The Pitch/Gusman Story, Vol 3

The Pitch / Gusman Story

Waymon "Gusman" Jones loved gospel music. Especially, he loved the rich stirring sounds of the quartets he heard as a farm boy in rural Georgia, then in his adopted hometown of Savannah, Georgia, where he set up his Gusman Record Shop. From his passion came an indispensible legacy of gospel song.

Between 1961 and 1978, Waymon Jones recorded and issued a stream of essential recordings by the Golden Stars of Greenwood, SC, the White Family Singers of Savannah, GA, the Six Voices of Zion of Columbia, SC, the Flying Clouds of Augusta, GA, and many others.

This three- CD set captures on 71 rare recordings the sounds Jones wanted everyone to hear, giving 21st century listeners a unique opportunity to roll back the years and hear the vital and vibrant sounds of a southern community's gospel music world in a simpler age. The enclosed booklet features historic group and label photographs and extensive notes by gospel music researcher and writer Alan Young.

new link

Joe Haywood - Warm and Tender Soul

Back when I put my Haywood compilation together, this disc did not exist. It claims to be complete and does indeed have the one track that I knew that I was missing, but it omits the 2 unissued tracks that Kent unearthed so I have included those to make it complete.

"Joe Haywood was a Bad-Ass! In several different compilations and a few 45's, I had become limitedly aware of the singer Joe Haywood, but only recently did I focus on building something in the way of a compilation. Without the fine work of Red Kelly's soul detectives, this idea would have likely been a still birth. Between Red, Larry Grogan and Sir Shambling, I picked up the information necessary to start digging for as many of the tracks as I could find (1 more 45 is in transit that will supply a missing track and get us to 21 but I couldn't wait any longer). It is possible that there are multiple versions of a few tracks, but so far they have all been licensed re-issues of the same recording." earlier write up

By far the best biographical info is here:

Soul Detectives Joe Haywood 1
Soul Detectives Joe Haywood 2

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Baby Washington and The Hearts - The J & S Years

Justine Washington (born November 13, 1940), usually credited as Baby Washington, but credited on some early records as Jeanette (Baby) Washington, is an American soul music vocalist, who had 16 rhythm and blues chart entries in 15 years, most of them during the 1960s. Her biggest hit, "That's How Heartaches Are Made" in 1963, also entered the US top 40.

Washington was born in Bamberg, South Carolina, and raised in Harlem, New York. In 1956, she joined the vocal group The Hearts, and also recorded for J & S Records as a member of The Jaynetts ("I Wanted To Be Free" / "Where Are You Tonight", J&S 1765/6). She first recorded solo, as Baby Washington, in 1957, on "Everyday" (J&S 1665).

In 1958 she signed to Donald Shaw's Neptune Records as a solo performer, and established herself as a soul singer with two hits in 1959: "The Time" (U.S. R&B #22) and "The Bells" (U.S. R&B # 20). She followed up with the hit "Nobody Cares" (U.S. R&B # 17) in 1961. Several of her singles on the Neptune and ABC labels were credited to Jeanette (Baby) Washington, which later led to confusion with an entirely different singer known as Jeanette Washington.

She signed with ABC Paramount in 1961, but her two releases for the label were not hits, although the self-written "Let Love Go By" later became a notable Northern Soul single. Washington then moved to Juggy Murray's Sue Records in 1962, scoring her only entry on the U.S. Billboard Top 40 with "That's How Heartaches Are Made" in 1963. Two years later, she hit again on the U.S. R&B Top 10 with "Only Those In Love". Among her other Sue recordings were "I Can't Wait Until I See My Baby's Face", co-written by Chip Taylor and Jerry Ragovoy, and "Careless Hands", penned by Billy Myles.

Washington revived her career in the early 1970s covering The Marvelettes' "Forever", (# 30 R&B) as a duet with Don Gardner. Her solo release, "I've Got To Break Away", made number 73 on the R&B charts, after which the advent of disco led to a decline in her popularity. She has never experienced great crossover recognition, although Dusty Springfield once cited Washington as her all-time favorite singer and recorded "I Can't Wait Until I See My Baby's Face".

Washington is still active as a live performer, appearing several times a year on the East Coast and performing on cruise ships. She also performed at the Prestatyn Soul Weekender festival in Wales in 2004. She performed with the Enchanters at a Philadelphia-area show in March 2008, and in Baltimore in June 2008. Washington was among the 2008 honorees in Community Works' Ladies Singing the Blues music series. wikipedia

Esquerita - All the Voola

I think it is time for a re-working of this post. There is a considerable amount of added material.

 Ahh, the sad story of Steven Q. Reeder, "but for chance there go I". One of the creative influences behind what makes Little Richard a star but when Richard uses Esquerita's style at The Dew Drop Inn and blows Bumps Blackwell's mind, he may have doomed his buddy to obscurity and an ugly death. Little Richard's New Orleans sessions are so huge and so national that when the guy who actually invented the whole schtick finally gets recorded he is dismissed by an understandably ignorant public as an imitator. No matter that he is a far superior pianist (I give Richard the clear singing edge), the world seemingly has room for only one. This post has been reworked to include all but a tiny handful of stray tracks - this is All The Voola.

Born in Greenville, S.C., in 1935, Steven Quincy Reeder began calling himself "Eskew" after his initials – S.Q. Later, of course, the name became Esquerita, then went back to Eskew. (Little Richard claimed his predecessor liked to point out how his nickname sounded like "excreta.") An early performing career with a gospel group known as the Heavenly Echoes soon led, in a roundabout fashion, to the singer's outrageous nightclub act.

