THE PLAYLIST 4: DOO WOP

Chapter Four

Rama Linga Wop Bop and Doo-Wop

    Doo-wop is street corner harmony. Friends from church, the neighborhood or school would gather on a mutually convenient city street corner and sing. The groups usually had four or ideally five guys, comprised of two tenors, one guy who could swing from a baritone to a bass, and, if they were lucky, someone who could fake a strong falsetto. Add some snapping fingers, clapping hands and slapping thighs, stir in the melodrama of Gospel arrangements with the secular focus of young love, and you had the sound of 15,000 young blacks and Italians on a march for local stardom. The term “doo-wop” itself comes from the prominent background rhythms the majority voiced to push to soloist’s singing into the forefront. “Rama Lama Ding Dong,” “Bomp She Bop,” “Oop She Boop,” “Bom Bama Bom” and other glorious nonsense syllables propelled a small percentage of these young folks into the status of potential hit-makers. Once the record companies began gobbling these kids up on their way into the studio, some minimal soul-inspired instrumentation was added for balance, but tinkling pianos, softly groaning saxophones, and meandering guitars always blurred behind the sharp focus of these, the greatest of all doo-wop songs.

The Chords. "Sh-Boom." Cat. 1954.

     “Life could be a dream/Sweetheart/Sh-boom/Hello again/Sh-boom/If I could carry you/To the paradise up above. . . .” If there were ever another song so innocent that it came in for the public bashing this one suffered, you can bet it’d be every bit as good. Television commentators decried the song’s artlessness, hack musicians ridiculed its lack of sense, imaginative idiots claimed its subject matter was the end of the world (the title replicating, one presumes, the ultimate explosion), and white groups copied it  (poorly), having their own hit versions while this Bronx sextet struggled just to get by. Fifty years later, no one much remembers the commentators, the hacks have gone to hack hell, and no one except the totally obsessed knows the names of the copycats. But The Chords will live forever for concocting this rollicking frenzy that was indeed deliriously guilty of being everything its detractors claimed—except possibly the apocalyptic soundtrack. Still, if the world has to end. . . .

The Elegants. Little Star: The Best of The Elegants. Collectables. 1991.

     My first thought when I saw this album was “They called it Best of because they couldn’t very well called it Greatest Hit.” In fact, I always thought of this Long Island doo-wop group as a poor man’s Dion and the Belmonts, simply because, as far as I knew, they never followed up their sole chart success, an ignorance on my part, to be sure, but one due to a lack of exposure outside the R&B charts. Then I played the album.  "Little Star" was as transcendent as ever. Indeed, when singers Vito Picone and Artie Venosa wrote and recorded this inverted Mozart lullaby, they created a song as ominous as it was innocent and serene. Everything else here has that same great studio-on-a-street-corner texture, Italian lovesick hoodlums trying to save themselves by wooing the right young lady into the distractions of love and romance.  

The Penguins.  "Earth Angel." Doo Tone. 1954.

     Tin Pan Alley meets doo-wop ala Fremont High School. Dead kids walking the planet searching for that true love transcendence was all the rage, thanks to this ode to secular halo-wearers.

Clarence “Frogman” Henry. "Ain't Got No Home." Argo. 1956.

     “But I Do” was a bigger hit,” but “Ain’t Got No Home” was a better and certainly stranger song, what with the Frogman’s declaration that he not only sings like a girl (true), but that he also sings like a frog (right again). Despite the use of this song by the reactionary Rush Limbaugh and in nearly every movie that purports to be about the 1950s (the royalties from which having kept Henry alive), “Ain’t Got No Home” retains its power with thrilling Professor Longhair-style New Orleans piano and, of course, the Frogman’s unique vocal croakings.

The Cadets. "Stranded in the Jungle." Modern. 1956.

     The Cadets were an inspired gang of lunatics whose moment in the sun was this 1950s side wherein the singer ends up in a pot about to be cooked into a festive dish by the local witch doctor. What’s most distinctive about “Stranded” is the fact that it’s actually two songs chopped up and mixed together. In the first song, our unnamed hero is surrounded by juju music appropriate to the cannibal feast of which he is the main course. The second song interrupts at every potential denouement with unabashed revelry, and just as that party reaches crescendo, we slam back into that boiling pot with about as much transition as scalding water. In addition to being one of the earliest cases of producer “sampling,” the Cadets’ version is also notable for inspiring a distinctly different version (though the arrangement was identical) by a group called The Jayhawks. That group’s version bombed, but The Jayhawks mutated into The Marathons and later The Olympics, under both names releasing some raucous novelty tunes. Meanwhile, back in the States…

Del-Vikings. "Come Go with Me."  Dot. 1957.

