Roburt

I'm not completely wrong ... where in the above do I say that any copies of BEGINNER 45's were pressed at Boddies ???? I have GUESSED that a stamper may have been made by Boddie BUT that's different to saying any 45's were pressed by Boddies. Lou R told me that Way Out practice, if they wanted quick acetate copies, was to run straight round to Boddies (but that was when Lou was still involved at Way Out 67 to 69). Lou was also involved on two 1970 Way releases (Bos Singers & Volcanic Eruption) but I think he had gone by then.

Some info from https://www.45rpmrecords.com/ .......... So the two Way Out releases before BEGINNER were both Plated & Pressed by / at Boddies .... seems to me that some copies of BEGINNER would come from master lacquers (that become the A or B side stampers used to press up the actual records) made at Boddies (but guessing here) ... .... 1st table is Way Out release info .... 2nd table is Boddie's Pressing Info ..... after early 72 (when 2nd table ends) just about every record pressed by Boddies was for his own releases (i.e. Bounty, Soul Kitchen, Soul Mine releases OR indie gospel recordings that Boddie would have done the whole thing for -- recording, plating, stamping, pressing up limited numbers of each 45 made). Boddies numbering system was quite easy to follow, 1st 2 numbers relate to the year ... 70, 71, 72, etc. .... so Day-Wood #6901 Imperial Wonders "Just A Dream" was job 1 in 1969 .... .... AND .... J&W Records #M-7028 Bro David Watt "Alright" was job 28 in 1970 hence #7028 other numbers after that (in say 7169 so the 69) must be the job number. BUT there are missing numbers (7168) but these could have been cuts laid down that never made it to the stamper / pressing stage.

Could well have been but I have no knowledge of it at all (I was out of the NS loop for much of the 70's which is when I guess this occurred).

Lots of postings on another current thread about a Jessie Fisher Way Out 45 & the different incarnations of this 45 ........... .... so I thought I'd reflect that on here ..... it was Lou who came up with the Way Out red & yellow swirl label design though he never got anything for his troubles. Lou always has had a strong artistic side & has had pieces exhibited in Vegas art shows down the years. ... Jessie Fisher was of course the brother of Jive Five member Richard Fisher ..... .... (some info on him here https://www.sirshambling.com/artists_2012/F/richard_fisher/index.php ) ... both brothers unfortunately passed at an early age though I don't have info on the reasons for each's untimely deaths. After his popular Way Out release, Jessie had another biggie out via the Way Out family, the 2nd 45 escaping on the So Jamm label. ..... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NnQMfbNKOVs This later effort (a 1974 release that made mention of an LP to follow) was cut by Jessie under the supervision of Dunn Pearson, the then leader of 9th Street Exit. This isn't too surprising as at the time Jessie was doing live shows with 9th St Exit as his backing band .....

More on the documentary & Deep City ...... https://www.miamiherald.com/entertainment/article2205765.html https://www.knightfoundation.org/blogs/knightblog/2014/3/13/deep-city-story-miamis-motown/ https://www.miaminewtimes.com/music/willie-clarke-on-the-rise-of-deep-city-records-6476762 This thread links in with the old thread on .... Tropical Records, Miami (Frank Seay, Etc) All these establishments & recording artists were based in the same area (Overtown) of Miami.

This documentary will be aired in Florida on WLRN in late September .... unfortunately we don't head out there till a bit later .... "Deep City: The Birth of the Miami Sound" made festival rounds across the nation, showcasing at SXSW in Austin, Texas, the Cleveland International Film Festival and the Miami International Film Festival. https://wlrn.org/post/new-documentary-explores-birth-miamis-motown https://wlrn.org/

Always gonna be a purely subjective viewpoint on this. For me it's the Isley's "This Old Heart of Mine" just coz it's a great Motown dancer that means so much to ME personally (hearing it as a youngish lad, the impact it had on me & my love for soul that's been with me for 50 years up till now). It ain't my fave soul record (or even fave soul dancer) but it is my fave Motown cut.

Numero bought up everything at Boddies after Thomas Boddie died. They put out a good release that contained the best of the stuff they found when they bought it. The Boddies ran their outfit (recording, mastering, pressing of 45's & LPs) as a pure business concern. They didn't seem too bothered about focusing on the creative side of putting out records, that was left to the artists. They offered a service that made them money & it was the passage of time that did them in. Why update & install better equipment when you could make money utilising the old stuff (with no upgrade expenses to be financed). But with time, the quality of their product was overtaken by competitors & only guys with less money to spend came to make use of their facilities. If you went to the added expense of hiring / using a high tech studio & decent musicians, why then go to an outdated facility to turn your master tapes into records. As those records would truly not be High Fidelity singles but lower grade items with more muffled sound quality. The Numero release utilised a few photos that still existed of earlier events that occurred during the Boddie's long recording adventure ........... Numero's 'Boddies acetate 45 box' (3 x 7" singles featuring previously unreleased recordings) got some stick when it was issued but I liked the raw feeling of the cuts on display & even bought 2 sets as I'm a bit of a Cleveland soul nut.

Junie Russo (from 1975) ....

I spoke to Lou and he confirmed that he had left Way Out by 1971 (he left in 70 to work with Hot Chocolate & they had their 45 "We Had True Love" - Co Co Cleveland - out by 71). But he said that the common practice at Way Out, up to 1970, was to use Boddies to turn the master tapes into stampers. So I'd guess that the 1st version of this 45 was the Boddies one.

Certainly has that 'Invictus-style' sound.

I'll ask Lou Ragland if he can shed any light on this matter. The B side of this 45 features a track listed as being from 69 -- "Waiting" ... is that the same on both versions ??

