"The Way You Do The Things You Do"
Artist - The Temptations
The Temptations, one of the most successful vocal harmony groups of the twentieth century, was created through the merger of two successful Detroit groups. Its members came from well-known doo-wop outfits from across the country. Otis Williams, the leader of the Temptations (and only surviving member of the original lineup) was from Texarkana, Texas; by the time he was in junior high he was singing with a local group called the Diablos. He moved to Detroit in 1950 and in 1959 formed the Elegants with Elbridge Bryant, Melvin Franklin, his cousin Richard Street, and Albert Harrell, all friends from Northwestern High School. They later changed their name to the Questions and then the Distants. Eddie Kendricks and Paul Williams were part of a vocal group in Birmingham, Alabama called the Cavaliers. After graduating from high school they moved to Cleveland, for its thriving rhythm and blues scene. Their manager advised them to move to Detroit where vocal harmony groups were quite popular. They agreed and in Detroit they changed their name to the Primes. Their manager, Milton Jenkins, also suggested they find a female group to open for them at clubs; that group, called the Primettes, would later become the Supremes.
The Primes met the Distants at a house party, and after Street and Harrell left the Distants the two groups merged into one consisting of Otis Williams, Franklin, Kendricks, Paul Williams, and Bryant. The new outfit called itself the Elgins. Jenkins arranged some gigs at local clubs, and, after hearing them in 1962, Berry Gordy signed them to his Motown subsidiary Miracle Records. But Gordy did not like the group's name, so Otis Williams and a Miracle employee came up with a new one, the Temptations.
Early in their career, after releasing five singles and one marginal hit, the group worried about theist future. Their next release - a song by Motown vice-president Smokey Robinson called "The Way You Do the Things You Do" - raced to the top of the pop and R&B charts, and established the Temptations as the chief purveyors of the Motown sound.
Also see: Smokey Robinson and the Miracles, The Drifters, The Clovers
Must Haves:
- Ain't Too Proud To Beg
- My Girl
- I Can't Get Next to You
- Ball of Confusion
Performers Influenced By This Artist:
"Baby Love"
Artist - The Supremes
The Supremes began their existence as the Primettes. In 1959 Florence Ballard and Mary Wilson, who were both fifteen, met at a talent show in Detroit and began singing together. They were heard by Milton Jenkins, who managed a local doo wop group the Primes (who later, after several member changes, would rename themselves the Temptations). He was looking for a female group to accompany the Primes for stage performances, and he thought the girls were a perfect fit, though they needed more members. Paul Williams, a member of the Primes, recommended a fifteen year old girl who lived in his housing project who he thought had a nice voice. Her name was Diane (later to be Diana) Ross. Ballard, Wilson, and Ross could all sing lead, but Ballard's voice was considered the strongest, so she typically assumed that role.
Ross' neighbor, Smokey Robinson, had connections at a new, locally owned record label, and the Primettes talked him into arranging an audition for Berry Gordy. Gordy didn't sign them because they were so young, but he told them to come back once they had all graduated from high school. The trio started hanging out at the Motown offices - after all, they had practically been signed - and ended up contributing hand-claps and background vocals to some early singles by Marvin Gaye and Mary Wells. Gordy did sign the group in 1961, on condition that they change their name. Ballard quickly came up with Supremes; Ballard and Ross didn't like it, but Gordy did, so the name stayed. Over the next two years they made a string of unsuccessful singles. A modest hit, "When the Love Light Starts Shining:" in 1963 was a sign of better things to come. The Supremes finally hit the top ten in 1964 with "Where did our love go," a single that their label mates the Marvellettes had rejected. By this time Gordy had made Diana Ross the lead singer, as her voice was brighter and more pop-oriented than Ballard's. Ballard and Wilson , though, turned out to be perfect background singers; Ballard's strong voice gave the backing vocals a presence that was lacking in most other girl groups. One of the most interesting things about the Supremes is that the group continued to make hit records after Ballard was replaced and Ross left to begin a solo career; the group, no matter the composition, was stronger than its individual performers.
Also see: McGuire Sisters, Frankie Lymon and the Teenagers, the Drifters, the Isley Brothers
Must Haves:
- Come See About Me
- Stop in the Name of Love
- You Keep Me Hanging On
- Someday We'll Be Together
Performers Influenced By This Artist:
- The Band
- the Jackson Five
- Joss Stone
- Destiny's Child
- Madonna
"In The Midnight Hour"
Artist - Wilson Pickett
"The Wicked Pickett," as he would come to be known, was born in Pratville, Alabama, though his family moved to Detroit when he was fairly young. He began singing in the choir of his Baptist church and was soon also singing on the streets of Detroit. In 1958 he formed a gospel quartet called the Violinaires, who made a few modestly successful records. By the early 1960s he was fairly well known as the leader of a popular local doo-wop group called the Falcons, which also included future soul stars Eddie Floyd and Sir Mack Rice. The group had already recorded a million-selling single called "You're So Fine"; their new member gave the Falcons another hit with his own composition "I Found Love," which broke the top ten on the national R&B charts in 1962. After this Pickett decided to leave the group and launch a solo career, without much success. Two years later he was signed to Atlantic records, but after several releases he was still without a hit. Jerry Wexler took him to the Stax studios in Memphis, hoping the collaborative environment would yield some exciting material appropriate to Pickett's hard gospel/soul style. Guitarist and producer Steve Cropper visited a nearby record store to familiarize himself with Pickett's sound and abilities before he arrived. He found two or three records—his hit with the Falcons and several gospel disks—and noticed that at the end of each song, right before the fade-out, Pickett launched into a vamp based on the phrase "in the midnight hour." Since this seemed to be favored territory for the singer, Cropper started working on a song that used that phrase as a hook. When he met Pickett later that afternoon, the singer was delighted. He had also been working on a song for the session, and with only about an hour of work—and, according to Cropper, a bottle of Jack Daniels—"In the Midnight Hour" emerged.