     One of the many things wrong with the world is the way real teamwork has gone out of fashion. I’m talking about the kind of teamwork where each person involved recognizes his own contribution as well as the contributions of every other person on the team—to the point where everyone involved understands the beauty of their interdependency. You used to find this kind of thing in professional sports, occasionally in the workplace, and even in popular music. I’m talking about the level of performance of any type where each person involved internalizes the mechanical and organizational concepts so tightly that he thinks of himself as a member of that particular team. It would be nice if the duration of these situations was longer—better, that is, for the rest of us. In the case of The Del-Vikings, the military, producers and record executives got in the way and the group that made this recording was only together for a few months.

The Coasters. Their Greatest Recordings: The Early Years. Atco. 1971.

     You could say this was a collection of writers/producers Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller’s best moments and you wouldn’t be far off. Certainly the beginnings of pop situation comedy are here. It would be wise, however, to remember Lee Allen’s saxophone, since that’s the road map everyone on this trip was following. And even though "Charlie Brown"  has not aged all that well, "Shopping for Clothes" still has lines that are as pertinent in these hip hop days as forty-plus years ago: “Stand over there, look in the mirror and dig yourself” is pertinent indeed. "Yakety-Yak's"  understated belligerence, "Young Blood"'s fear of Father, and "Down in Mexico's" infinite party appeal all make these contemporary and never quaint. “That is Rock and Roll” ranks with The Showmen’s “It Will Stand” as an ultimate testament to the form. And “Riot in Cell Block #9,” actually recorded by The Robins, which were only half of what would become The Coasters, has such an ominous feel, it’s no wonder its refrain (“There’s a riot goin’ on) went on to become the title of Sly and the Family Stone’s greatest album.[i]

The Capris. "There's a Moon Out Tonight." Planet. 1958.

     The original line-up of The Capris were from Ozone Park, New York, a burg that could then be summed up (as Springsteen later would) “When you hit a red light, you don’t stop.” The five young Italian Americans led by the multi-ranged Nick Santo constructed a stroll-dance harmony around the simplest of lyrics: “There’s a moo-oon out too ni-eye-ite/Whu-oh-oh o-oh/There’s a song in my hear-ar-art/Whu-oh o-oh.” First released on the planet label in 1958, it suffered the ignoble indifference of most doo-wop numbers by white vocal groups. Old Town Records discovered the tune three years later, at precisely the moment when searing group harmony by people of any color had at least some chance of stirring up national interest. Between the effect of Santo’s acrobatic note-bending and the rhythms of a drummer with a metronomic sense of timing, “There’s a Moon Out Tonight” reintroduced the early 1960s doo-wop craze. When people become too hip to love this ode to romance by these maniacs, then love itself must be dead. Maybe that’s why it’s a graveyard classic.

The Danleers. "One Summer Night." Mercury. 1958.

     Jimmy Weston led his friends through a blissful doo-wop bop that either takes you back to 1958 and the Summer of Your Life, or forward into a reality only understood in dreams. “One Summer Night” doesn’t require experience. It simply asks that we listen softly and taste the air it breathes with enthusiasm.

The Silhouettes. "Get a Job."  Ember. 1958.

     The Gospel group The Golden Tornados mutated into a hard-driving pop vocal band when they found out the power of “yipyip yipyip yip” and “shad da da da da.” Get a Job” was their hit, an early example of social protest.

Huey “Piano” Smith and the Clowns. "Don't You Just Know It."  Ace. 1958.

     Of all the nonsense lyrics to gabba-garble their way up the charts in the 1950s, “Don’t You Just Know It” takes the honor of being the wildest. Backed by a band of professional transvestite musicians, Smith’s New Orleans piano sounded like he was artfully dancing upon the instrument rather than using his hands. But it’s the gloriously psychotic call and response between the uncredited female singer and the rest of the Clowns that really heats up the infectious contagion. “Gooba gooba gooba GOO-BAH!” she screams at one point, as if imparting the secret to life. The Clowns respond like any good flock and repeat in kind.

