Valerie Holiday is talking about her first Solo Album “In Bloom”. You can get it on April the 4th 2021.
Link for the Album:
https://valerieholiday.hearnow.com/in-bloom
Link to her special Version of Who is she and what is she to you

Opera Singer Reacts to The Three Degrees | Performance Analysis | MASTERCLASS |

Formed in 1967, the Natural Four approached Fred Ivey about becoming their manager. Ivey owned a local record store called Tape Town and eventually made a deal with a local Oakland label, Boola Boola Records. Their first release, “I Thought You Were Mine” sold 30,000 copies locally, after being regularly played on San Francisco soul/R&B radio station KSOL and on Oakland’s KDIA where it rose to #7 on the chart.

ABC Records saw the group’s potential and picked them up. Their second release on Boola Boola, “Why Should We Stop Now” was re-released and, ABC then released “The Same Thing in Mind”, a remake of their first hit “I Thought You Were Mine”, and a cover of The Temptations’ “Message From a Black Man”, but none repeated the success of their initial recording.

Chess Records released the single, “Give a Little Love” in 1971 without success and, following this, Chris James replaced the rest of the band. The new group, with Delmos Whitley generally taking lead, signed with Curtis Mayfield’s label, Curtom Records, in 1972 and proceeded to release a string of US R&B hits, including one Top 40 breakthrough, 1973’s “Can This Be Real”. Their three Curtom LPs were mainly produced by Leroy Hutson, formerly of The Impressions, but after their third album failed to chart, the group called it quits.

source: Wikipedia 

Hear the true Story behind the group from Chris James himself for the first time and exclusiv!

A Facebook entry of the record label Disclosure Records drew our attention to an early release – a Blaxploitation soundtrack to a film called Fox Force 5, which may have been made sometime towards the end of the 70s.

On the website of Disclosure Records you will find a newspaper article about this soundtrack and and the movie.

Unfortunately, neither the author of the article nor the magazine it appeared in is known, which would have allowed us to further investigate this film / soundtrack.

We therefore contacted the head of Disclosure Records to find out more about this release.

James Hart (CEO of disclosurerecords.com) answered in great detail and recommended talking to Steve Sechi. He was the songwriter (with Janice Dempsey) and arranger of the soundtrack album, and also played several instruments on the album.

We contacted and Steve and met him in his studio in Connecticut.

Steve laughed as we told him about our attempt to get information on this release.

He says “There are people involved in this project and they do not want to talk about it, but will I try to answer your questions as far as I can”

Our first question concerned the musicians on the album, who were called Funk Soul Brothers. Parts of this group have been playing together since the 1970s, said Steve.

“We’ve all known each other for a long time. For instance, I’ve been working in bands with the Conga player, Jary Mall, since I was 18 years old. ”

“As far as my music is concerned, I mainly specialize in 60s / 70s funk, soul and jazz. I have a special connection to the 70s because that was when I started to make music professionally as a saxophone player, and later as a writer.

At the time, I also started looking for obscure albums,  for ideas, because I just found the music very organic, and alive.

Much of what you hear on the radio today was made using computers, and doesn’t have real musicians.

To me, the 70s were musically more interesting. There were so many different types of music, from Motown and Stax to groundbreaking bands with very original sounds.

“One moment you heard Blood, Sweat and Tears, whose style was absolutely new. Then you’d hear an album by Jimi Hendrix, who when I first heard him, I almost fell off the chair. I didn’t know a guitar could sound like that!

Then there was Santana, a band that combined rock and Latin percussion. The music was far more varied than today, as the record labels were different. At the time, you did not know what kind of music you would hear next: Stevie Wonder’s Talking Book album, Marvin Gaye’s What’s Going On, and so many more.

Even the singers were more versatile at that time, today many singers sound the same and have the same style.

Today’s productions are too perfect and pristine for my tastes.

On the older records, you could often hear little mistakes and that’s kind of cool too. Sometimes the musicians or singers were a little out of tune, or they played a little out of time.