Jerry Wexler claims that in addition to being the song that launched Pickett's career, it introduced the famous Stax "delayed backbeat" after he asked the musicians to match the rhythmic accents to the rhythm of a popular dance, the Jerk. Steve Cropper, however, insists that the "delayed backbeat" had a much simpler and more prosaic origin: it was the natural result of recording in the cavernous Stax studio in Memphis, which was a converted movie theater.
Also see: Ray Charles, Big Joe Turner, Sam Cooke, Marvin Gaye
Must Haves:
- "Mustang Sally"
- "Land of 1000 Dances"
- "634-5789"
- ""Funky Broadway"
Performers Influenced By This Artist:
- Duane Allman
- Al Green
- Bob Seger
- Jake Blues (John Belushi)
- John Lennon
- the Band
"Respect"
Artist - Aretha Franklin
In Rolling Stone magazine's list of the best 500 songs of all time, Aretha Franklin's scorching cover of Otis Redding's top forty hit "Respect" appears as number five. As numbers one through four are all originals, this technically makes "Respect" the best cover version ever put on wax. Her interpretation was so powerful and definitive that Redding declared publicly that despite his authorship she owned the tune for all time. The song was recorded shortly after Jerry Wexler signed her to the Atlantic label. Even though her six-year tenure at Columbia had failed to make her a star, Wexler felt that Aretha's full potential as a vocalist hadn't yet emerged. He sent her to the Fame studios at Muscle Shoals, Alabama, and put her at the piano to conduct Booker T. and the MGs and the Memphis Horns. The session yielded her first hit, "I Never Loved a Man (the Way I Love You)," and revealed her skills as an arranger and her chemistry with the mighty Stax rhythm section. Wexler flew all of them to New York to record the follow-up.
Franklin's version of "Respect" is markedly different from Redding's original. Many of the song's most definitive moments—the chanted quasi-refrain of "Re-Re-Re-Re-Re-Re-Re-Re-spect" which separates the verses, the stop time passage in which Aretha spells out the title, and the chanted, double-time "sock-it-to-me" litany— were introduced by Aretha's background singer (and sister) Carolyn. Aretha's other sister, Erma, also sang on the session. The three grew up singing together in their father's church and were deputized as backup singers when Aretha realized that "I Never Loved A Man . . . " needed something extra in the chorus. The King Curtis saxophone solo presented something of a challenge. There is no bridge in the Otis Redding version, so there were no chord changes to serve as an accompaniment. Wexler had Booker T. and the MGs play the changes to "When Something Is Wrong with My Baby," a song that Stax stars Sam and Dave had recorded the previous day.
Also see: Dinah Washington, Clara Ward, Mahalia Jackson, Big Maybelle
Must Haves:
- "Chain of Fools"
- "I Never Loved a Man (the Way I Love You)"
- "Think"
- "Rock Steady"
Performers Influenced By This Artist:
- Ann Peebles
- Chaka Khan
- Gladys Knight (after 1968)
- the Pointer Sisters
"Papa's Got a Brand New Bag, Part "
Artist - James Brown
James Brown may have always been the hardest working man in show business. He was born into rural poverty in South Carolina and was raised in similar circumstances in Augusta, Georgia. He began working at the age of five, dancing on the streets for spare change, shining shoes, and performing odd jobs. When he was sixteen years old he became entangled in an armed robbery and was sent to reform school. There he met Bobby Byrd, who had done some gospel singing; Byrd's family helped Brown to secure his release, and he joined Byrd's quartet, the Silver Swanees. It did not take long for the Swanees to notice that their new member was clearly going to be their lead singer; the power of Brown's voice and the magnitude of his charisma were undeniable. After seeing a rhythm and blues review show featuring Hank Ballard and Fats Domino, Brown and Byrd decided that they could make far more money singing rhythm and blues than they were singing gospel songs. They changed their name to the Flames and soon landed a contract with the small Federal/King label, based in Cincinnati. The first record of the group now known as James Brown and the Famous Flames, "Please Please Please," was a Top Ten hit on the R&B charts, and the future seemed promising. With the exception of "Try Me" in 1958, their follow-up disks did not do well, as most were derivative imitations of Ballard, Ray Charles, and other chart-topping artists. Brown identified the problem and addressed it with a two-pronged approach: he put Byrd in charge of assembling a top-notch group of multi-instrumentalists who were proficient in a number of styles, and he began experimenting with different combinations of blues, rhythm and blues, gospel, and jazz. Top Ten hits like "Think" (1960) suggested he was on the right track.
By this time Brown and the Flames were famous for their exciting live shows, and Brown wanted to try to capture the energy of his concerts on record. He presented the idea to Syd Nathan at King Records but was turned down; no one had ever released a live album of rhythm and blues, and Nathan wasn't convinced one would sell. Brown personally put up the money to record a 1962 appearance at the Apollo Theatre in New York and released the disc over Nathan's objections. It shot to number two on the Billboard charts; pop radio stations began introducing Brown to a whole new audience and prepared rock and roll for the polyrhythmic, riff-based style that emerged in "I Got You (I Feel Good)" and "Papa's Got a Brand New Bag."
Also see: Hank Ballard, Ray Charles, Roy Brown, Sam Cooke
Must Haves:
- "I Got You (I Feel Good)"
- "Cold Sweat"
- "Sex Machine"
- "Say It Loud (I'm Black and I'm Proud)"
Performers Influenced By This Artist: