Pointer Sisters - Having A Party

Hello 2 all!!

This is becoming way too often an occurance around here, yet another huge lapse in time between posts. Despite my best efforts, it just couldn't be avoided. I mentioned it some weeks back, Baby Slay'd touched down on April 24, 2009 and since his homecoming 3 days later, Mama & Papa are pretty much running on fumes since little man doesn't take to sleeping at nite. In addition, I've relinquished my mancave/project studio space to the new arrival and I'm kinda stuck in limbo for the time being.

So what does this all mean? What this means basically is I have almost no access to my the bulk of my collection, I've no workstation/computer at home ('cept for a laptop with hardly anything installed on it), and add to that, my archiving/needledrop/ripping station is now in pieces scattered across various corners of my house awaiting reassembly. Truthfully, as much as I want to put ev'rything back together and get back to my normal workflow, when I look at the pitiful amount of free-time I'm gettin' lately, I really don't see it happening anytime soon.

Still, none of this means I'm thinking of shutting down this blog or taking any further time off. What I've decided to do just to keep things goin' is scale things down a bit more and put more emphasis on the music alone. The "con" of this is there'll probably be alot less artwork and no write-ups accompanying each offering while the "pro" is that the lack of additional prepping will allow me to fire off a post much faster. I'm hoping this will only be a temporary thing.

So without any further ado...

Pointer Sisters - Having A Party

For some reason I've been on a bit of a Pointer Sisters kick lately, they've been on heavy rotation in the car and on the pod so today I bring you their 1977 ABC-Blue Thumb LP, Having A Party. This one made it's debut on CD a few short years ago thanks to the good folks at Hip-O Select and can easily be found here.

An original vinyl copy shouldn't be hard to come by either since these albums are plentiful as dirt, and almost as cheap last time I checked. Interested in the flat black plastic edition? Try here.

Featured cut: "Waiting On You"

N-joi!.

R.I.P. Michael Jackson

There are no words.

Gichy Dan's Beechwood #9 - s/t

I've had this thing (pics & audio) ready to go for quite some time now but just couldn't get the write-up done. Well, I found a few free moments today and tried to knock it out. N-joi!

Have you ever had a song stuck in your head, yet you didn’t know the artist, didn't know the title, didn't know the words and only had a vague recollection of a melody--but that melody was strong enough to keep you haunted, hunting high & low in a seamlessly never-ending search...no, ... QUEST, to find it? Well folks, I did and this record was my "white whale" for years.

Now dig while I bore y’all with the details…

Back in the late 70s, my sister would wake me up for school every morning and the radio in our room was always set to either "WBLS" or "92 WKTU-FM" (thems iz NYC radio stations for the uninitiated). Both stations primarily spun R&B & Dance Music but I remember that the KTU DJs would always throw in some odd-sounding stuff during their morning shows. Now when I say "odd-sounding," I just mean odd to my ears at the time, since the tunes were usually novelty records and material they strayed far from their ordinary programmed playlist. I was 6 or 7, but I remember hearing stuff like the Waitresses' "I Know What Boys Like," Coati Mundi's "Me No Pop I", and "Eugene" by Crazy Joe & The Variable Speed Band.

One morning, I heard a song that caught my attention. They played it a few more times over the following weeks but I always missed the station ID breaks in-between sets where they'd back-announce the songs so I never got a title or artist to hang on the song. The few listens were all it took for the melody of the hook to get stuck in my brain. That unknown melody would randomly play on repeat in my head over the next 4 years before I finally decided to do something about it. The only problem was, by the time I’d decided I liked the song enough to want to own it, it had long since been dropped from rotation and the station's format had changed since I'd heard it in it's original form so I had no way of tracking it down or finding out who it was or what it was called

I don’t know how, but somehow I got the notion that the song I wanted was sung by Kid Creole & The Coconuts. Maybe it was because their stuff had the same kinda vibe as the track I was looking for…who knows. Still, being a kid with basically no income, it took a loooong time but I started buying up Kid Creole records one by one when I could afford to. I was usually semi-disappointed with each one because although each one was a gem in its own right, none of them had the song I wanted. I did figure out that this cat by the name of August Darnell was the common link between all the Kid Creole stuff I’d been buying and the Dr Buzzard’s Original Savannah Band 45 of “Cherchez La Femme” fame I‘d already had at home and that kinda had that same sound. Armed with this nugget of knowledge, I began snatching up anything and everything with Darnell’s name on it. Over the years that followed, I wound up collecting all four Savannah Band albums as well as a bunch of material from Creole/Darnell offshoot projects like Coati Mundi, Machine, Don Armando’s 2nd Avenue Rhumba Band, and Cory Day. After all this I still was no closer to finding my mystery song and just about gave up the hunt cuz it was just costing way too much dough.

