Manifesto December, 2012
Ooo.. I’m all disembodied!
Perhaps not literally but I write now so far away from the last
available issue of Manifesto that I feel almost unconnected. I’ll do what I can, I’ll make a few
points, but I feel as if my pen is losing all vitriol. Is that really the case? Let’s see….
Well, I can observe a few things in my already-dust-covered June
Manifesto. Probably the most
interesting for me is Rob Moss’ item on Ed Wolfrum and his observations, as a
studio engineer, on Detroit recordings of the sixties. Don Davis used to use United Sound
studios quite a lot back in those days and at Goldmine, we hit a deal with Don
to release material he owned, a lot of stuff came from there – a situation
Goldmine financed in terms of retrieving material from old masters. In fact stuff keeps emerging rather
mysteriously from what would appear to be that source and I’ll say no more,
suffice it to say that we obviously weren’t offered all the tracks mastered at
the time. It is also rather
disappointing, nay astounding to learn that Wolfrum has a ‘library’ of
unreleased material which Rob claims ‘will probably never gain a release’. Hands up those that think that to be an
acceptable situation! If this is
true then Wofrum is doing no-one a favour. And whilst legal situations may be murky who is really going
to complain or be precious about it?
If anything the producers of said music probably have legal entitlement
anyway. I’ll always remember Davis
stating that he did not sell Solid Hitbound productions to Ric Tic or Golden
World either outright or in perpetuity, and certainly not to Berry Gordy!
On to Soul Sam in June’s Manifesto and those rather horrible scans in
brown paper – a column which brought about a rather classic circumstance via
the Jesse Slaughter review (‘I Had A Dream’ on Les-Stan). For sure a great disc and one which had
a small following in the eighties, perhaps more importantly it is a Florida
recording/label co-written and produced by the great Paul Kelly. A look in our price guide sees the disc
rated at £30 and at £20 in the pie region of our sceptered isle, an area that
also produces a price guide to rare soul.
However, our on-line price guide now sees this as a £250 touch for the
simple reason that I’ve recently sold it at such a price. Look around the world – Ebay, Pop Sike,
Gemm, whatever you like – the Jesse Slaughter disc is not available at
all. The classic circumstance
referred to above is that of an age-old price remaining constant while no-one
thought about it and that of a revived sixties spin (in the absence of ‘new’
sixties discoveries) revealing a total dearth of copies i.e., ‘I Had A Dream’
is really rather rare. And, by the
way, it is also really rather good.
Talk of Florida soul leads me onto another tremendous slab of sixties finally
starting to make a name for itself after being known for a couple of decades at
least. I can’t swear that I
haven’t reviewed REATHA REESE’S fabulous ‘Only Lies’ (Dot) before in Manifesto
but it’s too big a job to check to be honest and I can’t swear it’s from
Florida either, although the latter is a good bet, if not, then Nashville,
certainly not Hollywood, California (the home of Dot Records). Of course Dot leased material in from
all over the place, but the clue here is Clarence Reid and Bob Riley on
songwriting credits. Florida
stalwart Reid had releases on Nashville’s Dial label and his songs for that
logo went under Tree Publishing.
Ditto the Reatha Reese – so it’s either/or as far as I’m concerned. So
what about the music? Well, this
is a simply superb piece of uptempo soul with an infectious rolling rhythm
pounding along. Reese can sing –
witness the wailing fadeout, a ballad flipside usually confirms this aspect and
‘Things I Should Have Done’ emphasizes that this artist should have had more
than the solitary release I know of (although I’ve a sneaky feeling she’s
someone else if you know what I mean).
Curtis Futch Jnr… ever heard of him? Well actually you have in the shape of Kurt Harris of
‘Emperor Of My Baby’s Heart’ fame.
Not only was the man Kurt Harris but his later releases reveal him to be
KURTIS SCOTT. Originally from
Georgia, Scott (aka Harris, Futch) moved to New York in 1952 and was to feature
in elements of the black music of the Big Apple for the next four decades. In the ‘soul’ era most of his releases
seem to be in association with famed all-rounder Robert Banks (of ‘Mighty Good
Ways’). Labels include Cherokee,
Apache and Marky Ho (a soul version of ‘Moon River’). He first came to the attention of the Northern Soul Scene
via a track leased out to Don Robey’s Sureshot label in Texas. Not heard in a dancehall for many a
year is ‘No, No, Baby’ a vocal to an equally forgotten instrumental by the Soft
Summer Soul Strings on Columbia, ‘I’m Doing My Thing’. Handily, my copy is date-stamped ‘July
30 1966’. A decent disc if a bit
too ‘bouncy’ for today it is however, not the focus of my current attentions
and we move into the seventies, 1975 to be exact, for that particular
aspect. The waxing in question is
‘Build, Build, Build’ (Happening) and, once more, Robert Banks is at the
helm. Rather different from
anything else I’ve heard from Scott, this is a strong seventies dancer with a
great arrangement that really does ‘Build, Build, Build’ the combination of strings,
chorus and lyrics screams ‘minor league in a good way, mail immediately to
Britain’. It features parts one and two as consecutive takes of the song rather
than vocal/instrumental. It’s a
rare one too! We recently obtained £1200 for a copy in our on-line auction.
