Soul

376. The Stylistics – Can’t Give You Anything (But My Love) (1975)

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The Intro

Philly soul group The Stylistics notched up many hits in the 70s, thanks largely to the unique falsetto of Russell Thompkins Jr and slick production of Thom Bell. But by the time they had a number 1 in the UK their fortunes were sliding in the US and they had a new production team.

Before

The Stylistics came about when two Philadelphia vocal groups merged in 1968. The Monarchs – Thompkins, James Smith and Airrion Love, joined forces with James Dunn and Herb Murrell of the The Percussions. Two years later they recorded debut single You’re a Big Girl Now, written by their road manager Marty Bryant and Robert Douglas from their backing band Slim and the Boys. It became a regional hit for Sebring Records and got them signed with Avco Records. They re-recorded it and it reached seven in the US Billboard R&B chart in 1971.

Avco approached Bell to be their producer in the hope he could work his magic on them the way he had with The Delfonics. However he was unimpressed with their audition and only agreed to work with them because he liked Thompkins voice. Avco gave Bell creative control and so he built most songs around Thompkins. Within the year they were number three in the Billboard Hot 100 with You Are Everything. Two of their best-known hits followed in 1972 – Betcha by Golly, Wow and I’m Stone in Love with You, which were their first entries in the UK charts, at 13 and nine respectively.

The hits kept coming over the next few years, notably, in the UK, notably Rockin’ Roll Baby, reaching six in 1973, and most famous of all, the classic soul of You Make Me Feel Brand New. This duet with Love reached two here and in the US, where it became their biggest hit. But it was one of the last songs that Bell was involved with, and they split in 1974.

That same year they were teamed up with songwriters and producers Hugo Peretti and Luigi Creatore, better known as Hugo & Luigi. Together they had co-written or co-produced big hits in the 50s and 60s including Twistin’ the Night Away, Shout and, and George David Weiss, Can’t Help Falling in Love. Also thrown into the mix was songwriter, producer and arranger Van McCoy. He had co-written the classic I Get the Sweetest Feeling in 1968. He became a pop star in his own right shortly before arranging Can’t Give You Anything (But My Love) when his disco smash The Hustle, produced by Hugo & Luigi, lit up the charts earlier in the summer of 75.

Review

There’s no escaping the fact working with Hugo & Luigi was considered a step down for The Stylistics, despite their new producers having an impressive pedigree themselves. I have mixed feelings about Can’t Give You Anything (But My Love) because it’s grown on me and if it is less slick, it’s a great chorus and has bags of energy, and Van McCoy’s arrangement, while very similar to The Hustle, doesn’t overpower the song and complements it well. The lyric is hardly original, a poor guy tells a woman he may not be able to promise much but his devotion.

Not only that, I’m not actually a fan of Thompkins’ falsetto. I love falsettos, but his is overdone I find. He gets away with it here though. You do have to wonder what is the point of the other singers though, there’s a great video of the group performing this on a rooftop, and the choreography is hilariously messy. But it’s all good fun in a rather cheesy, dated 70s way.

After

Although they were lucky if they scraped the top 50 in America in this era, the UK hits continued for a while for The Stylistics. Na-Na is the Saddest Word reached five, Funky Weekend climbed to 10, and an inevitable cover of Can’t Help Falling in Love hit four in 1976. $7,000 and You, in 1977, was their last chart entry. Their next producer was Teddy Randazzo and the group felt they were looking out-of-date next to disco. They ended the 70s with a small role in the film adaptation of the musical Hair (1979).

The Outro

The Stylistics were reunited with Bell in 1980, but couldn’t recapture the magic. Dunn left that year and Smith a year later. Raymond Johnson was recruited but when he left in 1985 they became a trio. To date, their last album was Love Talk, released in 1991. They continued to tour until 2000 when Thompkins left. Line-up changes have continued ever since, and Thompkins formed The New Stylistics in 2004.

The Info

Written by

Hugo & Luigi & George David Weiss

Producers

Hugo & Luigi

Weeks at number 1

3 (16 August-5 September)

Births

22 August: Actress Sheree Murphy

Meanwhile…

16 August: Football hooliganism was on the rise in the 70s, and on the opening day of the English league season, hundreds of fans were arrested at games across the country.

19 August: The campaign for the release of George Davis, convicted of armed robbery, culminated in Headlingley cricket ground being vandalised, causing the scheduled test match between England and Australia to be abandoned.

21 August: The unemployment rate reaches the 1,250,000 mark.

27 August: 14-year-old Tracy Browne is badly injured in a hammer attack on a country lane at Silsden, near Keighley.

364. The Tymes – M/s Grace (1975)

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The Intro

Here’s an unexpected number 1 for a soul group who had a US chart-topper in 1963 and had struggled to get near that level of fame again. The Tymes kept on trying though, and were rewarded 12 years later with their one and only stint at pole position in the UK.

Before

The Tymes, hailing from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, had nearly 20 years under their belts when M/s Grace was released, having formed in 1956 as The Latineers. The line-up featured Donald Banks as bass, Albert Barry as first tenor, Norman Burnett as baritone and George Hilliard as second tenor. Learning the ropes on the local circuit, they became a quintet when George Williams became their lead vocalist in 1960.