Cut to my freshman year of college, during which time I worked nights at a NYC record store where I met up with a “music connoisseur” who mentioned he was a huge Kid Creole fan. I sang him the melody and he said it sounded familiar but he couldn’t remember the title or artist but was sure it had something to do with August Darnell. I finally had some sort of confirmation that I was on the right track and with that, the hunt resumed. One night a few months later, during my lunch break, I stopped in to Bleecker Bob’s in Greenwich Village and rifled thru his “Kid Creole” section (they would sometimes lump related artists together in the same bin). I pulled up this colorful, self-titled album that I’d never seen before by a group I’d never heard of calling themselves Gichy Dan's Beechwood #9. I flipped it over and sure enough...BAM!...there was Darnell’s name all over the back of the jacket. I was already down to my last few dollars for the week but I couldn’t resist the gamble, so I walked out of the store that night, flat-broke with a new addition to my stacks tucked under my arm. I subsequently ran back to work, pulled my handy Mister Disc portable turntable out of my locker and dropped the needle on it….SUCCESS!!! The track was “Laissez Faire” and my search was finally over.

As I mentioned above, Gichy Gan's Beechwood #9 was a side-project of writer/producer/musician August Darnell while he was still part of Dr. Buzzard's Original Savannah Band. The story goes that Darnell had written a number of tunes that Savannah Band wound up not using so he called upon the talents of Frank "Pago Pago" aka "Gichy Dan" Passalaqua and vocalist Lourdes Cotto along with a huge roster of musicians whose names would adorn many Darnell-produced album covers in years to come. In 1979, the ensemble delivered their sole LP on the RCA label. In the following year, Darnell would go on to release the first of many albums under his Kid Creole alias. In 1981, a single called "Cowboys & Gangsters" was released on Island Records' ZE subsidiary. This would be the last official Gichy Dan project.

Gichy Dan's Beechwood #9 is long out of print on vinyl and might give you a hard time if you're looking for a clean copy to call your own. Still, you can try your luck here. If the vinyl frontier isn't for you, fear not good people, because an official CD reissue of the album is slated for release sometime in the very near future. When it drops, you should be able to nab a copy here.

Featured cut: "Laissez Faire"

Listen to my vinyl rip here.

UPDATE COMING SOON!!!

I know I've said it before, but I'm really sorry it's taken me so long to get a new post up. I've been juggling a lot lately while gettin' ready for a new arrival at the Slay'd household. That's right folks, I'm happy to announce that "Lil' Slay'd" is expected to touch down any day now. To the visitors who've stopped thru and were kind enough to leave comments, I thank you all and promise new tunage is on the way.

Oh yeah, all the images will be back too. :)

WE ARE EXPERIENCING TECHINCAL DIFFICULTIES....PLEASE STAND BY

Ms Sharon Ridley - Full Moon

I wish I had more to tell y'all about the artist featured in today's post. Sadly, there's no bio information or anything of the sort floating around anywhere where I could find it.

All I was able to drum up was a very generic-sounding blurb from her booking agency.

Observe...

"Sharon Ridley has entertained worldwide for many years. Her performances have taken her to such far off locales as Japan, Russia, Belgium, Switzerland, and the USA gambling meccas of Las Vegas and Reno. Her performance style is smooth and sophisticated, and she captures the hearts of audiences wherever she performs. She is a musical delight."

It's really a cryin' shame that this woman has managed to deliver one the most beloved and hard-to-find singles of it's kind and nothing more about her is out there than that. Seems par for the course I'm afraid, even going back thirty years, there wasn't even a decent shot of Ms. Ridley on her own album cover. No inner sleeve, no line notes....nuthin'. Hell, it wasn't until I stumbled across the agency photo that I even knew what she looked like.

