Garethx

A very interesting post Robb, but pretty much bears out what I was trying to get at above. It seems the majority of the tracks this topic throws up originated in the non-Detroit offices. The instances of Motown's Detroit employees producing or writing for 'outside' artists during what we think of as the company's heyday are pretty-much non-existent. The New York and Los Angeles offices seem to have operated in an entirely different way to the Detroit base. The New York experiment was abandoned pretty quickly and seemed to be more or less an attempt to get Miss Ray out of the picture in Detroit. In any case I'm trying hard to think about any artists or producers who made the jump from that situation to long-lasting involvement with the mainstream company (of course there are figures like Robert Bateman Bob Staunton who contributed but were hardly mainstays like Smokey or the Hollands or Norman Whitfield were in Detroit). LA was different again and as you say all the production or writing personnel seemed relatively free to carry on their involvement with other record companies and that office at least 'found' Brenda Holloway, even if her initial success did indeed lead to rancour and fall-out for some of the creative talent involved. Also worth mentioning that Jobete's LA office gave the young Jimmy Webb his start as a salaried professional songwriter.

Also a good publisher will try to find the correct vehicle to sell as many records as possible with any given song. In the classic Motown period it was the signed artists and producers who could pretty much guarantee this outcome. The fascinating thing to hear would be first hand accounts of how exactly such songs as "Lonely Girl" or "Lonely Lover" made their way onto what were pretty much 'Mom and Pop' labels. I can think of one example of a record which doesn't fit into many of the broad categories above: Nick Ashford's "When I Feel The Need" on Verve. A Jobete song and one where Nick Ashford was on a producer-writer contract, but only specifically as part of the Ashford-Simpson duo and was presumably briefly free to try his hand as an artist on another label. Marvin Gaye's powerhouse rendition was left in the can for any number of reasons we can only guess at now.

I think what you say is true to an extent Bob, but the fact remains that the vast majority of the 1960s Jobete catalogue was recorded in-house and the main mechanism which ensured that was Producer contracts. Most of the people who had instant access to the songs were contracted producer-writers who couldn't have overseen outside recordings under their own names anyway. A number of the examples mentioned above were non-Detroit originated songs where the writers-producers were not necessarily under exclusive contract: Sidney Barnes/George Kerr etc. in New York and Frank Wilson/Marc Gordon/The Pipkin Brothers in LA. Also there are a number of examples from the Pre-Pop hit period where the Producer contract system might not have been as securely tied down. In a relatively vast 1960s catalogue of songs the amount which never saw a Motown producer or any number of signed acts attempt them is still pretty limited. Jobete came to become synonymous with Motown. A blessing in some ways but a curse in others. As the 1960s wore on the powers that be were keen to get the catalogue of songs performed by as broad a cast of performers as they could in the 'white bread' world. One of the ways they tried to do this was having songs placed on the albums of the big crossover entertainers such as Dean Martin and so on. The Jobete moniker may have scared off some potential customers because of the above mentioned synonymity, so other brands were bought into the publishing fold like Stone Agate Music. "For Once In My Life" was written specifically to be a 'modern standard' which consumers were meant to assume was a far older piece of music. A new publishing company, Stein & Van Stock, was created specifically for songs such as these: songs generated in-house but not meant to lead to typical Motown arrangements or treatments. The name was meant to conjure images of some of the older Tin Pan Alley publishers. After the move to Los Angeles the company was so different in so many ways to what went before, and I suppose your late '70s example is symptomatic of that change. 1970s Motown still made many good records, but the homogeneity of sound and approach was largely no longer there.

A cover version of Jimmy Ruffin on Soul as opposed to the strict definition of this topic (a Jobete song where the released version was non-Motown recorded or released and where there was no contemporary Motown release). For what it's worth the Clay Hunt cut is far superior to Jimmy Ruffin's in my opinion.

Just listening to the other side of the Paris 45 (a Jobete song too) "Wishing Well" and his voice on that is excellent; clearly the same guy as on Uni and 4J as 'Mr Tears (Paris)'. According to John Ridley's website his real name was Ekundayo Paris and he was and is a songwriter of some repute, responsible for, of all things, Robbie Williams "Rock DJ" through it's sampling of Barry White's "It's Ecstasy When You Lay Down Next To Me".

