Robbk

Happy Christmas and a healthy and prosperous New Year of 2024 to everyone involved with this wonderful and indispensable website!

"Hey Baby!" by The Ban-Lons. Not really a "Cover", as it wasn't out yet long after Bruce Chanel's version had stopped selling - it WAS however, a "remake". "Norwegian Wood" by Hugh Masekela "Grazing In The Grass" by Hugh Masekela "Cathy's Clown" by The Ideals "Hey Everybody" by Ramona King. - original by Henry Alston

I like the duo of The Parliaments' "That Was My Girl"/"Heart Trouble" better!

You must be REALLY young if a couple years apart seems like in different eras to you! At my age, two years goes by like the batting of an eye. I admit though, that I have records on my list from 2 different eras.

There were so very many 45s with super-good songs on both sides (many, many on Motown's labels. I'd have to think for years on it, or need to look at all 40,000+ of mine (which are scattered in 5 places on two different continents). I'd be long dead before I could determine which actually is my favourite 2-sided 45. What comes to mind first is "Open The Door To Your Heart"/"Our Love Is In The Pocket" by Darryl Banks. The Temptations' "My Baby"/"Don't Look Back" The Spinners' (Detroit of course!) "Truly Yours"/"Where Is That Girl" Mary Wells' "What's Easy For Two, Is So Heard For One"/"You Lost The Sweetest Boy" The Distants' "Come On"/"Always" The Uptones' "I'll Be There"/No More" The Shepprds' "Tragic"/Feel Like Lovin' " Actually, I think I liked the combo of "Golden Teardrops" and "Carried Away" by The Flamingos on Chance Records from 1953 a bit more. The Five Keys' "Red Sails In The Sunset"/"Be Anything, But Be Mine" The Five Keys' "My Saddest Hour"/"Oh Babe" Dionne Warwick's "Don't Make Me Over"/"I Smiled Yesterday" The Cinderellas' "Baby, Baby, I Still Love You"/"Please Don't Wake Me" Frances Nero's "Keep On Lovin' Me"/"Fight Fire With Fire" Terri Bryant's "Geni"/"When I'm In Your Arms" I could spend what's left of my life listing them continuously, and fall into a heap from exhaustion. So, I'll stop here.

Yes, the single version must be Dennis Edwards. The raspy parts give it away. The only other possibility would have been Paul Williams, but the raspy parts sound exactly like Edwards, because Williams would have been even more gravelly, and with a slightly deeper tone. Dennis' forays into falsetto are an unexpected pleasure, to say the least. I never knew his voice was that versatile. That situation reminds me of The Contours' Billy Gordon's mellow singing on the lead on "That Day She Needed me". It was a totally unexpected change from his normal baritone style.

There's nothing new in my box. Please send it again, or post your question or comment here. I doubt there is anything on this subject we wouldn't want other members to read.

Nice article Keith. Lester, himself has been often overlooked, other than his rare record getting notoriety. I didn't like either side of his one LaBeat release. He was a much better singer than he showed on his two released cuts. Too bad his life was cut off so early. Too bad he didn't get a chance with a record company to give him a true chance and the right material. Unfortunately, we at Airwave couldn't get the financing to do a project on him, because we had other things going on, and by that time, he had really given up on trying to forge a singing career.

The earliest Correc-Tone productions all were published by Brianbert Music. "I Know How It Feels" was published by Jobete Music, and recorded by a couple Motown artists. I don't remember Brianbert Music sharing the publication on those records or recording listings. Laura Johnson's Correc-Tone Production of that song also had only Jobete Music as listed publisher. Although, it is curious that Brianbert was listed as one of the writers (which indicates the writing team of Brian Holland and Robert Bateman. So it was written by Janie Bradford, Popcorn Wylie, Brian Holland, and Robert Bateman, while they all were at Motown, Curiously, ALL four of them either had promised to leave and join Golden's new firm (Brian) or ended up there (the other three). You may well be correct that the Fred Bridges record was produced by Bateman and Holland when Bateman had left Motown for an earlier, very short stint in late '61. But then, Holland was probably involved. According to what Bateman said in another interview, he set up that music company for himself and Holland. Apparently, when Holland didn't join him at Correc-Tone, Bateman asked him to sign away his rights in the partnership, as the former was staying with Motown, and not following him to Correc-Tone. Holland was apparently moonlighting away from Motown starting in early 1962 and going until very early '64, with Pat Meehan's Hi-Lite, REM, and Pillar Records, as a producer and songwriter, using his mother-in-law's name, Dorothy Pierce as an alias so Gordy wouldn't find out. Joe Hunter was also moonlighting there. One of Hi-Lite's singers told me that. Quite a few Motown writers producers, musicians, and singers were moonlighting between 1961 and early 1964, just before the company skyrocketed, and most of the majortalents started to get decent money from him.