Sharon's single, "Changin'" was a staple at the famed Paradise Garage nightclub when legendary DJ Larry Levan would play the track as the night's closing song. The white label, promo-only extended mix of "Changin'" (mistakenly listed in the deadwax as "Changes") is highly sought after and commands obscene prices.

Ladies and Gentlemen, I bring you Ms. Sharon Ridley and her 2nd full length album released in 1978 on Clarence Avant's Tabu label, Full Moon.

You know the drill by now, Full Moon has long been on the OOP list, but you can sometimes get a copy on the cheap here.

Featured cut: "Changin'"

Listen to the full album here.

Marlena Shaw - Just A Matter Of Time

Born Marlina Burgess in 1942, Valhalla, New York. Marlena Shaw began her singing career in the 1960s and is still singing today. Her music crossed genre boundaries and was enjoyed by people of all races. Her strongest fan base was in the African American community. Her music has reached out and touched all forms of music, and is still seen today as samples in hip hop songs, and in commercials on TV. Her uncle, Jimmy Burgess a jazz trumpet player, first introduced her to music. In an interview with the New York Times, she told the reporter "He introduced me to good music through records---Dizzy [Gillespie], Miles [Davis], a lot of gospel things, and Al Hibbler, who really knows how to phrase a song."

In 1952, her uncle Jimmy brought her on stage at the Apollo Theater in Harlem to sing with him and his band. This was her first performance, and the audience loved her. Shaw’s mother did not want her daughter to go on tour with her uncle at such a young age and refused to let her go. Instead, she enrolled Shaw into the New York State Teachers College in Potsdam (now known as the State University of New York at Potsdam) to study music. She later dropped out of school, got married, and had five children. She did not give up on her singing career. She began to make singing appearances in jazz clubs whenever she could spare the time. This most notable of these appearances was in 1963 when she worked with jazz trumpeter Howard McGhee. She was supposed to play at the famous Newport Jazz Festival with McGhee and his band, but left the group after getting into an argument with one of the band members. Later that year, she got an audition with legendary Columbia label talent scout John Hammond. John Hammond had discovered talents including Billie Holiday, Bruce Springsteen, Aretha Franklin, and Bob Dylan. Shaw did not perform well during the audition because she was too nervous. Undiscouraged, she continued to play at small clubs in 1964 until 1966. Her career took off in 1966 when she landed a gig with the Playboy Club chain in Chicago. It was through this gig that she met with representatives the music label Chess Records, and soon signed with them.

Shaw was discovered by Chess Records in 1966. Her first two albums, 1967's Out of Different Bags and 1969's Spice of Life were released on their Cadet subsidiary.

She moved to Blue Note Records in 1972, and became their first female artist. That year, she returned with Marlena, the first of five albums Shaw would record for the label.

In 1977 Shaw, left Blue Note and inked a deal with Columbia records. She churned out a total of 3 albums during her stint with the label leading off with Sweet Beginnings, followed by Acting Up in 1978 & Take A Bite in 1980. Beginnings featured of her most successful singles to date, her unique rendition of "Yu-Ma/Go Away Little Boy."

Over the next two decades Marlena recorded albums for a variety of labels including South Bay, Verve and Concord Jazz.

In 2000, her tremendous overseas popularity led to Anthology, a splendid collection from London’s Soul Brother Records. Two years later, Marlena released her Live In Tokyo set.

The following year she recorded Lookin' For Love. Like her previous to albums, Lookin'... was issued in the United States by 441 Records.

Shaw still performs and records today, you can keep abreast of her tour dates and other info via her MySpace page here.

Just A Matter Of Time is, of course, out of print and has yet to be reissued but an original vinyl copy of your own should be easy to track down for a good price here.

Featured cut: "Think About Me"

Listen to the full album here

The Stovall Sisters - s/t

Sorry it's been so long since my last post, my 2K9 got off to a hectic start, but I'm not gonna bore you good people with the details. Let's just get into this post.