They were signed to Cameo-Parkway in 1963 and were an instant US success, when debut single So Much in Love, written by Williams, topped the Billboard chart. It also reached 21 in the UK. Their debut LP, named after the single, also featured a popular cover of Wonderful! Wonderful!, previously a hit for Johnny Mathis. But after the title track of the follow-up, Somewhere, The Tymes couldn’t maintain their popularity. They tried releasing records on their own Winchester label, but it folded after two singles. Then they were dropped by MGM after another two releases. There was a brief comeback on Colombia in 1968 with a cover of People from the musical Funny Girl, which only scraped into the US chart but reached 16 in the UK. They were soon dropped again.

Longtime producer Billy Jackson bought them time at Gamble & Huff’s Sigma Sound studio in an attempt to get them signed, but to no avail. However, RCA decided to sign them. Meanwhile, John Hall of the band Orleans and his wife Johnanna had written a doo wop-style love song about a sophisticated lady called Miss Grace that wasn’t really suitable for his band, so they asked their publisher to pitch it elsewhere. She went to The Tymes, who were happy to oblige, though they did cleverly suggest making ‘Miss’ a ‘Ms’, a term growing in popularity in the mid-70s, which suggested a rather hip, progressive woman. It was the second single released from the album Trustmaker, and fingers crossed it would do well after You Little Trustmaker was a top 20 hit.

Review

M/s Grace has an elaborate opening, bringing to mind Gamble and Huff’s slick work. But it then turns into a more old-school, upbeat soul number, which is difficult to dislike. But I’m not sure there’s enough there to really love. It’s one of the more minor number 1s of the decade, but nonetheless, it would have been a welcome blast of sunny optimism, always needed in the post-Christmas malaise of January. There’s bags of energy, and it’s nice to hear of veterans who’ve struggled for years coming good. This nation does love the underdog.

The Outro

Weirdly, M/s Grace had the opposite effect to So Much in Love. While it was a number 1 in the UK, it tanked in the US. The UK revival of their fortunes didn’t last long either, as they never had another top 40 entry. After decades of the same line-up, by 1976 Berry and Hilliard had been replaced by Terri Gonzales and Melanie Moore. The former later recorded a solo album with Chic’s Nile Rodgers, and the latter worked with Chaka Khan. Williams died in 2004, aged 69, Banks in 2011, aged 72, and Hilliard in 2014, aged 73. Berry and Burnett remain, and still tour with a new line-up.

The Info

Written by

John & Johanna Hall

Producers

Billy Jackson & Mike Chapman

Weeks at number 1

1 (25-31 January)

Trivia

Deaths

16th Duke of Norfolk, Bernard Fitzalan-Howard – 31 January

361. Barry White – You’re the First, the Last, My Everything (1974)

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The Intro

Literally one of the biggest soul stars of the 70s, US singer-songwriter-producer-arranger Barry White was a disco pioneer, and You’re the First, My Last, My Everything is a prime example of his smooth, sexy résumé. Jokes about his weight aside, the ‘Walrus of Love’ sold millions in his lifetime, making him a chart heavyweight. Sorry.

Before

Barry Eugene Carter was born on 12 September 1944 in Galveston, Texas to Melvin A White and Sadie Marie Carter. They moved to South Central Los Angeles, California when he was young, and he fell in love with his mother’s classical records and began learning the piano, while his mother also taught him how to harmonise. Perhaps this explains the lush orchestration that would become one of his trademarks. One of the most obvious things to spring to mind is White’s baritone, with him since the day his voice dropped suddenly, aged 14. He later recalled his mother crying that his previously squeaky voice had gone forever.

At 16 White was sent to prison for stealing tyres, and while there his life changed when he heard Elvis Presley singing It’s Now or Never (O Sole Mio). He vowed to go straight and focus on music. This was nearly taken away from him when he was arrested again shortly after his release for attempted murder. Luckily for him, the victim came out of a coma and was able to give a proper description of the attacker, thus proving White was innocent.

He joined The Upfronts and sang bass over six singles, beginning with Too Far to Turn Around in 1960. His debut solo single, as Lee Barry, was Man Ain’t Nothin’ in 1966 on Downey. For much of the 60s he worked as a songwriter and arranger for small labels in California, and he relied on welfare cheques to feed his family. Among the acts he worked with were The Bobby Fuller Four, and he also wrote music for The Banana Splits children’s TV series in 1968.

After years of plugging away, White got his big break in 1972 when Love Unlimited recorded debut album From a Girl’s Point of View We Give to You… Love Unlimited. They were an all-female soul trio in the mould of The Supremes that White had spent two years honing. The ballad Walkin’ in the Rain with the One I Love became a hit in the UK and US.

Then came The Love Unlimited Orchestra in 1973. The 40-piece were assembled by White to back Love Unlimited, but he also decided to release material by them in their own right, and Love’s Theme became a smash-hit and was one of the few instrumentals to top the Billboard Hot 100. It also climbed to 10 in the UK. Also in 1973, White was searching for a male singer to work with, and recorded some demos, but when his business partner Larry Nunes heard them, he loved White’s croon and said he should record them and take the spotlight. White didn’t agree and took some persuading, but he subsequently recorded enough to release an album, and from I’ve Got So Much to Give came his first solo hit, I’m Gonna Love You Just a Little More Baby, featuring a riff as heavy as the man himself, and his deep purring, it’s a soul classic.

With that and songs like Never, Never Gonna Give You Up from follow-up Stone Gon’, White became known as the go-to man to soundtrack sex. I wonder how many children came about to the music of White? We Brits had certainly never heard such steamy stuff in the singles chart.