Ike & Tina Turner Somebody, Somewhere Loma (and by association Darrell Banks version on Revilot) are Jobete songs too, as is of course "Lonely Lover" by Jimmy McFarland (with recordings in the can by Marvin Gaye and The Four Tops which have seen light subsequently). The Paris record is an interesting one. On ebay a few years ago a copy turned up with maybe more WOL than I've ever seen on a record. It was in fact a dedication to the artist (who was referred to as 'David') by all those who played or sang background on the session. It was basically everyone in the Motown LA office at the time, the Holloway sisters, Frank Wilson, Marc Gordon, Morris Chestnut from The Vows etc. I don't know if it's been definitively proven that Paris was the same guy who recorded on 4J but "Sleepless Nights" has always struck me as a bit of a vanity recording by a non-professional singer. Maybe he was their dentist or accountant. Sandy Wynns 45 similarly appeared on the mysterious "DOC" label (as well as on Champion) which has a Pennsylvania address on what is clearly a West Coast disc to presumably throw people off the scent of a 'moonlighting' Motown release.

Three Northern classics off the top of my head from the Jobete catalogue: Paris Sleepless Nights Doc Sandy Wynns The Touch Of Venus Champion Eric Mercury & The Soul Searchers Lonely Girl Sac

There is a counterfeit of the tan label Jaba release to look out for.

Stud Gardner on his Revue LP. Done as a deep soul ballad from what I can remember.

He was (or maybe still is) the lead singer of one of the latter incarnations of The Embers.

Informative topic and also very interesting that it can be nailed down quite so definitively to Gene McDaniels. Who played it and was it played slap bang in the middle of either a set or the night? As others have mentioned there had been something of a tradition of slower records played with a specific purpose as 'enders' in various clubs and The Drifter had long been a record held in high esteem by collectors, right from the time of its UK release. Some slower mid tempo records had been pretty big in the scene's heyday: Eddie Foster is a pretty slow dancer, as was Arin Demain: it's not a million miles from the 'Beat Ballad' sound. The first time I would have come across the specific term was maybe via certain record lists, possibly Dave Raistrick's, in the mid 80s. This was the time when Stafford djs were playing a number of slower records in their sets. I'd be interested to know if some of the record dealers and collectors of that era had a direct line to the Popcorn scene's collectors as a number of those Stafford sounds like Kell Osborne on Titanic, Romance Watson on Coral and Sam Fletcher on Tollie had been played in the Belgian clubs. The Trends "Not Too Old To Cry" on ABC-Paramount had also been a Popcorn sound, albeit for the other side. Sam Fletcher was supposed to have come from Ian Levine's collection but whether he had actually played it at The Mecca or at other clubs is a moot point (can anyone say for sure?). Tommy Navarro similarly had Popcorn scene roots, although that, like some of the others has a definite cha-cha-cha rhythm (like Romance Watson) which I think of as slightly different from an out-and-out Beat Ballad. Maybe a definitive example of a total ballad played at that time was Faye Crawford on RCA Victor, covered up as June Edwards "Come On And Tell Me". It captured the imagination for at least a few weeks and opened the door for other slow things to come through. Hattie Winston's "Pass Me By" was also held in high regard but was probably a bit too rare to catch on in a big way nationally. A couple of things to remember about that time though. The 'Stafford Sound' is sometimes characterised as being all about a slower tempo, but a lot of the newer sounds from a lot of the djs there were actually really frantically uptempo. The slower things were an occasional punctuation. Also, relatively few of the slower records were out-an-out orchestrated Big City Ballads in the strict Gene McDaniels mould: Johnny Gilliam on Cancer and Soul Bros. Inc. on Golden Eye for example were floaty early seventies Southern Soul and really miles from true Beat Ballads. Slower-than-before Detroit 45s played a big part too. The slower side of Stewart Ames was just as big as "Angelina", at least for a short time. Bobbie Smith on American Arts and Joan Baker on Diamond had strong Detroit connections and had been collected earlier in the scene's history (because they were Detroit records or productions) before they went on to enjoy dance floor popularity. In London Randy Cozens was very influential about spreading the word about that slower strand of Soul which could be played in clubs and danced to. Via his Black Beat columns and through a few London people travelling to hear the 'Mafia djs' up and down the country a good deal of knowledge of such sounds was spread back and forth at the time. I remember buying things like Eldridge Holmes "Worried" on Jet Set and Willie Tee's Capitol 45s from Pete Lawson which a few years earlier would have been inconceivable to classify as "Northern Soul" of any kind. Once Stafford closed it was much more common to hear Beat Ballads at other venues and maybe that's when the quality dropped a bit. It seems now that for every great one like Jack Montgomery on Barracuda there were a lot of distinctly soul-less things. For the next generation of djs it wasn't a big deal to play a few slower things at any point in a set. My enthusiasm for hearing these kind of records has recently been rekindled. Although I still wouldn't like to hear too many bad ones during a night out, they make agreeable background noise on youtube or what-have-you.