Somewhere in the dim and distant past of soul literature I bemoaned the
fact that what I call ‘staxified’-styled uptempo records didn’t have much of a
place on the Northern Scene. Well,
‘don’t wish too hard for what you want or you might just get it’ is my mantra
here; of course Stax records have always had a place on the scene if not a
vertebral role as does Motown, but recent spins by the likes of Clarence Murray
or Don Varner lead me to believe that messier-but-soulful stompers are being
accepted. Two such items are in
front of me now. Gradually
creeping up in price is CARL HOLMES AND THE COMMANDERS ‘Soul Dance No 3’
(Blackjack), quite rightly so because this is firmly in Wilson Pickett
territory taking absolutely no prisoners with its pounding beat and caustic
vocal delivery. In fact I would
like to know just who the singer is – other Carl Holmes 45s don’t sound like
this gritty unknown, the Blackjack release credits Pervis Herder, but he was
principally an organist with a light voice at best. Cliff Nobles could do the searing vocals as we know and I
wouldn’t be at all surprised if it were him. Blackjack (Carl Holmes later fronted the Sherlock Holmes
Investigation) was a Philadelphia label but it’s ‘down home’ to Atlanta and
William Bell’s Peachtree label for GORGEOUS GEORGE and ‘Get Up Off It’. Amazingly George’s real name was
Theodopholus Odell George, a
former valet for Hank Ballard, George cut quite a figure on the southern
chitlin’ circuit as an M.C. Periodically
George would enter the studio, for instance he had a 1965 one-off Stax release
‘Biggest Fool In Town’, and his seventies releases for Homark Records are
valued. The feeling is that
Gorgeous George should have gone in to the recording studio more than he did
and ‘Get Up Off It’ proves that weighing in with several punchy bouts of
uptempo southern soul and a running piano not unlike a Little Richard record,
all punctuated with typically healthy southern horns. You won’t find this one in a hurry that’s for certain. Like one or two other Peachtree
releases this one is very rare and long in-demand in Japan for the Deep Soul
flipside ‘It’s Not A Hurting Thing’.
Just realised that I have a rare early dancer by this guy as well on
Neptune ‘Now I Believe In Miracles’ plus he was Georgie Boy on SSS
International and Birmingham George on Marsi.
Just to confirm that all is not what it would seem with Northern Soul
collecting, I got asked for ‘Sax On The Track’ by Mike and Ike (Arctic) the
other day. It is of course a
rather splendid and surprisingly raunchy instrumental on the famous Philly
label. Stroking my chin over the
price, my potential customer (a noted deejay) admitted that he had never seen a
blue-lettered original and that all copies he had seen were the black-lettered reissue/bootleg. Went to my own collection and sure
enough my own copy was less than pristine indicating that few if any, other
copies had come my way. £60 in our current paper price guide but now £100
on-line. I hate to admit it but
the internet does have its advantages.
I will finish with a killer CD track from the recent Kent compilation
‘Hall Of Fame’. Consisting of 24
tracks, no less than 21 are previously unissued featuring names familiar to the
UK like James Barnett and June Conquest.
Ralph ‘Soul’ Jackson does a reasonable version of Jimmy Hughes’ ‘You
Really Know How To Hurt A Guy’ as does the unidentified Jackie on ‘Almost
Persuaded’. Clarence Carter
answers Etta James’ ‘Tell Mama’ with the great ‘Tell Daddy’ (but why, oh why,
Mr Rounce do we get O.B. McClinton?).
Northern Soulers however, will swoon (or should do) over BOBBY MOORE and
‘Baby Come Back’. Possibly a tad
too sprightly for the dance floors of today, somehow, somewhere, this
effervescent mover reminds me of some very rare Northern in-demander which I
just can’t put my finger on.
Apparently dating from a 1971 session ‘Baby Come Back’ sounds at least
four years older than that year and incorporates great saxophone work from
Moore (who rarely actually sang on his recordings). Bouncy, trouncy, fun, fun, fun.
Our website now includes loads of lovely soundbites
for the delectation, delight and desire of potential customers. To feast on this banquet of Northern
Soul go to
www.raresoulvinyl.co.uk
Reatha Reese was indeed from Florida. That's the name she was known by in the clubs, so it's not likely that it was a pseudonym for someone else.
ReplyDeleteAs or Jesse Slaughter... fortunately I picked one up several years ago from J.M. I love the deep soul B-side as well.