Love Unlimited’s lead singer Glodean James became White’s second wife in 1974, and this was the peak of the Walrus of Love’s chart placings. His music became less raunchy and more celebratory of love in general with the singles from Can’t Get Enough. The almost-title track Can’t Get Enough of Your Love, Babe, climbed to number eight on these shores before he hit the top spot.

You’re the First, the Last, My Everything was originally a country song written by White’s friend Peter Radcliffe back in 1953 but the singer couldn’t get You’re My First, You’re My Last, My In-Between recorded. When White was down on his luck, Radcliffe bought his children toys for Christmas, and White never forgot that. Songwriter Tony Sepe was shocked when Radcliffe played it to them both in the studio, finding it dated, but White told Radcliffe to stay away for three weeks and he’d turn it into a smash. When he heard the results, he cried.

Review

With a shortened intro from the album version, White purrs ‘We got it together, didn’t we?’ You can imagine him saying it with an after-sex cigarette in his hand. Try not to picture it too hard though… Rather than seducing his lover, this is a tribute to their love, and so there’s no wonder this became his safest hit, used at wedding discos and anniversary parties decades later. Like all White’s prime cuts, it’s made with the dancefloor in mind, with stabbing strings that make you want to punch the air or even slide along it on your knees depending on how much you’ve drunk.

And yet, it doesn’t click with me like it perhaps should. As a big soul, funk and disco fan it should be right up my alley, but there’s something about White’s work that stops me loving it. It’s perhaps the sad fact he’s considered a cliché now, and a bit of a joke due to his sweaty appearance and frilly shirts, a throwback to cheesier times. I prefer his filth from the year previous, and consider that more groundbreaking, but I certainly don’t deny as disco goes, this is superior to some of the tat that followed in its wake. And as a huge Pulp fan, I do enjoy White’s spoken word, lengthy, hypnotic intros. As did Jarvis Cocker, clearly.

After

The hits kept coming for White, for a few years, with plenty of top 10 action in the UK with singles like What Am I Gonna Do (number five), Let the Music Play (nine) in 1975 and You See the Trouble with Me (two) in 1976. Two years later his cover of Billy Joel’s Just the Way You Are was his last hit for nine years.

After six years of fame with 20th Century Records, White left in 1979 to set up his own label, Unlimited Gold, with CBS/Columbia Records. Unfortunately this coincided with a downturn in sales. Tastes were changing and disco was on its way out. The 80s were lean times and the label folded in 1983. Four years later the single Sho’ You Right briefly returned him to the charts.

In the 90s, disco came back in vogue, as the children of the 70s looked back on their youth, just as rock’n’roll had a revival in the 70s. White became a living legend and his 1992 album Put Me In Your Mix returned him to the US charts. In 1994 Practice What You Preach (from The Icon Is Love) reached 20 in the UK singles chart. He leant his voice to The Simpsons and appeared on Ally McBeal, and seemed happy to poke fun at himself. He wasn’t always as cool as his reputation suggested though, enjoy these outtakes of him losing his rag while recording a voiceover for Paul Quinn College. BBC comedies such as The Mary Whitehouse Experience and The Smell of Reeves and Mortimer liked to spoof the Walrus, the latter being particularly funny to the teenage me.

Ironically, White’s last album was called Staying Power, released in 1999. His health problems were catching up with him, and that year he was forced to cancel tour dates due to exhaustion and high blood pressure. In 2002 he was hospitalised due to kidney failure, and while undergoing dialysis and awaiting a transplant in May 2003 he suffered a severe stroke. White died on 4 July 2003, aged 58.

The Outro

Look past all the layers of irony, and White was very talented, and his songs of love were a positive force in disco. As the Fun Lovin’ Criminals sang on 1998 single Love Unlimited:

‘Barry White, saved my life
and if Barry White, saved your life
Or got you back with your ex-wife
Sing Barry White, Barry White, it’s alright.’

The Info

Written by

Peter Radcliffe, Tony Sepe & Barry White

Producer

Barry White

Weeks at number 1

2 (7-20 December)

Trivia

Births

13 December: Radio DJ Sara Cox/Franz Ferdinand guitarist Nick McCarthy

Meanwhile…

15 December: In an attempt to save fuel at a time of Arab embargoes following the Yom Kippur War, new speed limits are introduced on Britain’s roads

18 December: The government pays £42,000 to families of victims of the Bloody Sunday riots in Northern Ireland.

358. Sweet Sensation – Sad Sweet Dreamer (1974)

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The Intro

We’ve had several acts on the blog now that started out on ITV talent show Opportunity Knocks, including Middle of the Road and Paper Lace, but here was the first and only number 1 by a band who rose to fame via New Faces. This series, produced by ATV for ITV, began in 1973 with presenter Derek Hobson introducing acts who would perform for four judges. Among those, and most notorious, was the sardonic Tony Hatch, the 70s version of Simon Cowell. But one act he did take a shine to were Mancunian group Sweet Sensation.

Before

This eight-piece were formed in 1971, consisting of lead vocalist Marcel King, Junior Daye, Vincent James and St Clair Palmer on backing vocals, plus Barry Johnson on bass, Roy Flowers on drums, Gary Shaugnessy on guitar and Leroy Smith on keyboards. Sweet Sensation were Manchester’s answer to the ‘Philly sound’, and by the time of their appearance on New Faces in 1974, this lush soul was growing ever more popular in the UK.