" With his flamboyant makeup, sculpted pompadour, assaultive piano playing and glass-busting trills, Little Richard is invariably described as a rock 'n' roll nonpareil. But Richard himself has often acknowledged that his persona has a lot to do with one of the true unsung heroes of rock – a forgotten wildman who answered to the stage name Esquerita.

Appropriately enough, they met in a Greyhound bus station in Macon, Ga., late one night, when the only people around were the prowlers "trying to catch something – you know, have sex," as Richard Penniman explained in his biography 'The Life and Times of Little Richard.' Eskew Reeder, as the man was then known, had the biggest hands Richard had ever seen. He performed, apparently, with an evangelist named Sister Rosa and an undersized singer appropriately called Shorty. When Richard asked this brother from another planet if he would teach him how to pound the piano, Reeder happily obliged.  

People are largely unaware that when those iconic Specialty recordings were made in New Orleans, Richard was not a piano player. (Fats Domino is amongst those thought possible to have played on the sessions.) His piano teachers were Reeder and "..a guy named James (Booker)." There was some period when Reeder toured with Richard as his piano player. It has never been clear to me when that was, or how it was they both ended up in New Orleans at the same time, and why Reeder stayed behind.

Though Little Richard would later claim he gave Esquerita the idea for his gigantic bouffant, (other parts of the story would seem to belie this) that's the only mention of Richard's mentor in the biography. To this day, little is known of Esquerita, whose sole album, released in 1959, was mistakenly seen as little more than a Little Richard copycat job.


"Professor" Eskew Reeder was discovered playing a Greenville barroom called the Owl Club by Paul Peek, guitarist for Gene Vincent's rockabilly backing band, the Blue Caps. Peek introduced the free spirit with the rhinestone wraparound shades to talent scouts at Capitol Records, who had signed Gene Vincent as the label's answer to Elvis. Here was the label's answer to Little Richard.

Later, Reeder would scuffle his way through the '60s, reportedly gigging with the future Dr. John and a young Jimi Hendrix – and cutting a few sessions with a grateful Little Richard. He recorded some songs for Motown, never released. He began changing his stage name – Voola, the Magnificent Malochi – to no avail.

By the '70s, he was playing seedy gigs in back-alley gay bars in New York, billed as Fabulash. A decade after that, he was reduced to begging for change as a squeegee man. Esquerita died of complications from AIDS in New York in 1986, at age 52.

Sadly, his one Capitol album, despite a fantastic, iconic cover image of the singer with his wig piled high and a collection of raucous bawlers inside, came across as one too many Little Richards for the world to handle. Ironically, it was only when an unproven Richard had stretched out his Esquerita muscle on a previously lackluster session in New Orleans that he found his own voice as early rock 'n' roll's most thrilling loony tune.

The first part of this bonanza will take you to Blue Dragon who recently posted the first chapter of this musical story (click the blog name). The subsequent material, mostly recorded here in New Orleans, is in the normal place.

H-Bomb Ferguson - Big City Blues

AllMusic Review by Steve Leggett

"Long before his 1990s re-emergence as a fright wig wearing blues star, Robert "H-Bomb" Ferguson had recorded a series of Wynonie Harris-styled jump blues singles in the '40s and '50s for a variety of labels and under various names, including several as the Cobra Kid. Although he was so close to Harris' delivery and repertoire on these sides that most critics dismissed him as an outright clone, Ferguson's booming, wink-and-a-smile voice was obviously something special. Ferguson first recorded under the moniker H-Bomb in 1951 when he signed with Savoy Records, and the name stuck. This generous 31-track collection from Rev-Ola Records includes Ferguson's Savoy tracks, as well as sides he cut for the Atlas, Prestige and Esquire labels between 1951 and 1954, and features such gems as "Rock H-Bomb Rock," "On My Way," "Preachin' the Blues," "Bookie's Blues," and his best known tune, "Good Lovin'." Discouraged with the direction of his career, Ferguson took up residence in Cincinnati, OH in 1957, where he was content to be a regional treasure (all the while experimenting with increasingly bizarre wigs and headgear) until his debut album, Wiggin' Out, was released in 1993 on Chicago's Earwig Records. The album established Ferguson as a true original in his own right, and gave the colorful singer a national stage until his death in 2006. The joy and energy obvious in these early sides makes the Harris comparisons merely academic at this point, and these are wonderful examples of late period jump blues by any measure."

Buddy Johnson At The Savoy Ballroom 1945 - 46

A fantastic radio broadcast ripped at 24/48 and transferred to FLAC.  Interesting... Dupree Bolton is in the band.  Enjoy!!!

Alto-Sax – Joe O'Laughton
Baritone-Sax – Teddy Conyers
Bass – Leon Spann
Drums – Teddy Stewart
Guitar – Jerome Darr
Piano – Buddy Johnson
Tenor-Sax – Dave van Dyke, Jimmy Stamford
Trombone – Bernard Archer, Gordon Thomas, Leonard Briggs
Trumpet – Dupree Bolton, Frank Brown, John Wilson, Willis Nelson
Vocals – Arthur Prysock
Vovals – Ella Johnson

A1 (Theme) Wlak'em - Opus #2
A2 Since I Fell For You
A3 St. Louis Blues
A4 Waitin' For The Train To Come In
A5 Night Shift
A6 Jodi
B1 One O'Clock Boogie
B2 The Other Side Of The Rainbow
B3 Exactly Like You
B4 One For A Nickel
B5 Gee, It's Good To Hold You
B6 In There
B7 Traffic Jam
B8 (Theme) If You Never Return

Jazz Archives JA-25

1975

The James Brown Story 1966-69 & 1970-73

What the reviewer below and , apparently, most of the rest of the world has failed to notice about these two LP's is that these ARE NOT the versions of these songs that were previously issued; a fact which DID NOT escape Unky Cliff. I was commissioned with the task of finding decent copies of both albums and ripping them. The resulting 79 minutes of music make a fine disc for those still addicted to hard copies.