The Students. "I'm So Young." Note. 1958.

     Not much is known of this 1958 doo-wop group except that the leader’s name was Prez Tyus and that they were from Steubenville, Ohio. The repressed hysterics of this lament are far less incidental than such trivia.

The Impalas. "Sorry (I Ran All the Way Home)." Cub. 1959.

     While not everything on Rhino Records’ Doo-Wop Box is actually doo-wop, there is so much good on their 101-song treasury that a person might come to believe that the only genuine way to bribe one’s way into heaven is with that package. The great bird groups are there (Ravens, Crows, Willows, Orioles, Flamingos, Penguins, Wrens, and if Spaniels are bird dogs, they’re here too), as are the car groups (El Dorados, Cadillacs, Capris, Edsels, and of course the Inpalas). Tony Carlucci, Lenny Renda and Richard Wagner teamed with Joe Frazier on this great 1959 genuine doo-wop moment, one of those all too rare records that threatens to explode at any second and then is over, begging to be played again.

Marcels. "Blue Moon." Colpix. 1961.

     Named after their lead singer’s hairstyle, Pittsburgh’s own Marcels took a good show tune from the 1930s and added bahm ba-ba bahm and dang da dang dong to “Blue Moon,” lined it with doo-wop harmony and sped it up considerably, making this the most commercially successful doo-wop song of all time. Give or take the tune’s escalating and descending melody, it is Cornelius Harp’s frustrated effort to communicate in the nonsense language only understood by teenagers and rock critics that keeps people coming back.

Randy and the Rainbows. "Denise." Rust. 1963.

     At a time when it seemed like every female mentioned in a hit record was named Mary, Sue, or Donna, the verisimilitude of “Denise” in a pop song truly hit hoe, or at least next door. And while no one in this group had the chops of Dion and/or The Belmonts, this neo-doo-wop quintet blended some two-four drumming (the only discernible instrument) with raving “Scooby-doo” fill-in nonsense lyrics, all of which pushed singer Dominick Safuto’s desperate falsetto to the forefront. If any of them could have rhymed “Dawn-esse” with anything, this tune would perhaps have the clout of its cousins.

The “5” Royales.

"Think."

"Dedicated to the One I Love."

“Tell Me You Care.”

"Baby, Don't Do It."

"Slummer the Slum."

"Help Me Somebody."

"Crazy Crazy Crazy."

"Monkey Hips and Rice."

"Too much Lovin'."

"Laundromat Blues."

All released on King Records.

     “Dedicated to the One I Love” bounds from an exploding nova with the infinitely wise jump blues authority of lead singer Johnny Tanner. Group commandant Lowman Pauling co-wrote the song and his back alley Chicago swamp knife fight guitar injects much-needed antagonism. Meanwhile, “Think” takes us by surprise like a prison shiv. As with all the Royales’ best songs, this one features the dual raw leads of Johnny and Eugene Tanner, linked by the reverb single-string guitar sandblasting of Mr. Pauling. And to emphasize the breadth of their skill, “Baby, Don’t Do It” sheds the usual Gospel vocal arrangement and reworks the sound into a Charlie Parker jazz attack.

     One of the best and most sophisticated, i.e., modern sounding, R&B groups of all time, Lowman Pauling, Charlie Ferguson, Obediah Carter, and Johnny and Eugene Tanner burned down the farm repeatedly between the mid-1940s and the 1960s. “Dedicated to the One I Love” has never been done better and neither has their version of “Think.” “Baby, Don’t Do It” and “Slummer the Slum” tore up the race charts but failed to go pop, which was everyone’s loss.

     It should be noted that the song “Dedicated” suffers in cover versions by The Shirelles and Mamas and Papas, both of whom robbed the essential power of Johnny Tanner’s dramatic lead introduction. When Tanner begins with “This is dedicated—to the one I love!” he jumps out with the sonic equivalent of a slap to the face. Together, these songs will take you out of the church and into the heart of a black Cincinnati night.[ii]

Devotions. "Rip Van Winkle." 1964.

     Still a working unit as of 2003, the Devotions are a vocal harmony group from Queens and the Bronx. Their covers of songs by more prominent doo-wop groups of the early 1960s gave no clue that they would ever release this, one of the wildest takes on the Washington Irving story ever imagined. Possessed helium giggles, bowling alley sound effects, crazed falsetto singing, and a bumpy midnight ride after a twenty-year snooze: it helps if you’ve never heard of the title character.