It’s worth noting that glam rock had been a totally white phenomenon, and now it was on the wane, soul and eventually disco were filling the gap. There were many more black acts at number 1 in 1974 then there had been for some time. And there hadn’t been a black British group at number 1 since The Equals in 1968. King was only 14 when they formed, making Sweet Sensation comparable to The Jackson Five due to his youthful falsetto. However, only King and Shaugnessy hailed from Manchester, the rest were from Kingston, Jamiaca, apart from Palmer, who was from St Kitts.

Hatch had prior number 1 success numerous times, with his wife Jackie Trent, among others, so Sweet Sensation landed on their feet when the well-connected producer took them under his wing and getting them a record deal with Pye in 1974. However, despite his patronage, debut single Snowfire tanked. They went back to the drawing board and enlisted David Parton to write Sad Sweet Dreamer, which featured Hatch and Trent on vocals too.

Review

It’s a fair approximation of Gamble & Huff’s masterful work, and tracks by The Stylistics, but it feels a bit stiff, low budget and ‘British’ by comparison. King’s falsetto is appealing and it’s ironic to hear a teen singing about putting things down to experience, but it feels more like a song to fill a gap for a week than a deserved number 1, which was exactly what it was really. One of the least memorable chart-toppers of the year, but by no means a bad song.

After

Sweet Sensation had found a winning formula but it proved short-lived. However, the follow-up Purely By Coincidence reached number 11 in 1975. Sad Sweet Dreamer was a good enough impersonation of Philly soul for the US too – it reached number 14 there. But that was pretty much it for the band. King left in 1975 and was replaced by Recardo “Rikki” Patrick. Their debut album, named after their number 1, did badly, and no more singles charted. In 1977 they took part in A Song for Europe but came eighth with You’re My Sweet Sensation. Pye dropped them and they split soon after.

In 1984, King tried to begin a solo career, and released Reach for Love on Factory Records. It was produced by New Order’s Bernard Sumner, and is considered a lost electro-soul classic now. It’s a great production from Sumner, and King’s voice is beautiful. Shaun Ryder of Happy Mondays apparently reckons it’s Factory’s best single, and ripped it off on Black Grape’s Get Higher in 1997.

The Outro

Sadly, King didn’t become a solo star and died of a brain haemorrhage in 1995, aged only 38. His former bandmate Johnson was also on Factory via the early underground dance outfit Quando Quango. Smith died in 2009 and James in 2019.

The Info

Written by

David Parton

Producers

Tony Hatch & David Parton

Weeks at number 1

1 (19-25 October)

Trivia

Births

20 October: Islamic terrorist Mohammad Sidique Khan

Meanwhile…

19 October: Conservative MP Keith Joseph makes a controversial speech in Edgbaston on the cycle of deprivation that effectively rules him out of high office. He left the leadership contest to replace Edward Heath and instead became one of Margaret Thatcher’s biggest supporters.

22 October: The IRA threw a bomb into an empty dining room in London’s Brook’s club.

354. The Three Degrees – When Will I See You Again (1974)

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The Intro

Thanks to the crack hitmaking team of Gamble and Huff, the lush, string-laden ‘Philly sound’ was one of the foremost soul styles of the late-60s and 70s. When Will I See You Again made stars of The Three Degrees, an all-girl trio that had existed for over 10 years. They became the first black female group since The Supremes in 1964 to hit the top spot.

Before

The Three Degrees began circa-1963 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The original line-up featured high-school students Fayette Pinkney, Shirley Porter and Linda Turner, but Porter and Turner didn’t stick around and were replaced that year by Helen Scott and Janet Harmon. In 1965 they were discovered by producer and songwriter Richard Barrett and they were signed to Swan Records. Their first single, Gee Baby (I’m Sorry), was released in 1965, the same year Sheila Ferguson joined their label.

Scott left The Three Degrees in 1966 to start a family, and was replaced by Ferguson, and by the end of 1967 Harmon had gone too and Valerie Holiday was in place, with Ferguson mostly on lead vocals, backed by Pinkney and Holiday, the ‘classic’ line-up had arrived. Barrett signed them with Warner Bros., Metromedia and Neptune over the next few years, but fame eluded them.

Their first LP, Maybe, was released on Roulette Records in 1970, and from there they landed a cameo in action thriller The French Connection (1971), performing Jimmy Webb’s Everybody Gets to Go to the Moon.

Things fell into place in 1973 when they signed with Philadelphia International Records, co-owned by Gamble and Huff. The duo had been making hits together since The Soul Survivors’ Expressway to Your Heart in 1967, and had worked with Dusty Springfield, Wilson Pickett and Archie Bell & the Drells. Then in 1971 they formed their own label to go up against Motown Records. Some of their greatest and most famous work includes If You Don’t Know Me By Now by Harold Melvin & the Blue Notes, Love Train by The O’Jays and Me and Mrs. Jones by Billy Paul – all slick, mature and memorable soul records.

The Three Degrees’ first job at the label was to record the vocals for TSOP (The Sound of Philadelphia) by MFSB, which was the theme tune to the fondly remembered US soul/disco series Soul Train. Next they recorded the album The Three Degrees, and they began to make headway in the UK charts when The Year of Decision reached number 13.