 "In the first few years after James Brown left Polydor Records at the start of the '80s, the label did little with his catalog, issuing a perfunctory best-of and licensing early material to Solid Smoke. But in 1984, Polydor began looking for ways to repackage and reissue its treasure trove of material (which included not only Brown's '70s work for them, but also his Federal/King sides of the '50s and '60s). The initial result was two albums, Ain't That a Groove and Doing It to Death, both produced by British Brown expert Cliff White (who had compiled the well-regarded U.K. compilations Solid Gold and Roots of a Revolution). Ain't That a Groove presented Brown's hits from the second half of the '60s that hadn't turned up on The Best of James Brown, including such classics as "Don't Be a Drop Out," "I Can't Stand Myself (When You Touch Me)," "Licking Stick -- Licking Stick," "Give It up or Turnit a Loose," and "I Don't Want Nobody to Give Me Nothing (Open the Door, I'll Get It Myself)." These were the defining tracks in Brown's '60s funk revolution, irresistible dance songs that, as often as not, also contained potent social messages. The music's immediacy made it hard to think of in the retrospective sense the album implied, but with much of Brown's catalog out of print, it was good to hear these songs again." AMG

Rev. Gary Davis

 Reverend Gary Davis, also Blind Gary Davis, (April 30, 1896 – May 5, 1972) was an American blues and gospel singer and guitarist, who was also proficient on the banjo guitar and harmonica. His finger-picking guitar style influenced many other artists and his students include Stefan Grossman, David Bromberg, Roy Book Binder, Larry Johnson, Nick Katzman, Dave Van Ronk, Rory Block, Ernie Hawkins, Woody Mann, and Tom Winslow.
He has influenced Bob Dylan, The Grateful Dead, Wizz Jones, Jorma Kaukonen, Keb' Mo', Ollabelle, Resurrection Band, and John Sebastian of The Lovin' Spoonful.

Gary Davis was born in the Piedmont region of the country, in Laurens, South Carolina, and was the only one of eight children his mother bore who survived to adulthood. He became blind as an infant. Davis reported that his father was killed in Birmingham, Alabama, when Davis was ten, and Davis later said that he had been told that his father had been shot by the Birmingham High Sheriff. He recalled being poorly treated by his mother and that before his death his father had given him into the care of his paternal grandmother.

He took to the guitar and assumed a unique multi-voice style produced solely with his thumb and index finger, playing not only gospel, ragtime and blues tunes, but also traditional and original tunes in four-part harmony.

In the mid-1920s, Davis migrated to Durham, North Carolina, a major center for black culture at the time. There he taught Blind Boy Fuller and collaborated with a number of other artists in the Piedmont blues scene including Bull City Red. In 1935, J. B. Long, a store manager with a reputation for supporting local artists, introduced Davis, Fuller and Red to the American Record Company. The subsequent recording sessions marked the real beginning of Davis' career and are available in his Complete Early Recordings. During his time in Durham, Davis converted to Christianity; in 1937, he would be ordained as a Baptist minister. Following his conversion and especially his ordination, Davis began to express a preference for inspirational gospel music.

In the 1940s, the blues scene in Durham began to decline and Davis migrated to New York. In 1951, several years before his "rediscovery", Davis's oral history was recorded by Elizabeth Lyttleton Harold (the wife of Alan Lomax) who transcribed their conversations into a 300+-page typescript.

The folk revival of the 1960s re-invigorated Davis' career and included a performance at the Newport Folk Festival and having Peter, Paul and Mary record his version of "Samson and Delilah", also known as "If I Had My Way" which is originally a Blind Willie Johnson song that Davis had popularized. "Samson and Delilah" was also covered and credited to Davis on the Grateful Dead's "Terrapin Station" album. Eric Von Schmidt credits Rev. Davis with three quarters of Schmidt's Baby, Let Me Follow You Down which Bob Dylan covered on his debut album for Columbia.  Blues Hall of Fame singer and harmonica player Darrell Mansfield has also recorded several of Rev. Davis' songs.

Davis died in May 1972, from a heart attack in Hammonton, New Jersey. He is buried in plot 68 of Rockville Cemetery in Lynbrook, Long Island, New York.

Buddy And Ella Johnson 1953 - 1964

Buddy Johnson (January 10, 1915 – February 9, 1977) was an American jazz and New York blues pianist and bandleader, active from the 1930s through the 1960s. His songs were often performed by his sister Ella Johnson, most notably "Since I Fell for You" which later became a jazz standard.

Born Woodrow Wilson Johnson in Darlington, South Carolina, Johnson took piano lessons as a child, and classical music remained one of his passions. In 1938 he moved to New York, and the following year toured Europe with the Cotton Club Revue, being expelled from Nazi Germany. Later in 1939 he first recorded for Decca Records with his band, soon afterwards being joined by his sister Ella as vocalist.

By 1941 he had assembled a nine-piece orchestra, and soon began a series of R&B and pop chart hits. These included "Let's Beat Out Some Love" (#2 R&B, 1943, with Johnson on vocals), "Baby Don't You Cry" (#3 R&B, 1943, with Warren Evans on vocals), his biggest hit "When My Man Comes Home" (#1 R&B, No. 18 pop, 1944, with Ella Johnson on vocals), and "They All Say I'm The Biggest Fool" (#5 R&B, 1946, with Arthur Prysock on vocals). Ella Johnson recorded her version of "Since I Fell for You" in 1945, but it did not become a major hit until recorded by Lenny Welch in the early 1960s.