I can't agree with Benji either. In some ways his voice makes the record.

The UK 45 of Tommy Roe has what appears to be an American ABC master number (in the form of 45AMPXXXX) on it as well as the UK catalogue number but I don't think there is a US 45 of it.

Definitely issued in the UK. Not so sure about ABC Paramount in the US either. Tommy Quickly was issued in the US on Liberty though and was apparently quite popular in LA.

Also of course the Jimmy Hughes "Steal Away" album is on the main VeeJay label. Fans of "You Might As Well Forget Him" should check out the album-only "I Tried To Tell You" which has a similar flavour and is notable as an early Penn-Oldham soul number.

Distribution of both Fame and Goldwax would have gone through VeeJay for an overlapping period in '64, although by no means all Goldwax records of the period had a national distributor: a number of the local-only titles are distinctly hard to pick up.

Thanks for the scan of the issue Mr Shoals. There are about a dozen VeeJay-distributed Fame singles. All the early ones until the first Atco-distributed 45, Jimmy Hughes' Midnight Affair, have VeeJay numbers. From then on the singles are Atlantic-Atco until Candi Staton's Old Man's Sweetheart, the first Capitol distributed number.

Interesting thing about the Tommy Quickly is that it's definitely a cover of the Jimmy Hughes version as opposed to a cover of The Tams: the arrangement is practically a carbon copy. Derrick Harriot's on the other hand seems to be a cover of The Tams. I've never heard (writer) Tommy Roe's version, which according to youtube was issued in the UK on HMV (ABC Paramount in the US?). All of this doesn't help Doctor Bird to get a copy but I got one pretty quickly after putting a want for it on here in the topic on the Ace/Fame Record Day box set.

Anyone ever seen an issue of the Fame single?

The Mutt & Jeff looks nicer than the Magnum. Have seen an MGM issue on a couple of occasions, so they are out there.

Interesting. So are there any theories as to the identity of the vocalist if it's not Gloria Shannon?

£75 for a true issue in nice condition is about right I would have thought.

I believe Jeanette Williams was from Columbus, Ohio.

That's such a lazy and ill-informed posting that it demands some sort of reply. Why make the tie-in with the stage play Once Upon A Time In Wigan? These are two completely separate entities. Suggesting putting on a stage play to raise funds and awareness is laughable (as if stage plays themselves require no funding, no research, no casting, no directing, no publicity). This is not a film version of an existing play, it's from a completely original script. Comments about records played in '73 not getting a look in today are puzzling and to be honest completely irrelevant. The figure mentioned as a funding target is not the entire budget. A production company, sales agents and so on and all that entails are already on board. As for demand for the film being only within the scene that's a crazy standpoint. The film and the scene are also two completely separate entities. The film is not being made as an instructional manual for prospective converts or a nostalgia piece for those who have been on the scene their adult lives. It's a story about growing up in the North of England in the '70s and uses being on the scene as a very important part of the background story. The way the story is told will have a universality beyond the confines of the back-story, like any quality drama. Audiences for films can go beyond those who actually have first hand experience of the subject matter. How many who saw "Saving Private Ryan" got shot at on the Normandy Beaches, for example? Pointing out that this is hardly likely to be a 'profitable investment' when I suspect (forgive me if I am wrong) you are not an expert in feature film finance is unhelpful at best and mischievous at worst.

Just bought one from a member here for the price Pete quoted. Credit to Manship for highlighting the quality of the other side though, as it's an exceptional piece of Memphis soul which I'd never heard and never seen mentioned as being any good before. I'd put it in the same league as something like Tony Borders "Promise To Myself" with a great arrangement and a soaring, emotional final minute. Top stuff. As for Art being white does anyone know for sure? His voice is an acquired taste but he definitely can sing. The Abet 45 is pretty nice: two quality midpace early 70s Memphis tracks written and produced by George Jackson. His version of Wonderful Dream is probably a bit better than Jackson's own Decca 45.