Tim Brown Talks!

It is simply astounding to contemplate that it is six months since this column appeared in December’s Manifesto. Various projects and foreign climes conspired against my availability. Another dealer recently claimed in self-congratulatory manner that he ‘spent every waking minute looking at vinyl’ – well that puts the Grand Canyon and Victoria Falls in their place doesn’t it? I won’t be falling into that trap much as I like soul records. The positive side of all of this is the amount of material to comment on in recent Manifestos. Here goes then…

I suppose the big story has been the hyping of Kenny Burrell’s Frank Wilson 45 by John Manship, the most weary aspect of which was an item on Radio 4 which yet again called into question the validity of any information we gather from the mass media so incorrect was it. Of course much of the misinformation has been created by Manship’s manipulation of the true story in order not to make any mention of myself or Martin Koppel. It has often been said that the 20th century was a victory for style over substance. Sadly, it would seem that the 21st century may well be a victory for fiction over fact sponsored largely by the internet.

As the most-told story in Northern Soul it is still surprising that the ‘Do I Love You’ saga is related inaccurately. Ian Dewhirst got as close as anybody in the March edition of Manifesto but even then is wrong on a few minor counts. First of all Simon claimed to me that Tom DePierro actually sold him the Frank Wilson 45, not lent it him, but sold it him. This is born out by the fact that Soussan had no other material from Motown’s archive at the time. 14 years later he had a number of unissued Motown acetates but these were from a quite different source. For sure Simon knew the track was a total winner, but actually his bootleg of the cut as ‘Eddie Foster’ was on In, not Soul Fox (as Ian stated). Soussan once informed me that he never pressed up less than 5000 copies of anything. As for Simon selling his collection in the early eighties it was actually 1978 and that is when we all found out who ‘Do I Love You’ was really by. Coincidentally in my occasional column in Black Echoes in ’77 I remarked that ‘Do I Love You’ sounded like a cross between ‘My Sugar Baby’ and ‘The Duck’ – even as a teenager I had my ears screwed on right! Russ meanwhile in the same publication thought that it sounded like ‘Get It Baby’ (oh dear!) By 1979 of course it was out on UK Tamla Motown dubbed from the Eddie Foster boot. In the event Motown did have a stereo mastertape it subsequently turned out, but the mono 45 take on the box set recently was dubbed from Kenny Burrell’s copy. When the said record passed from Jonathan Woodcliffe to Kev Roberts circa 1981 it actually wasn’t sold – it was traded for a pile of twelve inchers (not your best ever decision Jon!) And actually it was 1999 when we sold Kenny Burrell Ron Murphy’s old copy, not 1997. Later we at Goldmine brought Frank Wilson over to the Togetherness Weekender at Fleetwood to sing his song (of course the ‘experts’ on the internet who like to pontificate over Goldmine Soul Supply know nothing of things like that) and Frank expressed his surprise that a 45 or a tape or anything existed! He told me that he had only been aware of the whole scenario for a few years. Ron Murphy was also the guy responsible for turning up Chris Clark’s version via the original engineer from the old ARP pressing plant. As for my copy of the disc, well, it does have an edge-warp but is not unplayable as Manship has claimed – in fact at the very first ‘Rarest Of The Rare’ all-nighters at the Ritz, I played it – as witnesses can testify. By the time you read this, the whole event will be over and either a new yardstick will have been created or the hype will have spawned an empty vessel. Personally I’m finding the whole subject rather tedious – I wonder what the winner would pay me to snap my copy in two?

Talking further of Simon Soussan (and Ian Dewhirst will be doing just that in this issue) many regard him as the ‘anti-christ’ of Northern Soul of course. Well he may have put the ‘d’s’ in dodgy’ but in many ways his influence had a great beneficial effect on the scene in terms of uncovering new records and providing access to many records via his bootlegging or re-issuing of 45’s (not all his releases were illegal by any means). Dave Godin may have done all the moralising and chin-stroking via Black Music and Blues & Soul, but thousands didn’t care about this when they went to buy the latest Soussan releases at their local market stall on a Saturday afternoon. These people are the bedrock of the scene’s longevity today whilst ten thousand convoluted words lie dusty and forgotten.

Los Angeles producer Kent Harris had his dealings with Soussan of course and in the late eighties this resulted in the issue of the previously unissued ‘Aint That Love Enough’ by Ty Karim on Ebony. Late last year Kent put out a quite wonderful CD compilation of all Karim’s material but I had to smile when I saw Soussan’s pre-release acetate of ‘Aint That Love Enough’ on Souvenir (that was his company at the time) lovingly reproduced in the sleevenotes as an original acetate – the anti-christ had managed to place his mark on the bible! I’ve gone on record many times before that CD as stating how much I adore Karims’s husky vocals, she had very little vocal range (Frank Wilson even said that to me about Gladys Knight!) but always sounded as if she had wrought every shred of emotion out of her being. That said I’ve totally gone off the 45 version of ‘Wear Your Natural Baby’ (previously a big personal favourite) since I became aware of how speeded up it is via the original take on the CD.