There is this James Brown song, I think it was “Superbad”. James “flubs the lyrics in one verse” and simply repeated the verse and left the mistake in. There was no autotune or anything like that back then.

They went more for the “feel” of a song, and didn’t worry so much about the small details.

Blaxploitation movies from the 70s were also a big influence. Though the films themselves weren’t all that good, the music from these movies was great.

I did a lot of research on those soundtracks, and have hundreds of CD’s of music from that era, but unfortunately no vinyl editions.

Fox Force 5 is the only vinyl record I own. ”

When asked how he got involved in the soundtrack to Force Fox 5, there was a long pause.

“I heard about a movie, an unreleased movie with the working title Brother Man. It made me think I would like to do an album like that, so I teamed up with a composer who’d written a lot for various production music libraries. He took me on board, and together we worked on this soundtrack album.

I was given a script, which I also showed to my good friend, the drummer / producer, Joel Rosenblatt. We talked about it, and started recording the project.

I’ve never seen the movie myself, and I don’t know if it really exists.

I believe that the film was never produced. It was the end of the 70s and the era of blaxploitation films was over. Probably the producers simply ran out of money.

Some time later, an animated series called Fox Force 5 was also planned. I don’t know if that project will ever happen, but I hope so.

It’s crazy that Europe has even taken notice of this album.

We would like to perform there. But to play the full soundtrack as it is on the album, we’d probably need a minimum of 16 musicians.

4 singers, 5-6 brass instruments plus bass, drums, 2 guitars, 1-2 keyboards and congas. That would be really expensive!

We may perform the album in New York, where there is an organization that sponsors music projects. But getting everybody together for rehearsals wouldn’t be easy, because the musicians we’d want use are always so busy.

But maybe we will do it. And maybe someday an indie producer will make a B-Movie version of Fox Force 5. That would be nice – and if it happens, we have a soundtrack all ready to go!”

There is another video clip next to the trailer called “When the Revolution Comes. The song fits in very well with our time, with the current political situation in the USA. I saw what happened politically here in the 60s and 70s, and experiencing it now again makes me very sad. ”

Steve exclusively provided SoulDisco with a copy of the Fox Force 5 script, which he said was probably not a finished version. We provide this to our readers. Furthermore, he also had material intended for the planned animation series, which we do not want to withhold from you.

If you want to order the album, you can order it at https://www.disclosurerecords.com/product-page/the-funk-soul-brothers-fox-force-5. The album is also available streaming services.

Created using FlowPaper Flipbook Maker ↗

Created using FlowPaper Flipbook Maker ↗

Some time ago, a trailer was introduced to the show, American Soul. In this show, the life of Don Cornelius is portrayed. An important part of this trailer was also the first SoulTrain (national) show from 1971. In the original show appeared next to Gladys Knight & the Pips / Eddie Kendricks / The Honey Cone,Bobby Hutton. However, he did not appear in soul train 40th Anniversary (2011) nor on the TV show American Soul. SoulDisco talked to Bobby in New York why he had no involvement in these events and what happened after his recordings for his only album “Piece of the Action” from 1973.
Bobby Hutton discovered his love of music at the age of 5, his first great love was Christmas songs.
He tried to sound just like the many artists who sang the songs he loved so much. This love of music accompanied him through school.
After 1.5 years he left college, “the music took over”, he began to sing in small clubs.
His role models were Jackie Wilson, Sam Cooke, Jesse Belvin, Little Willie John. He was often compared to Johnny Mathis “but I was never influenced by him,” Nate King Cole is also not missing on his list. The artist who had the greatest influence on him was Jackie Wilson. Mario Lanza could also be found on his turntable.
“I tried to listen to artists who were in the same vocal range as me, but I did not try to copy them, but to develop my style from their style. We were very poor people, so I had no access to instruments, so I tried to use and perfect my voice as an instrument. ”
When asked if he saw his great idol Jackie Wilson live, Bobby says,
“Yes, I did, I was hired by Billy Davis, who spent his time at Chess Records to replace Bobby McClure, who worked with Fontella Bass. Bobby McClur and Fontella had artistic differences. My first job with her was at the Apollo Theater in New York. My name is Herold Hutton, but Billy made me Bobby Hutton. And since then it has stayed with Bobby Hutton. On the single “Lucky Boy” it is still Herald, but then the name does not appear anymore. Jackie Wilson was the headliner of the show. Fontella was the second act, I was very upset when you’re not good they are throwing tomatoes or other stuff at you, I’ve never sung a duet before. To my relief, the show was a success, we sang “Don’t you mess up a good thing” and “Do not jump out of the skill into the fire”, backstage I met my great idol Jackie Wilson. ”