Lorraine, what you were up to in April 66 ..... did you do many promotional shows for "What Can I Do" ??? If so, were any shows done in conjunction with the Marvelettes, Edwin or Dee Edwards ??

Some Italian Rifi label 45's ...........

Is it an instrumental or vocal cut ?? There's an awful C&W / rockabilly early 60's type 45 on Allstar by a guy called Ray Frushay (a vocal track) but don't imagine it's that.

Just reported in US press ........... https://www.commercialappeal.com/entertainment/music/music-titan-chips-moman-is-dead-at-79-35315a2e-5feb-5bbe-e053-0100007f82f0-382850711.html He worked with many soul greats: the Markeys, Solomon Burke, Esther Phillips, Jamo Thomas, Rosey Grier, Bobby Womack, Patti LaBelle & B Bs, Masqueraders, Roy Head, Dynamics, Sam Hutchins, Joe Jeffrey, King Curtis, Roy Hamilton & many many more.

A few of the notable foreign singers who entered the music festival ....... 1964: Peggy March 1965: Dusty Springfield, 1966: Gene Pitney, 1968: Dionne Warwick 1968: Louis Armstrong 1968: Wilson Pickett 1969: Stevie Wonder, 1971: José Feliciano 1990: Ray Charles

I took the wife on a long weekend trip to Milan about 6 years back. There, outside the main railway stn, they held a Sunday morning market. There were at least 2 / 3 record stalls on that market & I picked up quite a few decent 60's / 70's items. I would think that the local collectors & the likes of Nancy Yahiro (when she lived there) would have scooped up most of the best local 60's / 70's dancers a few years back though. Lots of your find seems to be non-Italian made stuff, what's the best of the local records ?? Nice oddities to find are the tracks associated with the big song contest staged in Italy every year, the Sanremo Music Festival. In the 60's, overseas artists would enter every year (Dusty Springfield, Wilson Pickett, etc) & would record a special contest song (in Italian) that would be released on a label set up by the Festival people. I have the Wilson Pickett 45 from the contest here somewhere ...........

John, that GSF LP out of Israel is a real find .... bet you were glad when it arrived. I'd guess that it was more like a 1974/75 release as the 'time lag' between a foreign record company negotiating & signing a deal with the US company, then getting the masters over, arranging the release, etc. always took longer than anyone imagined. From the sound quality of the cuts on the LP, would you say they sourced the tracks from master tapes or actual copies of the US records ??

Info on Don Thomas in this 5 year old NY newspaper article .......... ... https://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/sole-surviving-drifter-don-thomas-60s-b-sound-alive-bronx-article-1.991569 Seems he was originally from Richmond, Va and in a group before the Drifters (who he joined after 65) called the Dealers. That Dealers are listed as a Cincinatti group (on Big Bunny) and they also worked with Claude Johnson, who usually worked out of New York. Lonnie Youngblood (also east coast) and Charles 'Don' Thomas were also involved with the group's songs. So I'd guess that the Mystics were actually from Cincinnati and when they split, Don Thomas joined / formed the Dealers till he was recruited by the Drifters.

I couldn't say which is the original of the Jnr Walker posters. The one that appears in the Mojo artwork book is the green one though. Just about all of those City Hall Mojo shows were staged mid-week (though I can't confirm the date of the Jnr Walker gig). Coz of this, the out-of-town niter goers didn't usually attend them or even see the posters which were only hung up around Sheffield itself. I did however attend two reunion shows, one held in Sheffield (ironically @ the Leadmill,originally the Mojo's rival club, the Esquire). This was held sometime in the early to mid 80's & Geno Washington was the live attraction (Richard Searling was asked to DJ but it being midweek couldn't get across after work to do it). I was pictured in the local Sheffield newspaper with Stringers at that event. The 2nd concert was staged in London (@ the Hippodrome / ex- Talk of the Town) in 1985 and starred Edwin Starr, Jimmy James & Vags, Chris Farlowe, etc. I ended up dancing on the stage & singing along with Chris Farlowe that night.

COINCIDENCE .......... Claude Johnson in 62/63 Cincinnati group .... ... Marshall Johnson, writer / producer for Calif group. Obviously Marshall Johnson was at least half of the label ownership .... the MAR in MARquette as he & Gene Page were also heavily involved in the other 45 (Rick Baker) released on Marquette in 68. Pacifica (where the label was based) is on the coast just outside SanFran. So that Mystics is yet another soul outfit using the name.

.......... AMENDED ............ AMENDED ............. One of Lou's UK royalty statements .... unfortunately Passion Music stopped sending out his statements over a year ago, even though sales of his UK releases are still trickling through ...... pity as Lou had earned just about enough to trigger another payment, but nothing has been received from Passion since last year, so it seems his money-stream from the UK has now dried up.

Another 'non-Mojo' Mojo poster ....... again this was a night staged @ Sheffield City Hall as a protest against the City Council trying to have the club closed down. It took place on Thursday 22nd June 67 after Stringers had halted the niters in an attempt to head off the Council. I think him booking a Council owned venue for this 'anti-closure gig', was intentional.

The montage above has entries from record companies in Belgium (& Luxembourg), Australia & Germany that represented GSF. GSF also had 45's out in Canada, UK, France, Italy, Holland, Japan, New Zealand, Sth Africa, Venezuela & Mexico. Did any GSF stuff escape in any other countries (either on the GSF label itself or a local label that represented GSF) ?? The ad above states that GSF was represented in Belgium by EMI but did EMI actually press up & release any GSF stuff locally or were 45's just imported from EMI UK to be sold there ??.