In 1946 Johnson composed a Blues Concerto, which he performed at Carnegie Hall in 1948. His orchestra remained a major touring attraction through the late 1940s and early 1950s, and continued to record in the jump blues style with some success on record on the Mercury label like "Hittin' on Me" and "I'm Just Your Fool". His song Bring It Home To Me appears on the 1996 Rocket Sixty-Nine release Jump Shot!.

Johnson died, at the age of 62, from a brain tumor and sickle cell anemia, in 1977 in New York.

Ella Johnson died in New York of Alzheimer's in February, 2004; she was 84 years old.

Scrapper Blackwell - The Virtuoso Guitar of Scrapper Blackwell

Francis Hillman "Scrapper" Blackwell (February 21, 1903  – October 7, 1962 was an American blues guitarist and singer; best known as half of the guitar-piano duo he formed with Leroy Carr in the late 1920s and early 1930s, he was an acoustic single-note picker in the Chicago blues and Piedmont blues style, with some critics noting that he veered towards jazz.

Blackwell was born in Syracuse, South Carolina, as one of sixteen children of Payton and Elizabeth Blackwell. Part Cherokee, he grew up and spent most of his life in Indianapolis, Indiana. Blackwell was given the nickname, "Scrapper", by his grandmother, due to his fiery nature. His father played the fiddle, but Blackwell was a self-taught guitarist, building his first guitar out of cigar boxes, wood and wire. He also learned the piano, occasionally playing professionally. By his teens, Blackwell was a part-time musician, traveling as far as Chicago. Known for being withdrawn and hard to work with, Blackwell established a rapport with pianist Leroy Carr, whom he met in Indianapolis in the mid-1920s, creating a productive working relationship. Carr convinced Blackwell to record with him for the Vocalion label in 1928; the result was "How Long, How Long Blues", the biggest blues hit of that year.

Blackwell also made solo recordings for Vocalion, including "Kokomo Blues" which was transformed into "Old Kokomo Blues" by Kokomo Arnold before being redone as "Sweet Home Chicago" by Robert Johnson. Blackwell and Carr toured throughout the American Midwest and South between 1928 and 1935 as stars of the blues scene, recording over 100 sides. "Prison Bound Blues" (1928), "Mean Mistreater Mama" (1934), and "Blues Before Sunrise" (1934) were popular tracks.

Blackwell made several solo excursions; a 1931 visit to Richmond, Indiana to record at Gennett studios is notable. Blackwell, dissatisfied with the lack of credit given his contributions with Carr, was remedied by Vocalion's Mayo Williams after his 1931 breakaway. In all future recordings, Blackwell received equal credit with Carr in terms of recording contracts and songwriting credits. Blackwell's last recording session with Carr was in February 1935 for the Bluebird label. The recording session ended bitterly, as both musicians left the studio mid-session and on bad terms, stemming from payment disputes. Two months later Blackwell received a phone call informing him of Carr's death due to heavy drinking and nephritis. Blackwell soon recorded a tribute to his musical partner of seven years ("My Old Pal Blues") before retiring from the music industry.

Blackwell returned to music in the late 1950s and was first recorded in June 1958 by Colin C. Pomroy (those recordings were released as late as 1967 on the Collector label). Soon afterwards he was recorded by Duncan P. Schiedt for Doug Dobell's 77 Records.

Scrapper Blackwell was then recorded in 1961, in Indianapolis, by a young Art Rosenbaum for the Prestige/Bluesville Records label. The story is recounted by Rosenbaum as starting three years before the recordings were made. While still growing up in his hometown of Indianapolis, an African American woman that Rosenbaum knew said he "had to meet a man that she knew, who played guitar, played blues and christian songs, they'll make the hairs stand up on the back of your neck." Rosenbaum goes into more details of meeting Blackwell; "I met the gentleman across the street from the Methodist hospital in Indianapolis". Scrapper's friend said, "well he hasn't got a guitar", so Art said "well I got a guitar." Scrapper than said that he needed some 'bird food', with Rosenbaum being confused as to what he was referring to, Scrapper continued, "you gotta get some bird food for the bird, before the bird sings... beer!" Rosenbaum said, "I'm too young!" Scrapper and his friend continued, "we'll buy the beer, you just give us some money." Art concludes the meeting, "So we did, and he started playing these beautiful blues. I didn't realize he was Scrapper Blackwell til I mentioned his name to a blues collecting friend." To which then the friend exclaimed, "you met Scrapper Blackwell!?"

He was ready to resume his blues career when he was shot and killed during a mugging in an Indianapolis alley. He was 59 years old. Although the crime remains unsolved, police arrested his neighbour at the time for the murder. Blackwell is buried in New Crown Cemetery, Indianapolis.

James Brown - 5 Classic Albums [flac]

 A little (okay BIG) surprise from Unky Cliff!

I think this is fairly self explanatory, eh? 

Gonna be pretty busy for a while...Jazz Fest is here!

Don Covay - Mercy, Mercy: The Definitive Don Covay

Don Covay (born Donald Randolph, 24 March 1938, Orangeburg, South Carolina, United States) is an American R&B/rock and roll/soul music singer and songwriter most active in the 1950s and 1960s, who received a Pioneer Award from the Rhythm and Blues Foundation in 1994.

His father was a Baptist preacher who died when Don was eight. Covay resettled in Washington D.C. during the early 1950s and initially sang in the Cherry Keys, his family's gospel quartet. He crossed over to secular music with the Rainbows, a formative group which also included Marvin Gaye and Billy Stewart. Covay's solo career began in 1957 as part of the Little Richard Revue.