Fontella Bass is known for her monster classic “Rescue Me” and Bobby’s biggest wish would have been to sing that song with her back then. But the Record Company had plans with her, and other plans with Bobby. She got the better song, Bobby says, she got “Rescue Me” and he got “Lucky Boy”.

“My suggestion was to make” Rescue Me “a duet, but this suggestion was unheard. I was very young and was not very experienced in business. You have to imagine, many of us just came from high school or college and were max. 20 years old. It was “learning on the job” that’s what I would call it. ”

But back to the roots, how did Bobby even got into the music business?

He won a talent contest “20 Grand” in Detroit. And William Mickey Stevenson invited him to Motown, where he met Berry Gordy and made friends with everyone there. The Supremes, like him, were there to record almost every day. One of the first he met there was Marv Johnson, and rumors were circulating that Motown was not happy with him and that Bobby should take his place.
“I met Raynoma (Berry Gordy’s first wife) and we started writing songs together, she invited me one night into her apartment were she lived in with Berry Gordy.
She wanted us to play the song we wrote to Berry, I do not remember the title of the songs, “it must be love” or anything like that, but I never recorded the song itself. ”

Looking back, Bobby says that the whole situation was funny to him, he says he suspects that Raynoma and Berry had a problem at the time.
Nevertheless, he left the apartment with a good feeling. He was ready to finally pick up material when he went home to his apartment in Detroit that evening.
Barrett Strong and Bobby were friends, and he took him home to Margaret Norton’s (then Berry Gordy’s lover) home and that encounter was to change his entire career.

“Margaret had a piano and we were playing something and were flirting ” nothing serious “I did not have a clue that Margaret was in a relationship with Berry.
A DJ Convention some time later should change everything. We were all in Berry’s office and suddenly Margaret is in the doorway with Berry. She turns to me and says “Tell Berry you said you love me,” and believe me I never said that to her.
I swear this on a stack of Bibles that it was not like that, I may have flirted with her but I have not seen her either before or after.
I was so embarrassed that I just left. At that time, I shared an apartment with Robert Bateman, who was the recording engineers at Motown.
And he told me one night that Berry was not good at talking to me. I did not have a strong connection to Berry, nor was I able to stand my man and go to Berry to tell him that it was not the way Margaret said.
I just went to build something new in Chicago again. In retrospect, I think everything was a game I fell by the wayside. Raynoma knew about the relationship between Berry and Margaret and wanted to make Berry jealous.
Today I would like to talk to Berry and tell him that it should not walked out of the situation and that I should have acted differently then.
But I was young and naive.
My start at Motown should have warned me. If you went into the building back then, there was a walk to the first office, there was a picture of Berry, it fell off the wall the moment I passed the picture and hurt my arm. Raynoma and Micky had to take me to the hospital so I could be sewn. I just think that it was already an omen then.
The contract with Motown would be very important to me today because Motown wanted all the rights to me, singing, songwriting and management. I’m not sure that this was legal. In my opinion, you cannot have so many parts of an artist. I see it as an experience how not to do things.
These contracts did not bring much money to the artists, but to those who were “in charge”.
Most of these contracts were designed to tie an artist to the label for many years. Since Motown could not take care of everyone due to the large number of artists, many fell by the wayside.