For a brief moment in 1971, Warner Bros.Records' Reprise imprint took sometime out from promoting Frank Sinatra,Sammy Davis, Jr., and Lola Falana records to spread the gospel via the electrifying music of the Stovall Sisters. Lillian, Netta, and Joyce Stovall were all born in Indianapolis, Indiana. They were the last three of ten children born to Della Stovall. Four older sisters sang as a church group for years until they married and settled into domestic bliss. The three younger girls sang in churches too as the Little Wonder in the 1950s, but by their teens had changed their name to the Valley Wonders. Della managed the group and booked their concerts. She also snagged them a record deal with a small label.

In 1964,the family moved to Oakland,California, where they finished high school, sang in church as the Stovall Sisters, and took on 9-to-5 jobs. They began to see that there was little money to be made in singing gospel, to they added secular music to their repertoire and started getting nightclub work around the city, lying about their ages because they were still underage. "We were with Ike & Tina Turner for a while," Lillian said in a 1971 press release. "I think we were the 18th set of Ikettes. We did a lot of recording sessions, too, but mostly it was club work. We were [known as] the Sisters Three when we did rock and roll, but we'd still record for the gospel label as the Valley Wonders or the Stovall Family."

Things weren't happening fast enough for their careers, so they took out an as in the Oakland Tribune that read, "Three Black Girls Looking for a Caucasian Band to Sing With." They got a lot of weird calls, but the only decent response from the ad was a keyboardist named William Truckaway. "He came right in and sat on the floor like we'd been knowing him for year," Joyce said back then. Through Truckaway, they did background vocals on "Bluegreens." He also introduced them to his musician buddy Erik Jacobsen, who decided to use them as the background singers on Norman Greenbaum's song "Spirit in the Sky." The song went to No. 3 on the pop charts and became the label's bestselling single up to that time.

Everyone enjoyed the sisters so much that Greenbaum's label, Reprise, decided to record a self-titled LP on them. Reprise issued three singles in 1971 including "Hang On in There," "Spirit in the Sky," and "The World Is in a Change," but none of them took off, The sister' sound was gutsy gospel wrapped in a rock music package and should have been a huge seller. Of particular interest was "Yes to the Lord," a brilliant gospel reworking of Martha Reeves & the Vandella's "My Baby Love Me." Also notable were the powerful vocal punches in the ballad "I'm Ready to Serve the Lord" and the sweet " The World is in a Change." Philip Baily briefly served as their music director before he eventually joined Earth, Wind & Fire. In the meantime, they did background vocals on Greenbaum's follow-up albums Back Home Again and Canned Ham. They did the same on Tom Fogerty's Myopia (1975) and Truckaway's LP Breakaway in 1976.
Bio source: Bil Carpenter's "Uncloudy Days: The Gospel Music Encyclopedia"

To find out what's going on with the Stovall Sisters today, you can visit their MySpace page by clicking here.

Their self-titled LP is long out of print but with some luck and lotsa patience you may be able to find an affordable vinyl copy here or sometimes here...I did.
The album was also reissued on CD back in 2005 and can be found here & here.

With things bein' as rough as they are lately, it's kinda cool to be able to find some solace within the lines of a song. Stay up y'all... Hang On In There.

Featured cut: "Hang On In There"

Listen to the full album here.

Jose Feliciano - And The Feeling's Good

Happy 2009 everybody, here's hoping the new is a damn sight better than the old.

Lemme kick off the new year with a new post. Read, listen and enjoy!!!

One of the most prominent Latin-born performers of the pop era, singer/guitarist Jose Feliciano, was born September 10, 1945, in Lares, Puerto Rico. The victim of congenital glaucoma, he was left permanently blind at birth. Five years later, he and his family moved to New York City's Spanish Harlem area; there Feliciano began learning the accordion, later taking up the guitar, and made his first public appearance at the Bronx's El Teatro Puerto Rico at the age of nine. He reputedly sat by himself in his room for up to 14 hours a day to listen to 1950s rock albums, classical guitarists such as Andrés Segovia, and jazz players such as Wes Montgomery. He later had classical lessons with Harold Morris, who earlier had been a student of Segovia 's.

While in high school, Jose became a fixture of the Greenwich Village coffeehouse circuit, eventually quitting school in 1962, at the age of 17, in order to accept a permanent gig in Detroit.

In 1963, after making his rounds with live performances in pubs and clubs around the country, he was signed at RCA Victor. In 1964, he released his first single "Everybody Do The Click" and followed with his first full-length release, The Voice & Guitar of Jose Feliciano. Later, in 1965 and 1966, he released his next two albums, The Fantastic Feliciano, & A Bag Full of Soul. Both were folk-pop-soul albums that showcased his talent on radio across the USA, where he was described as a "10 finger wizard."