A single "Bip Bop Bip" was released on Atlantic and produced by Little Richard, on which Covay was billed as "Pretty Boy". It also featured his backing band the Upsetters. Over the next few years Covay drifted from label to label, but a further dance-oriented track called "Popeye Waddle" was a hit in 1962. He also wrote and recorded "Pony Time" which later became a US #1 single for Chubby Checker. Covay meanwhile honed his songwriting skills by penning a hit for Solomon Burke, "I'm Hanging Up My Heart for You", while Gladys Knight & The Pips reached the US Top 20 with "Letter Full of Tears".

Covay's singing career continued to falter until 1964, when he signed to the Rosemart label. His debut single there with the Goodtimers, "Mercy Mercy" (accompanied by a young Jimi Hendrix on guitar), established his earthy bluesy style. Atlantic bought his contract, but, while several R&B hits followed, it was a year before Covay returned to the pop chart. "See Saw", co-written with Steve Cropper and recorded at Stax, paved the way for more hits.

Don Covay's songs still remain successful: Aretha Franklin won a Grammy for her performance of his composition "Chain of Fools". He is a legendary composer and singer, best known for his R&B classic compositions "Mercy Mercy", "Chain of Fools", "See Saw" and "Sookie Sookie". Covay had success as a singer as Don Covay and The Goodtimers, and his compositions have been recorded by such varied artists as Steppenwolf, Bobby Womack, The Rolling Stones, Wilson Pickett, The Small Faces, Grant Green, Peter Wolf and many more.

In the mid 1990s Don Covay had a debilitating stroke, but he has recovered well. He is still active. His most recent album Adlib, released in 2000 on the Cannonball label, was his first album in 23 years.

Ann Sexton - The Beginning

In the course of presenting this blog and the reading/research necessary in doing that, I have often been confused by references placing what are to me clearly southern soul artists in something called 'Northern Soul' (note capitals). I have finally come to understand that those references are to a U.K. musical/dance movement that doesn't actually include what I would call northern soul (i.e. Motown, Philly, etc.). How confusing! Anyway that explains the reference in the wiki article below.

"Ann Sexton (born Mary Ann Sexton, February 5, 1950) She was born in Greenville, South Carolina, and is the cousin of singer and songwriter Chuck Jackson. Influenced by gospel music, she sang in her church choir and won local talent shows before singing back-up on a recording by Elijah and the Ebonies. She married the group's saxophonist, Melvin Burton, and the pair formed their own band, Ann Sexton and the Masters of Soul, in the late 1960s.

She was seen performing with the group by songwriter David Lee, the owner of the small local Impel record label, who recorded and released her first solo single, "You're Letting Me Down", in 1971. She then signed to John Richbourg's Seventy 7 Records, part of the Sound Stage 7 group, for whom she recorded a series of singles in Nashville and Memphis, Tennessee. In 1973, "You're Gonna Miss Me" reached no.47 on the Billboard R&B chart, and she released the album Loving You, Loving Me. Many of her recordings were co-written by herself and her husband, and several later became popular on the Northern soul scene in the UK. She recorded ballads as well as dance tracks, and the Sound Stage 7 label released her album The Beginning in 1977. It featured the single "I'm His Wife (You're Just a Friend)" which reached no.79 on the R&B chart.

She later worked at a New York school as a paraprofessional, using her married name Mary Burton. After her 1973 recording of "You're Losing Me" was featured in the 2003 film, 21 Grams, Sonny Hudson, who worked in the same school, answered some internet inquiries about her. Hudson, acting on her behalf and that of the German DJ and promoter Dan Dombrowe, began negotiations and after a lengthy period, Sexton agreed to go on stage again after a 30 year absence. In March 2007, she made her first performance since the 1970s at the Baltic Soul Weekender in Germany. She performed again at the Baltic Soul Weekender in April 2008, and has continued to make occasional appearances at festivals in the US and Europe since then." wiki

James Brown - The Singles, Vols 4 & 5

 Pappa's post reminded me that I still had a couple more of these to do. I'm going to try to clean up those loose ends I've left hanging over the past year.

In the period covered by these 4 discs (1966-69) JB ascends to 'Soul Brother Number One'. No longer is he opening for others, he is a headliner now. Judging by the material, he seems to have been ceded a pretty free hand in what he records in his new relationship with King. The fascinating thing to me is that undeniable classics like Cold Sweat and It's A Man's, Man's World are side by side with covers of I Loves You Porgy, Mona Lisa, and Our Day Will Come.

By Vol. 5 Brown seems to have fully committed to his new sound however, and there are fewer forays into attempted crossover material. In fact, the only cover on the 2 discs of vol5 is a jazzy instrumental of Little Green Apples.

These four discs are an absolute chronicle of the James Brown bands' development of their brand of funk.

James Brown - The Singles, Volume Three (2 discs)

Soul Brother Number One is baaaack! Yeah well that is almost unfair of me so let me say up front that this period and this pair of discs are no where near as brilliant as the two previous sets.

As on fire as Brown was through the previous two sets and the epic Apollo Concert of 1963 (I guess I should have posted that before this) he certainly takes a nose dive and comes up staggering on the majority of this stuff.

Brown had attempted to split from King and form his own Production company with Bobby Byrd. They signed with Mercury subsidiary Smash but King was not having it and went to court and won an injunction that prevented Brown from singing on record, he could only play organ. Three Smash vocal tracks came out prior to the injunction, one of which is actually pretty good, "Out Of Sight". Unfortunately also during this period King took advantage of the situation to empty their vaults of rejected songs, LP takes, and some MORON decide to take some perfectly good tracks and dub in crowd noise and screams in one of the most annoying production foibles ever.