When Will I See You Again was the third release from their eponymous LP, and it wasn’t popular with the trio. Ferguson later recalled that when Gamble played it to her on a piano, she threw a strop and said she was insulted he expected her to sing such a simple song. She admitted she was wrong after it had sold millions.

Review

And she was wrong, as it’s a lovely song and rightly considered a soul classic. It’s worth it just for those angelic sighs, really – The Three Degrees’ harmonies really are something special. They make the yearning at the heart of the song seem real and identifiable. Ferguson is in love, but she’s being kept hanging by a thread, but her feelings are so strong, she can’t give him up. But his lack of commitment is leaving her desperately unsure – it’s worth noting every single line in the song is a question. The music is gorgeous too, another string-laden, clean, deep production from Gamble and Huff.

After

The Three Degrees were finally mainstream stars, and are still remembered as being Prince Charles’ favourite group, as he revealed in the 70s. When Will I See You Again was the fourth best-selling single of 1974, and reached number two in the US. Further singles success was sporadic, but Take Good Care Of Yourself was a top 10 hit in 1975. The following year, they left Gamble and Huff and moved to CBS Sony/Epic Records, but Pinkney, the only remaining original member, departed after an argument with their manager over her relationship with singer Lou Rawls. Scott returned to the fold.

Their 1978 album with disco genius Giorgio Moroder, New Dimensions, was an inspired move, scoring three big hits with Giving Up, Giving In (number 12), Woman in Love (number three) and The Runner (number 10). They performed at Prince Charles’s 30th birthday party that year and rounded up the decade with their final hit, My Simple Heart (number nine) in 1979, and a TV special, The Three Degrees at the Royal Albert Hall, with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra.

The Three Degrees had further albums and TV specials, but time had moved on. They were one of the first acts to jump on the Stock, Aitken and Waterman bandwagon in 1985, but to no avail. A year later, Ferguson, the most famous of the trio, left, and it was never the same after that. After several attempts to find a replacement, Scott and Holiday went with Cynthia Garrison, creating the longest lasting formation, from 1989-2010. In 1993 they recorded a new version of their chart-topper with Thomas Anders of German duo Modern Talking.

The Outro

Founder member Pinkney died in 2009 of acute respiratory failure, aged 61. In 2011 Garrison fell ill and was replaced by Freddie Pool. Their most recent album was Strategy: Our Tribute To Philadelphia, released in 2016. Pool, Holiday and Scott continue to perform. Ferguson has remained in the public eye since her 1986 departure, recording solo work and starring in TV and theatre. She was a contestant on I’m a Celebrity… Get Me Out of Here! in 2004 and has also appeared in Celebrity MasterChef, The Weakest Link and Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?.

The Info

Written & produced by

Kenny Gamble & Leon Huff

Weeks at number 1

2 (17-30 August)

Trivia

Births

23 August: Scottish actor Ray Park

Deaths

29 August: Actress Judith Furse

Meanwhile…

29 August: The final Windsor Free Festival was broken up by Thames Valley Police. The tactics used were so violent there was a public outcry.

353. George McCrae – Rock Your Baby (1974)

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The Intro

I love George McCrae’s Rock Your Baby. One of my favourite number 1s of the 70s, this is a landmark in early disco music, thanks to the slinkiest of grooves and McCrae’s heavenly falsetto – and to think, his performance was the happiest of accidents. Finally, after seemingly endless 50s rehashes and tributes, here was a new sound.

Before

KC and the Sunshine Band were Florida-based disco pioneers, formed in 1973 by record store employee Harry Wayne Casey (aka KC) and TK Records engineer Richard Finch. The same year, Vince Aletti became one of the first to use ‘disco’ as a term to describe a genre, in Rolling Stone that September. Casey and Finch had begun releasing material with their new band and among the demos they worked on was Rock Your Baby.

The backbone of the track was courtesy of an early drum machine on a Lowry organ left in the TK Records studio, a rare sound back then. Casey took to the keyboards and Finch took care of the bass and real drums, and as they built up the track, they felt something magical. Finch told Songfacts ‘it was like God was in the building or something’. They paid KC and the Sunshine Band guitarist Jerome Smith $15 to lay down some licks and wrote lyrics inspired by Hues Corporation’s hit Rock the Boat. KC and the Sunshine Band were not an established act at this point, and Casey couldn’t reach those high notes, so who should they get to sing it? TK Records owner Henry Stone suggested soul singer Gwen MCrae, but fortune smiled on her husband, George, instead.

George Warren McCrae, Jnr was born 19 October 1944 in West Palm Beach, Florida, the second of nine children. He formed his own singing group, The Jivin’ Jets, before joining the US Navy in 1963. That same year, he married Gwen Mosley. Four years later, the McCraes reformed the group, but they split soon after, and they began working as a duo. Gwen signed a solo contract and began to have modest hits, so George became her manager. He was about to return to college to study law enforcement when he sang over Rock Your Baby.

Review

KC and the Sunshine Band are mainly remembered these days for catchy disco anthems, great blasts of fun, but perhaps short on substance. With Rock Your Baby, they created something magnificent, entering unchartered territory by adding the sweet soul voice of McCrae to a drum machine with a holy melding of man and machine. I Feel Love is the most magnificent disco song, but without Rock Your Baby, would we have got there?