It also means that they could not record for many years with anyone else, as the contract clearly forbid.
I was suggested by Melvin Franklin to become part of the Temptations, at that time the idea was very strange to me. That’s why I turned it off.
After Motown, I tried to my luck with the group “The Capitols” and get a contract with them on the James Brown label Kind Records. ”
When asked how he wanted to work for another label while working for Motown, Bobby says.
“It should not be. “But I would not let anybody stop me,” says Bobby.
“I never got a written release note from Motown”. The tragic thing is, you’re young, you want your music to be heard and move forward.
As you sign these contracts in the belief that everything is in your best interest.
And it happened to so many artists, you need an agent and you have to be careful that it’s fair and honest.
Then there is an agency that wants to have money.
You take in $ 100, your manager charges 15% and the agents charge 30% and then you have to pay the band that works for you.
There is not much left for yourself.

You do not even think about that when signing a contract because you have no idea about the business.
After my time with Fontella, I worked in the local clubs in Chicago, where nobody knew who I was. I worked very hard to feed my family. I sang 6 nights a week except Sundays and learned all kinds of songs. I did that for years until I got a new contract with Philips Records. There I recorded some Northern Soul classics, including “Come See What’s Left of Me” and “You’re My Whole Reason.”
With the last song he was one of the artists who were in the first national broadcast of Soul Train.

“After 50 years, you look back on your life and see” the good the bad and the ugly “you have to accept it as it is and also if you wish that many things might have gone differently.

I have a song on YouTube 20 Years later, which will have over a million views in the next few days. And you know, what really bothers me is the fact that this song is never played on the radio, even though it’s so popular.
Today, people come to your music so fast, they hear you and do not even have to pay for it in the case of YouTube. Had the song been released 20 years ago, with the appropriate promotion, it could have become a 2 million seller.
Therefore, the situation today is “bitter sweet” for me.

The song “You’re My Whole Reason”, which I sang on SoulTrain, was recorded in my twenties, and in 2017 I recorded a new version and I can still sing that song in the same key as the original. If you invited me to a talk show, etc., I could sing the song the same way I did in 1971.
I think my appearance on SoulTrain has helped make the show a 7-year contract with CBS.

How did it happen that he was on the show?

It all started in Chicago, I already had some hits here “That’s how heartaches are (1968)”, I never had a real connection to this song, I just did not like the sound, “Come see what left of me (1969) “,” More today than yesterday “, they were all in the top 5. 1970 then followed by a bigger hit” I cannot stand a woman to timing a man, “which was then played throughout Chicago.
You know, SoulTrain has been here in Chicago since 1970. It was a 5-day show, with Jerry Butler, The Emotions and The Shirley’s on the first shows. Since they were on tour a lot, Don needed someone to take the spots in his show. And the only one who came into question at this time from Chicago was me. So, you have to imagine that of the 5 shows in the week, I was at least in 3. Of course, this increased my notoriety in Chicago. I was the “Hottest Act in Chicago” at the time. Unfortunately, there are no more tapes from the time of the local shows. The studio for the local broadcasts was very small “20 by 20”. The program ran 52 weeks a year, 5 days a week. At the time, Donny Hathaway was writing a song for me, as it was clear that I would join the pilot in the first nationwide broadcast on SoulTrain alongside Gladys Knight & the Pips / Eddie Kendricks / The Honey Cone. The song was called “Your my whole reason”.
Live was not sung, all I had to do was lip-sync to the recorded songs.
When we arrived in California, director Mark Warren came to Don and alluding to me, he becomes a big star.
I think Don felt a bit offended at that moment. That did not get any better as Mark stopped by at our hotel “to hang out with me”. I did not do anything behind Don’s back or anything. Basically, I was a victim of the circumstances. I did not want to anything away from Don, I was just so proud to be there.