That may have been Wilbur Golden's first financed recording before Correc-Tone's Studio was finished. It was produced for him by Golden's chosen A&R Man for Correc-Tone, Robert Bateman, probably just after Stevenson backed out of his agreement to leave Motown. It was published by BrianBert Music (which was originally set up, by Bateman, to be either a partnership between Brian Holland and Robert Bateman (apparently just after Stevenson dropped out, and The Holland Brothers had not yet followed) or to represent the trio of those two and Golden, to be the in-house music publisher for Correc-Tone. So, it is clear that Bateman set up BrianBert Music to be used for Correc-Tone's operations. The reason for Golden sharing only a third of the publishing revenues, or getting nothing from it (and having his own publishing company, Correc-Tone Music), was that due to having so little cash available at the start of his operations, due to having to pay 3 months rent on his new offices and construction and equipment of and for his new recording studio, plus paying back a large loan to Ed Wingate, he didn't have enough cash to pay Bateman, the Holland Brothers, and pianist Willie Harbert (his new Chief musician/arranger) the full salary amounts they demanded. I assume that he had planned to use his own, Correc-Tone Music to start reaping those profits, after record sales revenues started rolling in in big numbers. That DiD happen after Bateman set up his own operations in New York, and eventually left Correc-Tone totally, in 1963. When The Hollands dropped out, Bateman decided to just keep Brianbert for himself alone. He and Brian had originally planned to use that name as a slight, ironic slap against Gordy, as "Brianbert" had been Motown's production team name for Brian and Robert (even when they added Freddie Gorman). All this was mentioned by Bateman in a few other interviews (and were stories I heard from other people who were at Motown back then, or knew the parties involved). As I recall, the ZTSP Columbia NY pressing plant pressing job code numbers starting with 816_ _ _, represented an early 1962 job. So, that seems to fit the time frame of Golden's reaching out to Motown's production people, and that particular incidence of Bateman's asking Gordy for a raise and threatening to leave. But maybe you are correct, and because Bateman had been almost constantly, during late 1961 through to his leaving in Spring '62, Bateman had been asking Gordy for a salary raise, due to his increasing production duties, successful sales from his productions, and his Snake-Pit recording accomplishments. But, even IF it happened BEFORE Golden started his operations, I think it still had been with Correc-Tone in mind and recording financed by Golden. I doubt that Bateman had the available cash at that time to finance the recording session time as well as the costs of setting up his music publishing company.

(1) As far as I remember, from what was related to me from others based on what Robert had told them, and what I heard him say in interviews, and the date code on the Versatile record, and what is written in the Soulful Detroit Fred Bridges article, I concluded that The Fred Bridges Versatile Record WAS. indeed, a Correc-Tone production, that was recorded at Special because that was before Correc-Tone's studio was completed, and Golden was out of cash to pay for its pressing, because he had used all his ready cash to pay for his new studio's equipment and materials. So he sent Bateman to New York to Shop some of their recordings in pressing/label/distribution/partial publishing deals. He did the same with The Pyramids sold to VJ, The Donays, Laura Johnson, and Marva Josie, and a few others. (2) I assume that those "Chimes" weren't Willie Jones' Chimes, but rather James Cleveland's Gospel Chimes (of Detroit), also known as "The Original Chimes", who recorded for Carmen Murphy's House Of Beauty Records. (3) Yes, that is "Carnegie Center" (Music Hall) located in Pittsburgh, PA. Robert also pronounced a few other proper nouns in a very funny way. "Carnegie Hall" is in New York City. But Robert called their venue "Carnegie Center" which is located in Pittsburgh and also has a music hall. So Pittsburgh must be where they performed.

Well, it is valuable to me, as I got to hear Bateman's voice, and so, get a better feeling for how he felt about past events, than I had had hearing about those events second hand from others (For example, his decision to leave Motown, based on Mickey Stevenson's steering him towards Wilbur Golden's plans to form his new Correc-Tone Records, and recording studio, which Stevenson told him HE was jumping too (for the big salary raises Golden was offering, and also telling Bateman that Eddie and Brian Holland and Popcorn Wiley were also jumping ship, possibly to leave lots of room for advancement for himself (as he really may have been planning not to leave after all)). When Bateman went to Berry to ask for a raise in pay, and after being turned down, threatened to leave for Golden's offer, Berry wished him good luck in his post-Motown career. Gordy then went to The Hollands and Stevenson, and offered them significant pay raises and bought them brand new Cadillac cars. Bateman felt stabbed in the back, and I heard that in his tone when he spoke about the incident and Stevenson taking what would have been HIS job as chief producer. As it turns out, only Wiley, and his fellow Satintones (some of whom morphed into Correc-Tone's Pyramids), and Janie Bradford who remained Motown's secretary and contracted songwriter, but moonlighted for Golden as a songwriter, under the alias of "Nikki Todd". Ex-Motowner Don "Juan" Mancha signed with Golden as another producer. And Herman Griffin left Motown to form his own Hit and Hit Sound Records, which, I believe was at least partially funded by Golden and distributed by Golden's distribution system (small regional only at first) and later, nationally, by Atlantic Records. There were some other recollections from Robert that gave me good insight, as well. They were all as I had guessed, but it's nice to have them confirmed from "the horse's mouth. So, I greatly appreciate your work and your sharing it with everyone instead of forcing us to buy a book (which I'd have bought gladly, anyway).