Back in the February Manifesto Ian Dewhirst wrote a positive full page review for a Universal box set compiled by Russ Winstanley ‘A Complete Introduction To Northern Soul’ - sorry Ian but I can’t let you, Russ, or the record company get away with that – even from a few months distance. Even allowing for the fact that, in the sleevenotes, Russ has the descriptive skills of Frank Bruno, or that the cover scans feature a number of bootlegs, even beat-up, ring-burned pictures of comparatively common originals (which do rather indicate that there won’t be a rush should Russ ever auction off his collection) then I cannot accept the banality of the selection. Okay – so you have access to 100 tracks from Motown, Stax, Cameo-Parkway and many more and you manage to give us ‘You Can Count On Me’ by Sammy Davis Jnr. Russ describes this, with startling originality, as a track you will either ‘love or hate’ there is actually no such choice, this is either an appalling piece of nonsense or an assault on the senses. There simply is no ‘love or hate’ issue, only ‘hate’ if you have any conception of soul music, indeed music in general. An introduction to Northern Soul as what – a form of comedy? Sadly it doesn’t end there, The Velvelettes ‘Ain’t No Place Like Motown’ was unissued, I’m not surprised, I bet Berry Gordy still has a chuckle about that one when he needs cheering up. Russ seems to appreciate the Merseybeat-esque ‘Take My Hand’ by the Dalton Boys. What next? – a version of ‘Aint No Soul’ by Gerry Marsden? And the amounts of commercial Motown on display such as ‘I’ll Turn To Stone’ and ‘There’s No Stopping Us Now’. Northern Soul wasn’t ever about putting your handbag down and limply wobbling around it in time to the music (unless you’re Andy Dyson). As usual, ‘Tainted Love’ is a chance to tout Casino ‘regular’ Marc Almond (turns out he never even went there). The four themed discs in the box set have themes of almost pointless inaccuracy. By now I’m tiring of listing the essential deficiencies of the compilation (for instance five seventies records only out of a hundred choices). It isn’t that there isn’t any good music here, there is plenty, and actually Russ’s idiosyncratic choices are frequently entertaining but the opportunity to proffer some great unappreciated music amongst the obvious was lost (i.e. ‘Angel Baby’ by the 3½, it’s a terrible white version). I remember the first time I met Russ – he was a man when I was a boy, but it’s as if he never grew up: musically he’s a bemoustached Peter Pan in Spencer’s Bags, still wetting himself at the prospect of ‘three before eight’ coming along so he can pop down to the Beachcomber and then on to the swimming baths. In the case of this particular man, time did pass him by and sadly ‘A Complete Introduction To Northern Soul’ proves it!

For all the above I like Russ Winstanley personally, he’s a nice chap and it is true to say that without him Northern Soul’s most important chapter (Wigan Casino) wouldn’t have happened but it seems that whenever Northern Soul plumbs the depths in taste and decency, he’s around. A case in point is the tragedy that was the Paul O’Grady Show a few months ago, you just knew Russ would be revealed stalking Northern Soul like some ageing uncle who won’t go home and leave the kids to have their party. Didn’t anyone tell O’Grady that no one wore platform shoes at Wigan, despite his claims that he was ‘a regular’? (oh no- he’ll get added to Russ’s ‘list’ like Anna Ford and Ludovic Kennedy). Don’t tell him, but Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin were there the first time I went to Wigan!. O’Grady entered the fray to ‘Like A Nightmare’ (and it was) by the Andantes, a record that I’ve never heard out at a venue and is, in any case, too fast to dance to. Of course our hero knew, and mouthed, every word as if he was bottle-fed on the tune then proceeded to start dancing like a Status Quo rocker. It was 1975 all over again with Wigan’s Ovation silk scarves and an article in the Daily Express entitled ‘Hands, Knees, and Bumps-a-daisy, everybody do the Northern Soul’. There’s going to be a film soon, why is it that I fear the worst?

Having savaged Russ it might be interesting to look at the output of another elder statesman over the time I’ve been absent. Who could it be, pointing at the blackboard other than Mr Barnfather, Head of House at St Twelves? Actually, and with all due respect to Soul Sam, most of his opinion was the same old stuff about the extent to which Soulful House should be accepted or what venues are good for what. In the April issue of Manifesto a couple of points were particularly ironic I felt. Firstly the remark that Salt and Pepper’s ‘Man Of My Word’ on Heatwave is one of the best new crossover sounds he’s heard. I bought this sound off Shifty about six years ago after he informed me that Sam had returned the said disc to him as unsuitable! Maybe older records sound a lot better after listening to Soulful House! The selection of The Apaches ‘Trying To Make Ends Meet’ (Big 8) is even more astounding given that I used the track and the title for a Goldmine funk CD based around Detroit about five years ago. Even then I couldn’t have foreseen that this kind of fast and furious funk would be acceptable to the Northern crowd at any point. To be honest I thoroughly approve and I have to tell you Sam – there are plenty more waiting out there for ya! Can’t say I agree with your appraisal of the Ravins on Demoristic tho’, it isn’t recently discovered but that’s a moot point – it’s just that it isn’t very good. Rare soul is sometimes rare because it’s poor and the Ravins is a case in point. Incidentally it’s been available on one of Kent’s Dave Hamilton CD’s for quite a while. As for the rest of your reviews as usual they are a fittingly eclectic mix, but do rather prove a point I’ve made before about the scarcity of genuinely new sixties discoveries (as opposed to unissued stuff). They do come along however, albeit infrequently these days and records such as Two Plus Two on Velgo, the Parliaments ‘Rainy Day’ or the Tiarras on Op-Art prove that they can still be found. A problem is that they are often so rare that the few deejays that own them are on an uphill climb to make them really and truly popular. As ever it is the discs that a few deejays (or more than a few) own that are the ones that really take off.