In 1966, he went to Mar del Plata, Argentina, to perform at the Festival de Mar del Plata. There, he impressed RCA Victor officials who requested he stay there to record an album in Spanish. They weren't sure what they wanted to record, but Feliciano suggested they record bolero music. The resulting album spawned two smash hits, "Poquita Fe" and "Usted."

After two more successful Spanish albums, Feliciano, now a household name all over Latin America, moved to Los Angeles where he teamed up with producer Rick Jarrard, who was at the time working on projects with Nilsson & Jefferson Airplane. This new pairing gave birth to the album Feliciano! and featured a soulful Latin-tinged cover of The Doors' "Light My Fire." When released as a single in 1968, "Light My Fire" was an immediate success, reaching number 3 on the charts that summer. The buzz from the single launched Jose him into the mainstream pop stratosphere and he immediately followed up with another Top 20 U.S. hit, a reading of Tommy Tucker's R&B hit, "Hi-Heel Sneakers."

In 1968, at the height of protests against the Vietnam War, Feliciano was given the opportunity to perform The Star-Spangled Banner at Tiger Stadium during the World Series. His highly personalized, slow, Latin jazz performance proved highly controversial. He accompanied himself on an acoustic guitar. The rendition was released as a single, which charted for 5 weeks on the Billboard Hot 100, peaking at #50. Feliciano's "Star-Spangled Banner" took place 10 months before the more famous Jimi Hendrix rendition at Woodstock. In 1969, Jose took home Grammy Awards for Best New Artist of the Year and for Best Pop Song of the Year. The same year he recorded three LPs — Souled, Alive Alive-O, and Feliciano 10 to 23, but never again equaled the success of "Light My Fire."

In 1970, he wrote and released an album of Christmas music, "Felíz Navidad," and this has probably become his most famous recording. Each year during the Christmas season, the song receives heavy airplay and has been recognized by ASCAP as one of the 25 all-time most-played Christmas songs in the world. In 1971, Jose traveled to Italy to participate in the San Remo Music Festival, singing the song "Che Sarà" in Italian, earning second place in that contest, as well as a standing ovation from the audience. He later recorded the song, which became a popular favorite not only in Italy, but throughout much of Europe, including the Iron Curtain countries, as well as in Asia. Feliciano later recorded the song in Spanish, as "Qué Será," which became an enormous hit in Central and South America, and in English, as "Shake A Hand," a monster seller in Scandinavia.

Throughout the 1970s Feliciano remained an active performer, touring annually and issuing a number of LPs in both English and Spanish, including 1973's Steve Cropper-produced Compartments. Jose wrote and performed the opening theme song to the 70s comedy series Chico & The Man, sung the show's closing theme, "Hard Times In El Barrio" and released songs on his 1974 RCA LP, And The Feeling's Good.

Drawing on his immense popularity, Feliciano was able to dabble in the world of television and film, lending his talents to big and small screen projects both behind and in front of the camera. He did a number of cameos on such TV shows as Chico & The Man, McMillan & Wife, Kung Fu, and served as composer for the 1975 Gordon Parks film "Aaron Loves Angela."

In 1980, Feliciano was the first performer signed to the new Latin division of Motown, making his label debut with an eponymous effort the following year. Throughout the 80s, Feliciano recorded and released albums for RCA, EMI, and Capitol, netting four more Grammys for best Latin performer by the end of the decade.

In 1995, Feliciano was honored by the City of New York, which re-named Public School 155 the Jose Feliciano Performing Arts School. In 1996, he had a short cameo role in the film Fargo.

In 2003 "Guitarra Mía", a special tribute to Feliciano, was produced by the Banco Popular de Puerto Rico and aired in Puerto Rico and in cities with large Latino populations in the United States. This television special (and its attendant soundtrack) featured Feliciano and many Puerto Rican and international stars singing some of his most famous songs, along with his personal favorites from other artists.