To some extent you have to listen to disc one just to hear the train wreck, likely listening with horrified fascination, but at the end of the day if you ever want to hear any of it again, besides maybe tracks 13 and 16, I'd be surprised. Disc 2 does not begin any better and for 8 tracks it is more drek. I am reminded somehow of Roberto Duran in the first Sugar Ray Leonard fight. A guy who had previously seemed so terrifyingly invincible was suddenly lost and flailing about awkwardly, helpless, ineffective.

This image, however, is apparently to some extent artificially created by the record companies and the legal hassles. Behind this chaos JB and the band are still rocking monster shows and working out their new thang. That new thing finally comes to light when James and King make up and sign a new contract.  On track nine of disc two the world is set right with "I Got You". After the mess that precedes it this track burns like a red hot coal, a blinding neon light that says HE'S BACK! Two tracks later you know it for sure because "PAPA'S GOT A BRAND NEW BAG"!

It is like someone has opened up the window, lean back and breath deep - a couple of pleasant tracks of organ playing James doing instrumentals of Try Me and Papa and then just in case you thought that first version of "I Got You" was lacking something, JB ups the ante big time on his second, utterly explosive version of the song. "I Can't Help It" continues the return to form but the final two tracks, while good, are marred by more potted in crowd noise.

One thing has become clear to me about the JB singles; I had intended to stop after this set but I can't leave The Godfather hanging like that, it just wouldn't be right, so Volume Four where he explodes upon the American conscious and becomes part of the sound of an era will be coming. 

The Dixie Hummingbirds - Journey to the Sky

Formed in 1928 in Greenville, South Carolina, by James B. Davis and his classmates, they sang in local churches until they finished school, then started touring throughout the South.

Lead singer Ira Tucker joined the group in 1938 at age 13, and they signed with Decca Records. In addition to his formidable vocal skills, Tucker introduced the energetic showmanship - running through the aisles, jumping off stage, falling to his knees in prayer - copied by many quartets that followed. Tucker also took the lead in the stylistic innovations adopted by the group, combining gospel shouting and subtle melismas with the syncopated delivery made popular by The Golden Gate Quartet, as well as adventuresome harmonies, which the group called "trickeration", in which Paul Owens or another member of the group would pick up a note just as Tucker left off. The group relocated to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania in the 1940s.

During the years, a number of talented singers starred in the group—their bass, William Bobo (known as Thunder), baritone Beachy Thompson, James Walker (who replaced Owens), and Claude Jeter, who went on to star for The Swan Silvertones. The Hummingbirds added a guitarist, Howard Carroll, who added even more propulsive force to their high-flying vocals.

The Hummingbirds absorbed much from other artists as well, performing with Lester Young in the 1940s and sharing Django Reinhardt records with B.B. King in the 1950s. Tucker and the Hummingbirds inspired a number of imitators, such as Jackie Wilson and James Brown, who adapted the shouting style and enthusiastic showmanship of hard gospel to secular themes to help create soul music in the 1960s.

The group recorded for a number of different labels over the years, while touring the circuit of black churches and gospel extravaganzas. They occasionally came to the attention of white listeners—at Café Society, the integrated New York nightclub favored by jazz cognoscenti, in 1942, at the Newport Folk Festival in 1966, and as backup for Paul Simon on the 1973 single "Loves Me Like a Rock". For a long time, the group was signed to Don Robey's Peacock Records, based in Houston, Texas. In 1973, Robey sold Peacock to ABC Records, which released a cover of "Loves Me Like a Rock," produced by Walter "Kandor" Kahn and the group's lead vocalist Ira Tucker, which reached #72 on Billboard Magazine's Top 100 R&B Singles chart. The single also won a Grammy for "Best Soul Gospel Performance". Kahn and Tucker produced an album for ABC entitled We Love You Like A Rock. The album contained Stevie Wonder's "Jesus Children", on which Wonder played keyboards.

At that time, the group consisted of five vocalists: Ira Tucker Sr., James Davis, Beachy Thompson, James Walker and William Bobo. Howard Carroll was the group's guitarist. The group now consists of William Bright (vocals), Carlton Lewis, III (vocals), Torrey Nettles (drums/vocals),) and Lyndon Baines Jones (guitar & vocals and Ira Tucker, Jr (vocals)

In 1973 The group sang the backup vocals on Paul Simon's "Loves Me Like a Rock", and "Tenderness", from his album "There Goes Rhymin' Simon".

In 2003, the Hummingbirds were the subject of an award-winning book about their 75-year career span, Great God A'Mighty! The Dixie Hummingbirds: Celebrating the Rise of Soul Gospel Music [Oxford University Press] by Jerry Zolten. The book was favorably reviewed in The New York Times. 2-26-2003.

In February 2008, the first feature-length documentary/concert film featuring the life and history of the Dixie Hummingbirds was released in commemoration of their extraordinary eighty years as performers. The Dixie Hummingbirds: Eighty Years Young has been shown on the Gospel Music Channel and has played at numerous film festivals. Produced and directed by award-winning filmmaker Jeff Scheftel, and executive produced by University of Hawaii musicologist Jay Junker, the film is now available on DVD, featuring extensive interviews with Ira Tucker, Sr., archival footage, and following the current group as they perform in numerous venues and rehearse under Mr. Tucker's spirited guidance, in their hometown of Philadelphia, and across the vast landscape of America.

Ira Tucker, Sr. died due to complications from heart disease on the morning of June 24, 2008, at the age of 83. The group will go on, thereby preserving the rich legacy left by Tucker, James Davis, William Bobo, Beachey Thompson, James Walker, Howard Carroll, et al., with possible new additions to their personnel down the road.

This package came from Uncle Cliffy without numbering and 5 extra track from somewhere, I numbered the first 28 as they are on the official release and added the 5 at the end, finishing with the magnificent  Christian Automobile.