(1) dftmc.info does NOT have "Love is What You Make It", or "Last Night I had a Vision", which, together, make up half of the 4 Eddie Holland songs I remember that were on a 10-inch recording studio acetate, from late 1964 (if I remember correctly), which was a Motown in-house demo, rather than Jobete Music Co. "Proof Of Ownership" acetate, pictured above (which Tom DePierro and I also had found in Motown's Vault (clearly made by Mike Valvano for Quality Control review), which 13 years later, we considered for potential release in Motown's "From The Vaults" LP project). (2) I'm sure that several Motown collectors in USA, who always kept to themselves, got several of them, which is why The NS community doesn't know where they landed. Nobody knew what records I had until the first NS DJ found out about me and my collection quite a few years after Brits were coming to The US looking for rare Soul records. There were some US collectors who were unknown by even most US collectors until they died and their collections were sold off.

Thanks Graham, for this interesting interview. I didn't learn anything new, but it did confirm a lot that I had heard from other old-time Motown insiders and other people involved with '60s Detroit Soul.

Your legitimate Golden World Studio acetate or vinyl in-house demo record indicates that Parker either took Hughes to Detroit to have Mike Terry record him, and arrange the songs, and also conduct the background track sessions, OR, tha Parker conducted Hughes' vocals sessions in Chicago or L.A., and had Terry produce the instrumentals sessions using Detroit (mainly ex- and then-current Motown musicians (moonlighting). Lots of Motown records had their recording session split between 2 cities, with vocals in one and instrumentals and background vocals in the other, or vocals and instrumentals in the city of the artists record company, OR with everything but a few extra instruments tracks and final mixing in the other city, or everything except final mixing in the 2nd city's recording studios. I remember split sessions by Joe Hunter for Duke Records in both Houston and Detroit, and by Hunter in Detroit for Golden World, and by Bert Keyes for GW in New York. As the music sounds like Detroit's musicians, he recorded, at least the instrumentals there, and also did the final mixing there. have you heard that Fred Hughes' vocals were recorded there? Unless we see some documentation or statement by people that were there at the time, I'd still guess Parker ran the vocal sessions in Chicago or L.A.

Goffin-King, Stevenson-Hunter, Van McCoy, Ashford-Simpson, Ashford-Simpson-Armstead, Whitfield-Strong, H-D-H, Fuqua-Bristol, Cosby-Moy-Wonder, Lieber-Stoller, Rudy Clark, Strong-Sanders, Dean-Weatherspoon, Smokey Robinson, Robinson-White, Barry-Resnick, Greenwich-Barry, Lowman Pauling, Curtis Mayfield, Mayfield-Butler, Chuck Berry, Billy Davis, B. Gordy Billy Davis-G.Gordy, Bateman-Holland-Gorman, Sharon McMahon, Mann-Weil, Maron McKenzie, etc. Too many to remember.

Those Herman Griffin and Ed Wingate partnership productions that were issued by Wand and Columbia/Date were, indeed produced and recorded in Detroit. Diane Lewis was certainly a Detroit artist. But Herman's ladyfriend (were they ever married) Gigi (lead of The Charmaines) was from Cincinnati. But, most of his recordings of her were done in Detroit or Toledo. But, I believe that all the Columbia recordings were made in Detroit. So, we should consider them Detroit productions.

Tom DePierro and I had an acetate of that recording in our stack of acetates and demo records for "From The Vaults", we found in The Motown Vault. I had it on my suggested list for one of our project's later LPs. I don't recall that one turning up in those 1980s and 1990 auctions, where most of them ended up in The UK. I remember that it had Eddie Holland's name on it along with the song title, so it must have been a Motown demo record, rather than the creme-coloured red typed Jobete Music "Proof of Ownership" acetates. But, now that I think of it, I seem to remember it also being on a bigger Lp-type acetate, containing 4 songs, all by Eddie Holland, if I remember correctly. I think it was from 1964. I remember finding the demo record because I remember being glad it was from the period 1962-1964, because that was my favourite Motown period, and I was fighting hard with Tom to get as many of the earlier sounds in the LPs. We found several more cuts from that period by several artists in that stack. If no one in The UK NS or Motown Collecting communities remembers seeing it, maybe an American or Canadian bought it?