On December 6, 2006, Feliciano's new Spanish album, José Feliciano y Amigos was released by Universal Records, featuring duets with many other Latin American stars, including Luis Fonsi, Lupillo Rivera, Luciano Pereyra, Rudy Perez, Cristian Castro, Marc Anthony, Ramon Ayala, Alicia Villarreal, Ricardo Montaner and Raúl di Blasio. A special edition was later released and featured Ana Gabriel and Gloria Estefan.

In 2007, Feliciano released an album called Soundtrack of My Life, the first English-language album completely composed and written by him. Feliciano is married to wife Susan; they have 3 children: daughter Melissa and sons Jonathan and Mikey.

And The Feeling's Good is OOP and inexplicably hard to to find but with a little luck and some patience, you can grab an original vinyl copy here at a good price.
Back in 1997, BMG Japan reissued the album on CD as part of the Free Soul series. That CD is now, as usual, out of print and hard to find at a reasonable price. However, if you really want one to call your very own and money is no concern, you can drop coin here and have one arrive at a mailbox near you.

Featured cut: "Golden Lady"

Listen to the full album here.

R.I.P. Freddie Hubbard

I really wasn't planning on putting up another post for 2008 but in this case, I felt duty-bound to make this exception so that I could acknowledge the loss of another legendary artist.

Jazz luminary Freddie Hubbard has passed away.

According to spokesman Don Lucoff, the 70 year old musician died at Sherman Oaks Hospital, in Sherman Oaks, California, this morning. The cause of death was from complications of a heart attack he suffered on November 26.

A renowned trumpeter and composer who helped define the 1960s jazz era, Hubbard played with artists John Coltrane, Ornette Coleman, Bobby Hutcherson, Oliver Nelson, Andrew Hill, Eric Dolphy, Herbie Hancock, Wayne Shorter, McCoy Tyner and countless others.

He was recorded on over 300 albums as a leader and a sidesman on various record labels such as Impulse!, Columbia, Elektra, MPS, Music Masters, Telarc, Blue Note, Atlantic and CTI Records.

I'll wrap up this post with an outstanding rendition of one of Freddie's signature compositions; Milt Jackson's 1972 recording of "Little Sunflower" (redubbed "Sunflower" for this release) featuring guest appearance by Hubbard himself.

Quickie: Ohio Players - Happy Holidays

You know how sometimes you feel a little tickle in your throat, and in the back of your mind you know it's probably a warning sign that you're about to be sick? Well I had that feelin' this past Friday morning and stupidly let it go, unchecked and untreated, all weekend long. As a result, I submit this Monday morning post from a sick bed as I shove copious amounts of over-the-counter cure-alls down my gullet to try and get well enough to go back to work tomorrow without infecting everyone around me. Anyway, my drugs are starting to kick in so I'll make this brief.

Today's offering is a small dose of Christmas holiday cheer served up by the legendary Ohio Players. This single-only release is long out of print but has resurfaced on various OP collections over the years. Sadly, most of those appearances only offer up the A-Side (Pt. 1) of the tune; so if you're trying to find the complete song you've only got 2 options: you can search here and try to find an original 45 pressing or, alternatively, you can try to get your hands on a copy of the Players' recently remastered Funk On Fire collection here.

N-joi!

Dizzy Gillespie - Soul & Salvation

Okay, now that Thanksgiving '08 is out of the way I've got a small window to get a few posts in before I get knee deep in prep for Dec. 25th. I pulled this one from the crates a few weeks ago but didn't get around to ripping & cleaning it up until tonight. Dizzy Gillespie's 1969 Soul & Salvation album released on the indie, New York-based label, Tribute Records. With masterful arrangements by Ed Bland, this set features stellar performances by sax man James Moody and trumpeter Joe Newman.

John Birks "Dizzy" Gillespie was an American jazz trumpeter, band leader, singer, and composer. He was born on October 21, 1917 in Cheraw, South Carolina, the youngest of nine children. Dizzy's father was a local band leader, so instruments were made available to Dizzy. He started to play the piano at the age of 4. Together with Charlie Parker, he was a major figure in the development of bebop and modern jazz.