The keyboard melody at the start is almost nursery rhyme-like, setting the scene for a tender serenade in which a blissed-out McCrae surrenders to his love – which is pretty unusual for this time. He’s no alpha male, and is letting her take the lead. Smith’s choppy guitar line is vital, even if it sounds very similar to Rock the Boat. This would in time become one of the key ingredients to the disco sound.

Rock Your Baby is sexual, of course, but it’s sensual and seductive more than anything. Listen to the way McCrae’s falsetto glides over the rhythm in an aural orgasm, and it can move like few disco songs can. The six-minute-plus album version is superior as it lets the song stretch and breathe. To be honest, I could listen to an hour-long mix of this and not tire of it.

After

Rock Your Baby sold millions and was number 1 in the UK, US and across Europe. It inspired John Lennon’s Whatever Gets You Thru the Night and ABBA’s Dancing Queen. Not bad for a debut solo single. McCrae, the first black artist to top the UK charts in nearly two years, is considered a one-hit wonder, but he actually had other popular material. Follow-ups I Can’t Leave You Alone and You Can Have It All went number nine and 23 respectively later in the year, and in 1975, It’s Been So Long climbed to number four, and I Ain’t Lyin’ reached number 12.

Also in 1975, Gwen recorded a reply to Rock Your Baby, Rockin’ Chair, on which George provided backing vocals. The following year, he and Gwen divorced, and Honey I became his last UK charting single. We Did It! was his last album for some time in 1979, as he left TK Records and went into semi-retirement.

In the meantime, KC and the Sunshine Band became one of the biggest disco acts on the planet, with a string of floorfillers that encapsulated the genre’s positivity. They recorded Rock Your Baby too, but only as an instrumental. It wasn’t until 1983 that they scored a UK number 1, with the effervescent Give It Up.

The Outro

McCrae surfaced again in 1984 with the album One Step Closer to Love, but it failed to chart. A remix of his number 1, known as the Frankfurst Mix, remixed by Paul Hardcastle, was released in 1986. He continued to make albums up until Do Something in 1996, then disappeared again, and has returned sporadically. He was part of Jools’ Annual Hootenanny in 2017. A cover of Rock Your Baby was a number eight hit for dance act KWS in 1992.

The Info

Written & produced by

Harry Wayne Casey & Richard Finch

Weeks at number 1

3 (27 July-16 August)

Trivia

Births

31 July: Actress Emilia Fox

Meanwhile…

15 August: The collapse of Court Line and its subsidiaries Clarksons and Horizon Holidays results in 100,000 holidaymakers stranded abroad.

318. Rod Stewart – You Wear It Well (1972)

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The Intro

‘Rod the Mod’, after years of striving, became a solo superstar off the back of Maggie May in 1971. And his group Faces did well out of it too, releasing third album A Nod Is as Good as a Wink… To a Blind Horse later that year and scoring a hit with the raucous Stay With Me. But there was some tension among the band, despite them helping out on Stewart’s next solo album Never a Dull Moment, that he was concentrating a little too much on his own career.

Before

Featuring covers of Jimi Hendrix and Sam Cooke as well as songs co-written with Ronnie Wood and Martin Quittenton, his fourth solo LP was released in July 1972, and You Wear It Well was singled out the following month.

It’s a sequel of sorts to Maggie May, also co-written by Stewart and Quittenton, in which the singer, now in Minnesota, is writing to a lover. Something went wrong along the way and he ‘blew it without even trying’, and he doesn’t know if she’ll ever even get his song/note, but he’s offloading anyway. The tone of the song is so similar, both lyrically and musically (the drumming at the start is surely a deliberate nod?) it seems very likely to be for Maggie to me, especially when you consider the references to age and ‘radical views’ (see my Maggie May blog for more on the origins of that song)

Review

As with Maggie May, Stewart is very good at telling a story and creating compelling characters. I don’t know what went wrong, but Stewart was clearly a great songwriter back then. His style was intelligent and impressive and it’s not easy to tell such vivid stories in pop songs. You can forgive him his innate laddishness when there’s such wit on display in the lyrics to You Wear It Well.

Unfortunately, it’s so similar to his previous number 1, you can’t help but compare, and despite a nice backing from the other Faces, it’s not as strong a song, and it’s lacking the bright sound of the mandolin. Nothing wrong with a song lacking a chorus, it’s a brave move, but this time around, it’s missing it.

The Outro

By the time Stewart had his third number 1 in 1975, he had changed record labels, moved to Los Angeles, and Faces had split.

The Info

Written by

Rod Stewart & Martin Quittenton

Producer

Rod Stewart

Weeks at number 1

1 (2-8 September)

Trivia

Births

6 September: Actor Idris Elba

Every UK Number 1: The 50s – Out Now on Kindle!

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Today sees the release of my first book! Every UK Number 1: The 50s is available on Amazon’s Kindle Store at £3.99 here. Members of Kindle Unlimited are able to read for free via their monthly subscriptions. If you’re into vintage music, pop culture and social history, it would make for great lockdown reading. Hope you enjoy!

The UK singles chart is the soundtrack to our lives and a barometer of the nation’s mood and tastes. And ever since 1952, the battle for the number one spot has had us all talking as well as dancing. 

In this fascinating spin-off from everyuknumber1.com, as seen in the Daily Mirror, music journalist Rob Barker comprehensively reviews all the best-sellers of the Fifties, delving into the wild lives of the artists and the real stories and secrets behind the hits. He also counts down the influential events that shaped them, as we moved from rations to never having it so good.