James Brown - The Singles, Volume 2 (King, 2 discs)

Yup, here we go! The next two disc entry into what you NEED to know about JB. (brace yourself chubby!) So that last Federal set? Yeah, well this is, if anything, better!

There is still a wonderful variety of sounds here, still casting about for a signature sound but certain things are clearly evolving. Brown has chosen to focus the band on Jazz and Jump Blues in their sound and approach. Most of the band solo space is the sax players. No question either that you can hear that Little Willie John has left an impression on James during the time he was opening for him. His phrasing, inflection and delivery have grown immensely. I'm really impressed with the whole package. The bottom line is that he a distinctly superior singer to the guy you heard on the first set and we all seemed to like THAT guy quite a bit!

The longer you listen you will hear the development of a 'sound' that carries across the different 'orientations' of the songs. JB is achieving an amazing synthesis of all those different earlier influences and has gotten his band "Ike Turner" tight. Extended instrumental breaks are regular and are dripping with Bill Dogget and Jimmy Forrest and the Johnny Otis 'show' influence is showing there as well. Quite simply, THIS IS SOME UTTERLY BRILLIANT SHIT!! One thing for damn sure, JB is given many modern major props as the Father of Funk and the Godfather of Soul but the undeniable genius is even more POTENT for me right here in these earlier recordings.

Footnotes: You guys are going to LOVE the disc 2 instrumental stuff like Devil's Den.
              And to my old buddy Wouter I would point out that in the early 60's EVERYBODY, JB, Wes Montgomery, Ben Webster, Little Willie John, I mean almost everyone had strings and cheesy backup singers. I guess I have developed a 'filter' of sorts, but yes, I asked for it!

James Brown - The Federal Years

If you have never heard this early material I think you will be fascinated like I was. James is obviously casting about in many directions looking for his 'sound'. His earliest version of Please, Please, Please shows that he idolized Little Richard at the time but the next track he is in a more Amos Milburn or Charles Brown mood. On track 3 he sounds a bit like Billy Wright as well. I'd definitely put him in that line from Wright thru Esquerita and Little Richard but he is adding pieces from all over. The fourth track is very much in the Roy Brown/Wynonie Harris mode and he handles that really well too. Later on there are even a few Doo Wop songs. In fact the one thing that really stands out on this material is what a fine singer Brown was, so much of his later material required so little actual singing that it is easy to forget what a dynamic voice he had. There are two discs to this first part and to each of the sets to follow as well.

"James Joseph Brown (May 3, 1933 – December 25, 2006) was an American singer, songwriter, musician, and recording artist. He is the originator of funk music and is a major figure of 20th century popular music and dance.

In a career that spanned six decades, Brown profoundly influenced the development of many different musical genres. Brown moved on a continuum of blues and gospel-based forms and styles to a profoundly "Africanized" approach to music making. Brown performed in concerts, first making his rounds across the Chitlin' Circuit, and then across the country and later around the world, along with appearing in shows on television and in movies. Although he contributed much to the music world through his hitmaking, Brown holds the record as the artist who charted the most singles on the Billboard Hot 100 without ever hitting number one on that chart.

For many years, Brown's touring show was one of the most extravagant productions in American popular music. At the time of Brown's death, his band included three guitarists, two bass guitar players, two drummers, three horns and a percussionist. The bands that he maintained during the late 1960s and 1970s were of comparable size, and the bands also included a three-piece amplified string section that played during ballads. Brown employed between 40 and 50 people for the James Brown Revue, and members of the revue traveled with him in a bus to cities and towns all over the country, performing upwards of 330 shows a year with almost all of the shows as one-nighters. In 1986, he was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and in 2000 into the Songwriters Hall of Fame.

Brown died on Christmas Day 2006 from heart failure after becoming ill two days earlier and being hospitalized for hours. James Brown is buried in Beech Island, South Carolina.

James Brown was born in Barnwell, South Carolina on May 3, 1933 to Susie (née Behlings) Brown (August 8, 1916 - February 26, 2004) and Joseph ("Joe") Gardner (March 29, 1911 - July 10, 1993) (who changed his surname to Brown after Mattie Brown who raised him). Although Brown was to be named after his father Joseph, his first and middle names were mistakenly reversed on his birth certificate. He therefore became James Joseph Brown, Jr. As a young child, Brown was called Junior. When he later lived with his aunt and cousin, he was called Little Junior since his cousin's nickname was also Junior. Later as an adult, Brown legally changed his name to remove the "Jr." designation. He was of African American and Native American (Apache) descent through his father, and had Asian ancestry through his mother, who was also half African American.

As a young child, Brown and his family lived in extreme poverty in nearby Elko, South Carolina, which at the time was an impoverished town in Barnwell County. When Brown was two years old, his parents separated after his mother left his father for another man. After his mother abandoned the family, Brown continued to live with his father and his father's live-in girlfriends until he was six years old. His father then sent him to live with an aunt, who ran a house of prostitution. Even though Brown lived with relatives, he spent long stretches of time on his own, hanging out on the streets and hustling to get by. Brown managed to stay in school until he dropped out in the seventh grade. During his childhood, Brown earned money shining shoes, sweeping out stores, selling and trading in old stamps, washing cars and dishes and singing in talent contests. Brown also performed buck dances for change to entertain troops from Camp Gordon at the start of World War II as their convoys traveled over a canal bridge near his aunt's home. Between earning money from these adventures, Brown taught himself to play a harmonica given to him by his father. He learned to play some guitar from Tampa Red, in addition to learning to play piano and drums from others he met during this time. Brown was inspired to become an entertainer after watching Louis Jordan, a popular jazz and R&B performer during the 1940s, and Jordan's Tympany Five performing "Caldonia" in a short film.