After the broadcast, the Chicago Defender (October 30, 1971) wrote “Bobby Hutton featured on SoulTrain.” Not a word from Don or Gladys Knight. I did not know anything about the article or anything, but you can imagine that the relationship between Don and I was at its lowest. I never went back to SoulTrain after that and my best-known records came out after that. If I had been on SoulTrain with it, my career would have been different.
This was the second time that interpersonal disagreements have led to me not being able to get started. ”
The recordings after SoulTrain include his only studio album, Piece of Action so far. E. Rodney Jones, was at that time, secretly managing him and brought him to ABC. “He always said that when the right song comes, I would be a superstar, bigger than Johnny Mathis. Unfortunately, E. Rodney had a dark side, dealing with drugs and all these things. And I was very worried about my career. He gave me a release from my contract and at the same time he made sure that my records at the radio station were not played anymore. And that was it then.

“Can`t get enough” and “Until I see you again”, these were the only songs that I influenced on when recording my album. These songs were written by Larry Wade and Terry Callier. Charles Stepney took care of the music of Earth Wind & Fire, and wanted me as an artist. I absolutely wanted him as my arranger for my album, but since ABC did not really know him, they took Dee Ervin.
And these two songs were Charles Basic arrangements that I was able to enforce. And when you hear these songs, you can see in which direction Charles wanted to take me, it was pop and R & B. These two songs were actually written for the Dells. Today I do not have to say anything about Earth Wind and Fire, Charles has made then one of the most famous groups.
It is a pity that at the time that ABC did not trust me about Charles.
I knew Charles because I recorded Coca-Cola advertisements with him, and I earned a lot of money with it for a while. ”

After the first album there was no follow up, why not?

“There were many reasons for that, one of the main reasons was my break with Rodney Jones and then I was on my own. Without a manager, you have trouble getting a new contract and I had a family to feed. And so, the years went by until the UK rediscovered me.

I did have follow up Single by 1974 “loving you, needing you, loving you, wanting you” and “watch where you’re going” as the b side on ABC, but after Rodney stopped all the promotion it went nowhere for me.

I have to say that these songs are great and back then it was a shame that were not promoted/played the way they should have.

https://youtu.be/VYmPGuIMGs0

In Europe, you appreciate good music and there I was rediscovered in the 80’s. Since then I play on soul weekenders. The UK has saved my career. Without the distribution of my music in the Northern Soul scene, we would not speak today. ”

Bobby performs regularly in front of a large audience in Europe and his songs are not only popular in the Northern Soul scene.

Why he was excluded from the 40th Anniversary celebration and the TV series remains a mystery that we will not solve here, because Bobby cannot explain it to himself. But it also remains a bitter taste to exclude an artist of the first hour, who was also able to contribute quite a bit to the local show before the National Soultrain Show was even considered.
Bobby loves his fans and thanks for the long time of loyalty.
Would he do things differently today? Yes, for sure. But at the end of the day he has a conciliatory view of his career, which is characterized by many ups and downs.

https://www.facebook.com/bobby.hutton.125

From First Choice to Super Sweet
The Interview

Once a member of Philly-soul group First Choice. In 1979 she recorded a self-titled album with producers John H. Fitch, Jr. and Reuben Cross, who co-wrote Evelyn King’s “Shame”, on Midsong International Records. The album included “Super Sweet,” which went to number 20 on the R&B charts and “Captain Boogie,” which went to number 33 on the R&B charts in early ’79.

Music by Wardell

Danny Pearson (January 6, 1953 – August 17, 2018) received attention at the end of the 70s with his only album “Barry White Presents Mr. Danny Pearson”.

SoulDisco conducted a telephone interview with the then 63 year old in 2016. Unfortunately, a final article could never be completed due to Danny’s severe illness. It was very important for us that the story of Danny would be told anyway, by himself in his own words. The recording you hear was made on the occasion of the telephone interview, and was never originally intended for publication. Therefore, the audio quality is not optimal. We are grateful, his family for approving this interview to be released.

The lead single from his only album, “What’s Your Sign Girl?”, peaked at #16 on the U.S. R&B charts and at #106 on the Billboard Bubbling Under Hits. At the time of his death, he was in the process of recording a new album. As far as we now these recordings are not supposed to be released any time, soon.

Music by Danny Pearson