To me, The Roddie Joy also sounds like Richard Tee's (NY) band, rather than Motown, or a Wingate Funk Bros, or Davis-Taylor Solid Hitbound recording. It's a bit tinnier, although it's one of Bateman/Tee's better Detroit style copies.

"Do The Duck" was a "G & G Production", which probably stood for Griffith (Herman) and Gordon (Marc). So Jobete's Co-Manager, Marc Gordon brought a song written by his own Jobete Music writing crew (The Lewis Sisters) to Griffith's Joker Records to press it and release it on local L.A. artists, because Motown did nothing of importance with it (e.g. not recorded by a star Motown act, and not given a release with a strong marketing push). So, we see the symbiotic relationship L.A. Jobete music had with Joker Records. Joker would provide some songwriter-producers who could write songs whose demo recordings produced by those producers could entice Motown to buy the songs, increasing Jobete's profits, and paying their staff, and Joker would also fund and produce the recording session of the production of the L.A. artist or group's final recordings, an the pressing of the records, and use their own distributor to distribute the records IF Motown DIDN'T buy the songs or have a successful sales level IF they did. That set-up formed a hedge against the potential danger of Motown's not buying songs or not creating significant residual income from their releases, allowing Jobete Music and their local L.A. record company's and their producers to get a reasonable shot at generating the sales and songwriting and music publishing residual income themselves. That worked well for the L.A. producers, Marc Gordon and Frank Wilson's "You Turned My Bitter Into Sweet", "Let Me Know" and a couple others by Mary Love with her contract with Modern Records, but not with any of the Joker issues, as Joker didn't get nearly as good songs, and didn't have the best distribution and marketing staff connections. Personally, I think "Love's Gonna Do You In", by The Autographs was a good enough recording, and The Autographs were a good enough group to have a big regional hit, or minor national hit. They were really talented singers and a tight group with good harmony, and they were tight with their dance choreography, too. Like so many other groups, they could have been big stars if Motown would have signed them in 1965, and given them a proper push. But Joker didn't have the marketing clout. Griffith was a well-respected DJ in the business, but he was interested in too many different things (Civic projects, Charities, other business ventures (He owned Crain's Records, and I believe, one more business), and had big time commitments for KGFJ and his job there,- so he couldn't concentrate fully on Joker, and he didn't have a talented enough staff at the label to make it big with Griffith pulled away in so many directions.

Wilson went elsewhere, to Soul City Records, because that was Marc Gordon's label. He may have formed that label to sign promising artists that Motown didn't want to record (Al Wilson and The Versatiles, who had changed their name to The Fifth Dimension, who recorded 3 demo tapes at Motown that didn't impress Motown Enough to release a record on them (until they were signed by Motown in the 1970s). Those 2 acts had most of Soul City's releases.

"Was the Joker Records label, based in Los Angeles (?) associated with Motown? ALL the releases are published by Jobete music, the publishing affiliate of Motown Records. Did Berry Gordy own or part-own this label and use it to release records that didn't suit the main Motown labels?" L.A.'s Joker Records was owned by LA KGFJ DJ, Herman Griffith and a partner, and he was friendly with Hal Davis, who, along with producer, Marc Gordon, ran Motown's Jobete Music's West Coast Office. And ALL of Joker's songs were NOT published by Motown's Jobete Music. "Jan-Cris Music" was Joker's in-house publisher, and published most (about 75%) of their songs. Jan and Cris were the names of Griffith's two daughters. The reason for 8 of Joker's songs being published by Jobete is that several of Joker's producers and songwriters were writing songs for Jobete L.A. (like Chester & Gary Pipkin, Vince Love, Charles Wright, Willie Hutcherson (Hutch), and others). A few of them were signed to Jobete as songwriters and Producers, who produced the "proof of ownership" recordings and artist demo records. Whatever they produced that Jobete wanted to own, the company bought. Even when Jobete bought a song, the local L.A. writer/producers, by contract, had the rights to put out commercial record issues on artists not signed to Motown (often demo singers and background singers), IF and when Motown had not issued its own commercial release on that song, within 6 months of buying its publishing rights. That is how so many Jobete songs were released sung by Mary Love (LA Jobete background singer) on Modern Records, and so many Jobete songs were issued on Joker Records, and Jobete LA producer Frank Wilson, issued songs sung by himself on his own local label (Power Records), as well as VJ's Tollie Records, and by Connie Clark on Joker.