Brown began his performing career at the age of 12, forming his first vocal group, the Cremona Trio in 1945, where they won local talent shows at Augusta concert halls such as the Lenox and Harlem theaters. As a result of this success, the group would later gig at several high schools and local army bases.  At the age of sixteen, he was convicted of armed robbery and sent to a juvenile detention center upstate in Toccoa in 1949. While in prison, he formed a gospel quartet with fellow cell mates Johnny Terry, "Hucklebuck" Davis and a person named "Shag", and made homemade instruments - a comb and paper, a washtub bass, a drum kit made from lard tubs and for Brown, what he called "a sort of mandolin [made] out of a wooden box." Due to the latter instrument, Brown was given his first nickname, "Music Box". In 1952, while still in reform school, Brown met future R&B legend Bobby Byrd, who was there playing baseball against the reform school team. Byrd saw Brown perform there and admired his singing and performing talent. As a result of this friendship, Byrd's family helped Brown secure an early release on June 14, 1952 after serving three years of his sentence. The authorities agreed to release Brown on the condition that he would get a job and not return to Augusta or Richmond County and also under the condition he find a decent job and sing for the Lord as he had promised in his parole letter. After stints as a boxer and baseball pitcher in semi-professional baseball (a career move ended by a leg injury), Brown turned his energy toward music.

By 1954, Brown had tried to get a deal with his gospel group, the Ever Ready Gospel Singers after recording a version of "His Eye Is on the Sparrow", but returned to Toccoa when they failed to get a deal. Returning, his friend Bobby Byrd asked Brown to join his R&B group, the Avons, who had went under the previous name, the Gospel Starlighters to avoid controversy with church leaders. Brown replaced another vocalist, Troy Collins, who died in a car crash. The group, which included alongside Byrd and Brown; Sylvester Keels, Doyle Oglesby, Fred Pulliam and Johnny Terry, modeled themselves after the R&B groups of the day including The Orioles, The Five Keys and Billy Ward and His Dominoes. Gigging through Georgia and South Carolina, they again changed their name to the Toccoa Band to avoid confusion with two other groups who shared the Avons moniker. Under this name, Brown recruited guitarist Nafloyd Scott and, under their manager Barry Tremier, added assorted percussion.

While performing in Macon, Georgia having now changed their name to the Flames, a club promoter, Clint Brantley (then agent of one of Brown's idols, Little Richard, suggested the band add "Famous" in front of their name to draw more people to his club. The group began composing their own songs during this time and performing them too including a Brown composition called "Goin' Back to Rome" and a ballad Brown co-wrote with Terry titled "Please, Please, Please". After Little Richard left Macon for Los Angeles after the release of "Tutti Frutti", Brantley included the band at every venue Richard had performed, leading to the growth of the group's success. Before Christmas 1955, Brantley had the group record a demo of "Please, Please, Please" for a local Macon radio station. Different accounts on how "Please, Please, Please" came together vary, one story from Etta James stated that during her first meeting with Brown in Macon, Brown "used to carry around an old tattered napkin with him, because Little Richard had written the words, 'please, please, please' on it and James was determined to make a song out of it...". Another story came the group had gotten inspiration for writing the song after hearing The Orioles' rock'n'roll version of Big Joe Williams' hit, "Baby Please Don't Go", taking its melody from the song.

Federal Records president Ralph Bass signed the Famous Flames to his label in February 1956 and had them record the song in Cincinnati's King Studios. Released the following March, the song became the Famous Flames' first R&B hit, selling over a million copies. Despite the song's success, other songs such as "I Don't Know", "No No No", "Just Won't Do Right" and "Chonnie-On-Chon" failed to chart. By March of 1957 after the release of "Please, Please, Please", most members of the Famous Flames walked out on Brown after the group's new manager, Universal Attractions Agency Chief Ben Bart insisted on the group's billing officially be "James Brown and The Famous Flames". After Little Richard left show business for the ministry, Brown was asked to fill in leftover dates, which led to an increase in his concert success in which afterwards, he recruited members of the vocal group the Dominions to be his replacement Famous Flames. The first single under this new lineup, "That Dood It", failed to chart. In late 1958, Brown financed the demo of the ballad, "Try Me". Released that October, it returned the Famous Flames to the charts, reaching #1 on the R&B chart, the first time it reached that position, in February of 1959, becoming the first of 17 chart-topping hits on the R&B chart, credited to Brown over the next decade and a half, with six of them crediting the Famous Flames.

Bolstered by this success, Brown recruited a new band, consisted of saxophonist J. C. Davis, guitarist Bobby Roach, bassist Bernard Odum, trumpeter Roscoe Patrick, saxophonist Albert Corley, drummer Nat Kendrick and his old band mate Bobby Byrd, who had rejoined Brown's band on organ. This resulted in the next Brown hit, "I Want You So Bad", which peaked at the Billboard R&B top twenty. The newly hailed "James Brown Band" debuted at the Apollo Theater on April 24, 1959, opening for Little Willie John. Following his dismissal of the 1957-58 Famous Flames lineup, he hired "Baby" Lloyd Stallworth, Bobby Bennett as replacements with Byrd and Johnny Terry returning as members. The confusion of the band was that for years, the Famous Flames were often mistaken for Brown's backing band; fellow Famous Flame Byrd was also a member of the backing band at one point. Initially a vocal and instrumental group, the group focused primarily as a vocal act after signing with Federal. In early 1960, Brown's band recorded the top ten R&B hit, "(Do the) Mashed Potatoes" on Dade Records, owned by Henry Stone, under the pseudonym "Nat Kendrick & The Swans" because Brown's label refused to release it. As a result of this, Syd Nathan decided to shift Brown's contract from Federal to Federal's parent label, King Records.