this tune, but I like the loping Chicago soul groove and interplay between Andrews' strong voice and background singers.

Happy Valentine's Day!

Eddie & Ernie - Thanks For Yesterday

Among other things, one of the biggest things lacking in modern R&B music is the absence of male duos. Although in the '60s Sam & Dave were the most commercially successful, there were a great many acts that recorded great material, albeit with less fame. Edgar Campbell and Ernie Johnson hit with "Time Waits For No One" in the early '60s and then spent the rest of the decade recording unheralded but awesome soul records for Eastern, Chess, Revue, Columbia, Buddah and other labels as a duet, one-off singles as solo artists (Ernie's "In These Very Tender Moments" appears on Episode #14 of the podcast), and as frontmen for the band Phoenix Express. The two men had an uncanny sense of harmony and attack, and their material, which ranged from uptown soul to deep balladry, was consistently top-notch. In a perfect world, they would've been as big as Sam & Dave. Fortunately for us soul fans, however, the late Dave Godin championed the duo and, through his Deep Soul Treasures series on Kent and the Kent comp Lost Friends, he got almost all of their material on CD for us to enjoy.

I picked today's selection in connection with today being Valentine's Day. Love is definitely a common theme in lots of soul music, but the lyrics of "Thanks For Yesterday" reflect the strongest type of love there is, the kind that sympathetically reaches out when one is in a vale of sorrow, feeling all is lost. "I wanna thank you, baby, for your love throughout the years, but especially for yesterday, when you wiped away all my tears." That's serious stuff, and Eddie & Ernie sing it that way. Listen to this one and then think of how your special someone reached out to you that way. Call them up and thank them.

(If you are looking for something less heavy as a Valentine's soul selection, do go over to this Soul Sides post featuring The Brothers of Soul's "A Lifetime," which is a very tasty piece of mid-tempo soul.)

RIP Ernestine Rundless

The Meditation Singers - Let Them Talk

Over the weekend I learned that Ernestine Rundless, founder and leader of the Meditation Singers and adoptive mother of soul legend Laura Lee, has passed away. Rundless founded the group in 1947, and among the initial lineup was Della Reese. The group started out in her husband's Detroit church and expanded into regional and then national prominence through records for Specialty, HOB, Checker and Jewel. I'm very partial to the group's Checker material, as the group proved itself to be adept at the "gos-pop" sound that Chess A&R man Ralph Bass encouraged in the mid-to-late '60s. Today's atmospheric selection finds Rundless and the group working it out over a groove that almost seems more appropriate for the Rotary Connection than a gospel act, but it really works.