Elvis Presley, Buddy Holly and Cliff Richard were among those who transformed the lives of young people throughout Britain, and taught a country battered by war how to have fun again. 

Find out which chart topper was written by an illiterate rapist who formed his own prison band. Learn about the strange early days of the charts, which led to the number one spot being held by two acts at the same time, with different versions of the same banned song. Who was the first woman to top the charts? And which hitmaker lives on as Cockney rhyming slang? 

Every UK Number 1: The 50s has all the answers on the decade in which pop took its first steps, before rock’n’roll shouldered in and left the baby boomers all shook up. 

304. The Tams – Hey Girl, Don’t Bother Me (1971)

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The Intro

I first became aware of this unexpected number 1 when watching a vintage edition of Top of the Pops a few years ago, and it really stumped me. How did this old-fashioned minor soul track, performed by a bunch of old men in strange outfits, do so well in 1971? Since then, I’ve discovered Hey Girl, Don’t Bother Me had first been released in the US in 1964. It topped the charts seven years later thanks to its popularity with the northern soul scene. It is in fact the only number 1 linked with the movement.

Before

The phrase ‘northern soul’ first began to be heard in 1968 in journalist Dave Godin’s Covent Garden record shop Soul City. It went public proper in 1970 thanks to his weekly column in Blues & Soul magazine. He had noticed that football fans from the north who visited his shop while following their team weren’t interested in the developing funk sound and instead still loved the more pop side of soul from the mid-60s.

In the late-60s, soul fans from all over the country flocked to the Twisted Wheel in Manchester to attend all-nighters, but in January 1971, its burgeoning reputation as a drug haven resulted in the venue closing down. Fortunately, the movement had grown across the north by this point. By the time of this number 1, the main two northern soul clubs were the Golden Torch in Tunstall, Stoke-on-Trent (Peter Stringfellow used to DJ there) and Blackpool Mecca.

The Tams originated in Atlanta, Georgia back in 1960, taking their name from their trademark tam o’shanter hats they would wear on stage. Founder members were the Pope brothers, lead singer Joe, and Charles, plus Robert Lee Smith, Horace Key and Floyd Ashton (who left in 1963).

Their first single of note was Untie Me, a Joe South song, which reached the Billboard R&B chart in 1962. Two years later was the high watermark of their original recording career, with modest US hits including What Kind of Fool (Do You Think I Am) and Hey Girl, Don’t Bother Me, neither of which charted in the UK. Both were written by Ray Whitley.

Review

Hey Girl, Don’t Bother Me is built around the song’s title, sung repeatedly by the backing singers, while Joe (who does have a sweet, distinctive voice) tries and fails to convince the listener that he wants no part of this girl, as he’s been warned she’s bad news. He doesn’t want to be added to ‘her list’ of tossed-aside lovers, but, well, she does ‘look so fine’… you get the drift. The main hook does stick around in your head for a while, but this sounds quite old-fashioned even for 1964, and must be up there with the most unlikely number 1s of all time.

It’s likely The Tams’ popularity among northern soul lovers was originally down to Be Young, Be Foolish, Be Happy, a much better track, that charted in the US in 1968 and on these shores in 1970. Unlike their number 1, here’s a song you can actually dance to, which is what I thought northern soul was primarily about?

Nobody looks more surprised at The Tams appearing on Top of the Pops to promote Hey Girl, Don’t Bother Me than the group themselves, as you can see in the clip above. It’s quite endearing watching them sticking out like sore thumbs, with Key in the middle actually looking quite scared. In fact, with about a minute of the performance left to go, he disappears, and they carry on without him!

After

That was it for The Tams and the UK charts, until 1987. They reached number 21 with… wait for it… There Ain’t Nothing Like Shaggin’! There’s no way of knowing if they were aware of what a ‘shag’ is in the UK (it actually refers to a dance called the Carolina shag) but the lyrics are very funny either way. The BBC understandably banned it, but as is often the case, the notoriety probably helped its sales. It also featured in the 1989 comedy Shag, starring Bridget Fonda. Their last charting single in the UK was 1988’s My Baby Sure Can Shag.

The Tams continue to perform to this day. When Joe died in 1996, Charles took over lead vocals, but he passed away in 2013. Key died in 1995, which leaves Smith as the sole original member.

The Outro

Northern soul grew in popularity throughout the 70s, with Wigan Casino becoming one of the most notable venues from 1973 onwards. Although the movement waned with its closure in the 80s, it still has a healthy following decades later.

The Info

Written by

Ray Whitley

Producer

Bill Lowery

Weeks at number 1

3 (18 September-8 October)

Trivia

Births

24 September: Set designer Es Devlin
25 September: Actress Jessie Wallace
28 September: Actress Liza Walker
29 September: Actor Mackenzie Crook
8 October: Conservative Lord Chancellor David Gauke

Meanwhile…

21 September: BBC Two music series The Old Grey Whistle Test, which ran well into the 80s, was transmitted for the first time.

24 September: Following revelations made by a KGB defector, Britain expelled 90 Russian diplomats for spying. 15 were not allowed to return.

1 October: The CAT scan, invented by Godfrey Hounsfield, was used for the first time on a patient at a hospital in Wimbledon.

