Roburt

.... FROM AN EARLIER LISTING ...... They're talking about me - Johnny Bragg (Elbejay) Um um um um um - Major Lance (Okeh) I had a fight with love - Johnnie Taylor (Stax) Livin' for the weekend - The O'Jays (Philly International) Wear it on our face - The Dells (Cadet) Barefootin' - Robert Parker (Nola) Soul sister, brown sugar - Sam and Dave (Atlantic) Let's wade in the water - Marlena Shaw (Cadet) ....... all the above were massive UK soul clubs plays in the past.

RE: 14/ Betty Harris and Lee Dorsey - love lots of loving (Sansu) This was recently mentioned in the 'UK Little Labels' thread (it was on Buffalo here) & a youtube clip of it posted. Had the UK 45 for over 40 yrs now (not played it in years) ... but it does sound well good now.

So is it known which studio John Davis / Frank Fioravanti used in Philly to cut the tracks released on Concept, Omega, Philomega & the like. No doubt it was an old established place where the equipment was well out of date by the early to mid 70's (the time they were using it).

Don't want to start a war (& my personal anti-Casino opinion doesn't matter much).... ... but the sounds played at the Wheel, Junction, Va-Va's, Torch, Blackpool Mecca were around 95% fine (IMHO) whereas the sounds played at the Casino were only around 60 to 70% right (too many pop items, mindless instros, stomper tempo soulless cuts by far). In the venue's declining years, rival niters in places such as Rotherham, Cleggy & Sheffield (+ Loughboro, Warrington & Leicester) seemed to get the sounds 'back on track' but things went a lot array in Wigan's major years.

This outfit were doing lots of gigs down in Miami in 1968 ...... I'm positive that Eddie Holloway (a solo singer plus member of the Soul Pleasers & vocalist on 3rd Guitar 45) and Sharon Robinson were just other singers on the bill; they had no actual connection with the Professionals.

US SOUL CHART No.1's that year included .... O'Jays -- Darlin Darlin Baby William Bell -- Tryin To Love Two Marvin Gaye -- Got To Give It Up Tavares -- Whodunit Emotions -- Best Of My Love Floaters -- Float On LTD -- Back In Love Again E, W & F -- Serpentine Fire

MORE JIMMY BISHOP RELATED INFO ....... Bluesman Leroy Jodie Pierson was born in 1947 in north St. Louis. His home life gave him a firm and fertile grounding in music .... His father ... played a lot of black music at the house, where Pierson heard the likes of Jimmy Rushing, Count Basie, Joe Williams, among many eclectic sounds, including the early, free-form days of radio. Family outings included trips to jazz clubs to see John Coltrane, Muddy Waters and Albert King. He said "When I was a kid, I used to listen to a lot of blues. I didn't understand that it was blues. To me it was more pop music because I didn't understand categorizations of music when I was seven, eight, nine years old. I was also listening to Gabriel [a KATZ deejay], used to listen to him every night. Gabriel would play the weirdest mess of stuff. I mean, one minute he'd play James Brown, the next minute he'd play George Jones, the next minute he'd play the Howlin' Wolf. So I knew that I loved Howlin' Wolf and Muddy Waters and these people, but I didn't know they represented a different form. There was also KXLW, which had a daytime license; they had to go off the air when the sun went down. They had a fella on named Jimmy Bishop in the afternoons. Best deejay I ever heard in my life, bar none. When I was on the radio [his "The Baby Face Leroy Blues Hour"] I stole 90% of my patter from Jimmy Bishop. All that ho-mommy-oh stuff, that style is all Jimmy Bishop. Gabriel was always a humorous disc jockey, but he wouldn't do any slick patter. I always liked that patter business" "When I was 13 years old I started dating a girl whose brother liked blues. He gave me an album called Lightning Hopkins in New York and said, "Listen to this." That was the profound experience for me". Jimmy Bishop quit KATZ & St Louis in 1963.

The theme of this thread just keeps expanding ....... Here are interesting articles that make mention of Jimmy Bishop's time in St Louis .... https://www.mckinleygoldbugs.com/RadioDays.htm https://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_hb6666/is_277_35/ai_n29187431/

Jimmy Bishop MC'ing a show he promoted at the Nixon Theater in Philly back in the day ....... Bishop had arrived at WDAS from KATZ in St Louis. He managed lots of groups (all the ones signed to Arctic), promoted lots of live shows (many at the legendary Uptown Theater in Philly), had his own record shop (not a bad move for a radio DJ & label owner) and produced sessions, scouted talent, handled A&R plus promotional duties. Quite a 'busy boy' then !!! JUMPING BACK TO THE INFO IN THE LAST POST ... his then wife (Louise) has stated on occasions that he fell in with the 'wrong crowd' and couldn't see that they weren't actually helping him. Jimmy had a dream to make it big in the record biz & he couldn't accept his wife's opinion that many of the people he was 'working with' were ripping him off. He thought she was trying to hold him back & they split up. Guess he 'sided' with the wrong people in that argument.