A deejay that does know how to dig up an ignored sixties side with some aplomb is Neil Jones. Generally not the four figure stuff and I don’t mean that negatively, as most of his ‘new’ plays are forgotten oldies (damned with more faint praise, how can I get out of this one now?) they often have a real chance of going somewhere. I know he has been playing JOE SIMON’S ‘Long Hot Summer’ (SS7) recently, and what a truly fantastic stormer that side is. Simon cut at least half a dozen great Northern dancers for John Richbourg’s Sound Stage 7 logo, but ‘Long Hot Summer’ is the best of them all and shouldn’t set anyone back more than £20. Of the sixties records that Soul Sam mentioned as Lifeline spins in the April Manifesto, ‘Long Hot Summer’ walks all over them. Another so-called common record that Neil has been working with is THE FLAMINGOS ‘Since My Baby Put Me Down’ (Philips). I think that the little fella had it covered up but as that isn’t fair on ‘known’ records beyond a week or two I’m revealing it here. It has a great slapping beat and some fabulous harmonies, the flipside is actually ‘Brooklyn Boogaloo’ which was briefly played when Dave Rivers was young as a failed follow-up to ‘Boogaloo Party’. Also culled from the album ‘Their Hits Then and Now’ the album can be obtained in stereo although my copy is monophonic so I’ve no idea if the stereo medium adds something to ‘Since My Baby Put Me Down’ or not. For certain the album is worth picking up for the great uptempo reading of Sam Cooke’s ‘Nobody Can Love Me Like You Do’ which the group also did earlier on End.

For all his rare upfront stuff Butch has been responsible for a few revived oldies, Johnny Howard’s ‘The Chase Is On’ started off with him. Recent times have seen him responsible for LEE FIELDS’ ‘Take Me Back’ (Angle 3) which has been going for £500 to the delight of those who picked it up for £3 or so in the Cleethorpes era (shouldn’t have sold it me for a quid in ‘77 when Burning Bush and Cobblestone were beckoning Ginge!) However, ‘Mighty Mighty Love’ (Angle 3) by the same artist has definitely dropped below the radar. Both the pieman (who rates it at £30) and myself (who missed it altogether) failed to spot that the track has the same backing track as ‘Take Me Back’ in our respective price guides, it took Brother Dearlove of Hull to point it out to me. My own conundrum was how I’d missed it and the answer turned out to be that I didn’t have the 45 but did have the cut on Fields’ ultra-rare Angle 3 album ‘Lets Talk It Over’. But to be honest the single must be very rare too, much rarer than ‘Take Me Back’ which is around to a certain extent. ‘Tyra’s Song’ on the flipside of ‘Take Me Back’ (Angle 3 but it’s also on A1) has the same backing track too. Thinking of that Apache single that Sam plays also leads me to believe that Lee Fields’ caustically brilliant ‘She’s A Love Maker’ (Norfolk Sound) has got to have some kind of chance now – okay so it is J.B. styled funk, but with the required fast tempo. A fantastic sound! For some reason I always link ‘Take Me Back’ with “What’s Bothering Me” by Timmy Thomas on Climax, probably by virtue of the fact that they were Cleethorpes spins at the same time. Upon reflection, that’s another so-called “commonish” 45 not seen much these days and I rated it at only £25 in our price guide (it’s even less in Alan Whicker’s guide). If ‘Take Me Back’ can get to £500 then there is certainly some scope for ‘What’s Bothering Me’ at three figures, especially as it is well worth a revival too.

Must just take this opportunity to welcome Sean Livesey aboard and quite a feat at only fifteen! Mind you he aint ‘arf gone modern – last time I saw him deejay he was a Vibrating Vibrations man now he’s all flavas and dropping cool toons with a good vibe. Taking the whiff of Fish into the front of the magazine you might say. And Chapman? What is it with him? I’m away for six months and in all that time he still hasn’t had an opinion – a balloon on a stick could stir up more trouble!

And after all that, I’ve just heard that I have to zip off to the States to look at some records so if I miss the June edition you’ll know why (at least 12 zoos within 200 miles of the vinyl as well).

Til Next Time
Tim Brown