303. Diana Ross – I’m Still Waiting (1971)

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The Intro

How much power did Radio 1 DJ Tony Blackburn have in 1971? Quite a lot it seems, as it’s thanks to him that Chirpy Chirpy Cheep Cheep topped the charts, and only a few months later he persuaded EMI (who distributed for Motown in the UK) to release this album track by the former Supremes singer as a single. It went on to become Diana Ross’s first solo number 1.

Before

I covered The Supremes when I reviewed their 1964 number 1 Baby Love, but Ross’s life deserves a closer look. She was born in Detroit, Michigan on 26 March 1944. Her mother actually named her Diane, but a clerical error resulted in ‘Diana’ appearing on her birth certificate. She was billed as Diane Ross on early Supremes records. Growing up, Ross had Smokey Robinson and Aretha Frankin among her neighbours.

On the day she turned 14 in 1958, the Ross’s moved to the Brewster-Douglass Housing Projects. She had ambitions to be a fashion designer and took several classes, in addition to modelling and hairdressing for neighbours. A year later, she joined Florence Ballard, Mary Wilson and Betty McGlown in The Primettes, the sister group of The Primes.

Thanks to Robinson, The Primettes auditioned for Motown in 1960. Berry Gordy Jr recalled being blown away by Ross’s voice in his autobiography, but he felt they were too young. In these early years, Ross would be responsible for the group’s look, serving as hair stylist, costume design and make-up artist.

In 1961, with McGlown gone and Barbara Martin in, Gordy signed The Primettes on the condition they change their name. Ballard chose ‘The Supremes’, and Ross was worried it made them sound like a male group, but as we know, The Supremes they became, and from 1963 onwards, reduced to a trio without Martin, they became one of the most successful groups in history. They scored their sole UK number 1 with Baby Love, but had many more in the US.

From around 1966 and for the next few years Gordy began pushing for Ross to take centre stage. He had considered getting her to go solo, but deciding the timing was wrong he settled on renaming them Diana Ross & the Supremes instead. Ballard was fired and replaced with Cindy Birdsong, and Ross would often be the only Supreme to actually feature on recordings, backed by session singers like The Andantes. The pressure resulted in Ross developing anorexia, and she collapsed on stage during a 1967 performance, and had to be hospitalised for exhaustion.

Nevertheless, Gordy continued to shine the spotlight on Ross, having her perform solo in 1968 TV specials by The Supremes. The following year he decided the time was right, and it was announced she was leaving the group. Someday We’ll Be Together became Ross’s swansong, and the single was the final US number 1 of the 60s. She made her final appearance as a Supreme in January 1970.

It was only four months later that her eponymous debut solo LP was released, and it featured her cover of Ain’t No Mountain High Enough (originally recorded by Marvin Gaye & Tammi Terrell), which climbed to number six in the UK and was number 1 in the US.

November 1970 saw the rush-release of her second album, Everything Is Everything. Deke Richards was commissioned to make the LP more pop than her debut, and it featured two Beatles covers (Come Together and The Long and Winding Road), as well as a sad ballad by Richards himself – I’m Still Waiting. No singles were released from it, initially, with Motown choosing to mine her next album, Surrender, released in the summer of 1971. Unusually, both Remember Me and the title track performed better on these shores than America, both reaching the top 10.

Blackburn, then in charge of the Radio 1 breakfast show, was a huge fan of Ross, and he loved I’m Still Waiting. He promised Motown/EMI that if it was made a single, he would make it his ‘Record of the Week’ and play it every morning for five days. Both sides kept their end of the arrangement, and the hype saw it reach number 1. It was Motown’s biggest-selling single in the UK until Three Times a Lady by the Commodores in 1978.

Review

I’m baffled as to why this is the case. For me, I’m Still Waiting should have remained an album track. It’s dated, melodramatic and rather unmemorable.

Ross sings from the point of view of a woman who met the love of her life when she was five and he was 10. He would tease her, as boys do, but she loved him. Then he had to move away, and told her not to wait for him, but for love. But Ross couldn’t forget him, and nobody else compares.

Nice sentiment, but it could have been so much better. It has a slick production, but the tune is certainly not up there with the classics of The Supremes. Ross isn’t known for displaying too much emotion in her singing, which is probably a good thing in such a sentimental song, but I find it hard to believe in the performance. I much prefer her next number 1, Chain Reaction, which came 15 years later in 1986.

The Outro

An ill-advised dance remix of I’m Still Waiting by DJ Phil Chill reached 21 in 1990.

The Info

Written & produced by

Deke Richards

Weeks at number 1

4 (21 August-17 September)

Trivia

Births

26 August: Actress Gaynor Faye
29 August: Business executive Nicola Mendelsohn
31 August: TV presenter Kirstie Allsopp
1 September: Conservative MP Daniel Hannan
2 September: TV presenter Lisa Snowdon
13 September: Actress Louise Lombard/Fashion designer Stella McCartney
17 September: Labour MP Parmjit Dhanda

Deaths

18 August: Travel writer Peter Fleming

Meanwhile…

1 September: The end of an era, as the pre-decimal penny and three-pence ceased to be legal tender.

3 September: Qatar became independent from the UK.

7 September: Three years after the beginnings of The Troubles, the death toll reached 100 with the death of 14-year-old Annette McGavigan, who was fatally wounded by a gunshot in crossfire between British soldiers and the IRA. There would be many more deaths still to come.

9 September: British Ambassador Geoffrey Jackson was freed after being held captive for eight months by extreme left-wing guerrillas Tupamaros in Uruguay.