With Charlie Parker, Gillespie jammed at famous jazz clubs like Minton's Playhouse and Monroe's Uptown House, where the first seeds of bebop were planted. Gillespie's compositions like "Groovin' High", "Woody n' You", "Salt Peanuts", and "A Night in Tunisia" sounded radically different, harmonically and rhythmically, than the Swing music popular at the time. One of their first (and greatest) small-group performances together was only issued in 2005: a concert in New York's Town Hall on June 22, 1945. Gillespie taught many of the young musicians on 52nd Street, like Miles Davis and Max Roach, about the new style of jazz. After a lengthy gig at Billy Berg's club in Los Angeles, which left most of the audience ambivalent or hostile towards the new music, the band broke up. Unlike Parker, who was content to play in small groups and be an occasional featured soloist in big bands, Gillespie aimed to lead a big band himself; his first attempt to do this came in 1945, but it did not prove a success.

After his work with Parker, Gillespie led other small combos (including ones with Milt Jackson, John Coltrane, Lalo Schifrin) and finally put together his first successful big band. He also appeared frequently as a soloist with Norman Granz's Jazz at the Philharmonic. He also headlined the 1946 independently-produced musical revue film "Jivin' in Be-Bop".

In 1956 he organized a band to go on a State Department tour of the Middle East and earned the nickname "the Ambassador of Jazz".

Gillespie was also involved in the movement called Afro-Cuban music, bringing Latin and African elements to greater prominence in jazz and even pop music, particularly salsa. Gillespie's most famous contributions to Afro-Cuban music are the compositions "Manteca" and "Tin Tin Deo"; he was responsible for commissioning George Russell's "Cubano Be, Cubano Bop", which featured the great but ill-fated Cuban conga player, Chano Pozo. In 1977, Gillespie discovered Arturo Sandoval while researching music during a tour of Cuba.

Unlike his contemporary Miles Davis, Dizzy essentially remained true to the bebop style for the rest of his career.

Gilliespie died of pancreatic cancer on January 6, 1993, at the age of 75 and was buried in the Flushing Cemetery, Queens, New York. He was survived by his widow, Lorraine Willis Gillespie; a daughter, jazz singer Jeanie Bryson; and a grandson, Radji Birks Bryson-Barrett. Dizzy had two funerals. One was a Bahá´í funeral at his request, at which his closest friends and colleagues attended. The second was at the Cathedral of St. John the Divine in New York open to the public.

Soul & Salvation has never been reissued on CD but you can usually find a few collectible, original vinyl pressings alongside the more affordable, unofficial repressings right here.

Featured cut: "Stomped & Wasted"

Listen to the full album here.

Silk - Midnight Dancer

What's good people? This week, as promised, I bring you part 2 of last week's Anglo Saxon Brown/Silk post. Not gonna get too wordy on this one since I covered the bulk of the info on this band in Part 1.

As of this writing, Midnight Dancer is loooong out of print, but If you want a copy to call your very own, you can try finding one here.

Featured cut: "I Can't Stop (Turning You On)"

Listen and n-joi!

Anglo Saxon Brown - Songs For Evolution

Originally formed in Philadelphia, PA as Anglo Saxon Brown, the group released their first LP, Songs For Evolution on the Atlantic label in 1976.

After a few personnel changes, the outfit reinvented themselves as Silk releasing their 1979 follow-up album, Midnight Dancer, for Gamble & Huff's Philadelphia International imprint.

Both albums possess the same key elements; slick production, superb vocal & instrumental arrangements plus that unmistakable Philly sound thanks to backing by MFSB. With all this going for 'em it's really hard to see why these projects weren't able to capture greater commercial success.

Usually, I try not throw up more than one piece per post but since I still wanted to showcase both of these albums, I'll do it this way instead. This week I bring you ASBs Songs For Evolution album and sometime over the next week or so I'll add Silk's Midnight Dancer into the mix.

Singles from both albums are have turned up on various compilations over the years but both LPs in their entirety are still on the OOP list. As usual, you can find copies of each just waiting to be snatched up here and here.

Featured cut: "ASB Theme"

(u can also hear ASB's "Call On Me" in the jukebox)

Listen to the full album here.

EVERYBODY REJOICE !!!

"Everybody look around, 'cause there's a reason to rejoice you see..."

11-04-08...America...Voice Your Choice!!!

Poster design: Josh Higgins, San Diego, CA

Get out and VOTE!