READING BETWEEN THE LINES A BIT ....... I presume Jimmy Bishop & his associates claimed ownership of many of the Arctic / Virtue backing tracks & as they were strapped for cash at the end of the 60's, sold them on for Frank Fioravanti's use. In 1967, Baltimore radio DJ Fat Daddy had hooked Kenny Hamber up with Arctic in Philly (the company being headed by ex singer Jimmy Bishop). Kenny's 1st release for Arctic was "Ain't Gonna Cry" & this 45 was followed by Kenny's remakes of "These Arms Of Mine" and "Lookin' For A Love" in 1968. However neither of these 45's received the proper attention as far as advertising and distribution were concerned. Other tracks he cut for Arctic remained in the vaults, as the label was on the verge of bankruptcy and very close to folding. By then Jimmy Bishop was in the process of jumping ship to become a promotion man / talent scout for Spring records. Since he had Kenny Hamber under contract for three singles, Bishop handed Kenny over to Jesse James (no doubt a sum of money going to Jimmy from Jesse) and the resulting cut "Camel Walk," was released on Mean records in 1969. So Jimmy Bishop was looking to move on from his label owning & producing days but still make some money from what he retained from that failing outfit. SO he could easily have just sold off all the old backing tracks then in his possession to Frank Fioravanti and then forgotten all about them. As stated earlier, the Arctic & Virtue Studio tracks had featured many of the musicians that would become members of MFSB in the early 70's & so were a 'quality product'. If Frank Fioranti was 'connected', JB could well have owed him money (loans to try to keep Arctic going) and so the backing tracks may have gone someway to repaying any debts.

I've got the Ska Kings UK Atlantic LP .. somewhere here (don't think I've come across it in a couple of years though, but it's here somewhere) !!! The UK album is EVEN RARER than the UK 45 (promo or otherwise). BTW, Ken Lazarus was featured vocalist on "Soul Time", the Byron Lee & Dragonaires US 45 issued out of Tamiami Station in Miami. This came out on the BRA label that was owned by a couple of 'Islanders' who had relocated to Miami. BRA had a subsiduary label (PAL) and it was on this label that the Jerry Williams produced tracks by (Ohio connected) female cross-dresser Jerri /Jerry Jones were released. After her earlier spells based in Ohio cities (including Cleveland where she was befriended by Kim Tolliver), Jerri spent the later years in the 60's in Miami before moving to Jamaica to cut reggae tracks in the 70's.

Later on Byron Lee went back to Memphis ...... I think Ken Lazarus had left him by then though.

Their biggie .... a big allnighter play in the mid 60's .....

Tuva side of that 45 ..........

AND OF COURSE . Byron Lee & the Dragonaires were marketed by Atlantic in the US (& UK) as the Ska Kings .... ... of "Jamaican Ska" fame . and this ........Memphis goes reggae .....

Another good track from him ....... .....AND as it says ...... Ken Lazarus is probably best known for his work as a lead singer in Byron Lee's Dragonaires band. In the early 60s the band toured extensively in the Caribbean which made Ken Lazarus a popular singer on the island.

We were all very forgiving back in the mid to late 60's (NOT) .... We used to take the piss out of the older lads who we had started attending allniters with but who had now stopped going (staying back in a hometown pub with their girlfriends) ..... .... whilst also moaning on & on about the 'mini-mod' 15 / 16 year olds who were trying out allniters for the 1st time ad thus spoiling OUR VENUES. Two years down the line and we had joined the crowd staying back in a hometown pub with their girlfriends, whilst the 'mini-mods' had turned into the 'main-players' attending dumps like the Casino.

Yea, people could afford to buy / rent their own place in their early 20's back then and so tended to 'settle down' much earlier. Now, loads of 'kids' sponge off their parents (& live at 'home') till they are in their mid to late 30's ..... so they go out more in their late 20's / 30's than most did 'back in the day'.

My guess is that if they had any sort of logo at all it would have been used on the letterhead of the companies stationary. As Lorraine handled lots of the outfit's admin tasks, she would be the one to ask.

I'm sure Demon could also have put it out on vinyl, with a couple of the LP tracks on limited edition 45 ... ..... BUT what would have been the point ???? This release is meant for music fans in general not OVO NS dinosaurs.

I went to an allnighter at the Wheel last year (1st one I'd been to there for about 41 years) and had a great time. If we can't save the Wheel building then why don't we just shut all the industrial museums, wreck all the old water / wind mills, blow up all the old canal aquaducts and rip up all the preserved railways. After all; they're only for people 'living in the past' (while we're at it, may as well melt down all the old 45's, coz now you can get all the tracks digitally).

I have submitted an objection to the planning application.You have to register 1st, await a confirmation e-mail & then submit your comments. A bit 'long winded' but I still thought it worth the effort.

Harmless seem to have the Jewel Gospel stuff sorted as far as CD release is concerned .... .... so now we need a kindly reissue label to do the same for the Chess Gospel stuff. Apart from the 3 or 4 tracks that have been ig NS scene plays down the years, there are plenty more great tracks just waiting to be discovered by the CD buying public. A fave of mine that deserves to escape on a V.A. CD is the Gospel Six "God Done Got Tired" ....... another dancer that could be of interest to NS feet. The Violinaires ("Children Are You Ready"), Meditation Singers and many more cut fine stuff for both Chess & Jewel. What other (Lesser-known) Chess gospel tracks should be 'out there' for us to buy ???

Rita Doryse was a fixture on the Baltimore soul / jazz club scene from around 1963 through to the early 1970's; so I doubt she would have promo'ed a track written by two guys based in Detroit.

Bugga, I bought a copy of the CD on Amazon earlier today & only just noticed that I have to wait about 3 weeks before I get my copy !!