Quickie: Sweet Thunder - Everybody's Singin' Love Songs (Disco12" Mix)

Who said you can't get discovered by mailing out a tape? That's how Sweet Thunder, a four man band from Youngstown, OH landed their deal with Philadelphia's WMOT (We Men Of Talent) Productions in 1976. The members were Charles Buie (vocals/lead guitar), Rudell Alexander (bass), Booker Newberry (vocals/keyboards), and John Aaron (drums). They didn't have a name when they submitted their tape to WMOT so an executive at the company came up with the "Sweet Thunder" moniker. WMOT, then distributed by Atlantic Records, released the band's first album Above The Clouds that same year.

By the time the band's self-titled second album was ready, WMOT had inked a distribution deal with Berkeley, Califnornia based Fantasy Records. The album's standouts were the uptempo dance cut "Everybody's Singin' Love Songs" and the Top 40 R&B ballad "Baby, I Need You Love Today."

The band's third and final album, Horizons was released in 1979 to lackluster sales and went virtually unnoticed. Buie and Alexander continued in music as session musicians and vocalists, Aaron became a producer and Newberry went on to pursue a solo career.

Wanna own a copy of this? If yes, then vinyl is your only hope since this mix hasn't seen a CD release yet. But the good news is that the supply is so plentiful you wont end up spending a fortune just to claim a copy. Pick one up here.

N-joi!

Quickie: Diana Ross - Muscles (Extended Version)

After "Mirror Mirror" from her 1981 debut RCA LP, Why Do Fools Fall In Love, this is possibly my favorite RCA-era Diana Ross cut. Penned and produced by Michael Jackson, "Muscles" was the lead single from Ross' 1982 Silk Electric album. I yanked this one from a $2 bin a years back, I own the LP, cassette & 45 but never heard the 12" version. The vinyl was kinda beat up but after a few minutes on the Nitty Gritty and some restoration in Audition it cleaned up pretty nicely.

If you're tryin' to find a hard copy of this extended mix to add to your stacks at home, ya better have a turntable in yer life 'cause this one never made it to any comps (none that I know of anyway). The good thing is, it's pretty easy to find without spending too much dough. You can try your luck here.

N-joi!

R.I.P. Dee Dee Warwick

*SIGH* More bad news to share, I was shocked and saddened to hear that we've lost one more soul legend. The phenomenal Dee Dee Warwick has passed away.

Dee Dee Warwick, a soul singer who won recognition for both her solo work and her performances with her older sister Dionne Warwick, has died. She was 63. Warwick died Saturday at a nursing home in Essex County, said Kevin Sasaki, a family spokesman. She had been in failing health in recent months, he said, and her sister was with her when she died. Warwick had several hits on the soul and R&B charts in the 1960s and 70s, including "Foolish Fool," "She Didn't Know (She Kept on Talking)" and a version of "I'm Gonna Make You Love Me" that was later covered by Diana Ross and The Supremes.

Most recently, Dee Dee provided background vocals for her sister's recent one-woman autobiographical show, "My Music & Me," which played to sold-out crowds in Europe this year. She also performed on the title song from Dionne Warwick's gospel album, "Why We Sing," released January 2008.

For more info on Miss Warwick, check out my Dee Dee post here.

R.I.P. Levi Stubbs / Four Tops - Still Waters...

Sad news yet again, Levi Stubbs, former lead singer of the mighty Motown vocal group, The Four Tops has passed away.

Levi, born June 6, 1936 as "Levi Stubbles", 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.

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.

::- Four Tops - Still Waters Run Deep -::

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 high charter; "Bernadette," "7-Rooms of Gloom" & "You Keep Running Away". 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. The Tops 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 1995, Stubbs was diagnosed with cancer, and later, suffered a stroke and stopped touring. 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. In 2000, Theo Peoples took Stubbs' place as the lead singer of the Four Tops, with Ronnie McNeir taking the place that Payton originally held. Benson died on July 1, 2005 and Levi Stubbs died in his sleep on October 17, 2008 at his home in Detroit from his ailments. He was 72.

I'm sure y'all know the routine by now, the vinyl LP is, of course, long out of print but you can fetch one here for little to nothing. Don't have a turntable?? No worries!!! If you prefer your Tops in a digital way, you can find Still Waters Run Deep on CD right here.

Featured cut: "It's All In The Game"

Listen to the full album here.