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[i] Jerry and Mike’s Greatest Hits: A partial list of Leiber and Stoller’s Finest Writing and Production Credits.

"Along Came Jones" The Coasters

“(You’re So Square) Baby I Don’t Care” Elvis Presley; Joni Mitchell

"Bulldog" The Shangri-Las

"Down Home Girl" The Rolling Stones

“Down in Mexico” The Coasters

"Drip Drop" The Drifters

"Flesh, Blood and Bones" Little Esther

“Gypsy” Ben E. King

“Heavenly Blues” King Curtis

“Hound Dog” Big Mama Thorton; Elvis Presley

“I Remember” Peggy Lee

"Jailhouse Rock" Elvis Presley

"Kansas City" Wilbert Harrison

"King Creole" Elvis Presley

“Love Potion #9” The Clovers; The Coasters

"On Broadway" The Drifters

"Past, Present and Future" The Shangri-Las

"Poison Ivy" The Coasters

"Searchin'" The Coasters

“Stand By Me” Ben E. King

“There Goes My Baby” The Drifters

“Young Blood” The Coasters

[ii] Perhaps the best story of The “5” Royales appears in a book called Stranded: Rock and Roll for a Desert Island, edited by Greil Marcus. The story in question is called “Dedicated to You” and is written by Ed Ward.

THE PLAYLIST 2 & 3

Solo By Myself: Male Soul Singers

     Atlantic Records thrived on an attitude of experimentation within a framework of self-discipline. Founding brothers Ahmet and Neshui Ertegun willed into existence the first independent label whose very lifeblood surged for the sole purpose of fertilizing an environment in which the best of all music would flourish. The Erteguns and financier Herb Abramson launched their enterprise in 1947. As studious jazz hounds, the brothers recognized that great music required more than a great band and a great singer. The people behind the microphone contributed just as much—and often more—than the more visible artists whose names appeared on the finished products. So Ahmet was moderately delighted to have the singers Ruth Brown, Joe Turner and “Stick” McGhee on his roster. He was outstandingly delighted to have producer Jerry Wexler, engineer Tom Dowd, and arranger Jesse Stone. Alone and together, these three men, along with Ahmet’s quirky knack for recognizing marketable songs (and a business savvy second to no one’s), polished and grooved out a Latin dance-based, saxophone-driven sound that influenced the next decade-and –a-half of R&B and soul artists. Through sheer will and drive these impresarios created some of the most endearing and moving music of all time.

     While the Erteguns were signing their first acts, McMinnville, Tennessee’s own Randy Wood noticed that the electrical appliance store he owned and operated never seemed to have any of the records his customers wanted. What they wanted was rhythm and blues. The manufacturers and distributors of R&B knew they had a market; they just didn’t know how to get to that market. Wood expanded his store first into a mail order house, then converted it into a full time record store, and once he could no longer keep up with the demand, he launched his own label. He called it Dot. Soon discs by Ivory Joe Hunter, Brownie McGhee, and Shorty Long would display the Dot label.

     Dot was instrumental, as it were, in fomenting a trend that took the meat from a lot of music originating on its own label. In the early 1950s, three main types of radio programming existed: pop (which meant strictly white songs for white listeners), country music (still marketed for whites, but considered less refined than the pop stations), and rhythm and blues (aimed squarely at the black market, at least until disc jockey Alan Freed aimed it at everybody). Recognizing the profit potential in the pop market, Wood began recording cover versions of R&B acts using squeaky-clean nonentities such as Pat Boone and Billy Vaughn. So, for instance, Imperial Records would record Fats Domino’s version of “Ain’t That a Shame,” which played heavily on the R&B station, and Dot would redo the song for Pat Boone and release it as “Isn’t That a Shame.” But the best artistic decisions don’t always (if ever) happen in the boardroom. The label’s Nashville representative liked the sound of a young Arthur Alexander and signed him to work with producer Rick Hall. The label’s heritage to soul music was firmly in place.

     Cover songs were nothing new to Hugo Peritti and Luigi Creatore, two record producers who entered the business making stars out of people such as Mercury Records’ Georgia Gibbs, the queen of covers. Hugo and Luigi, as they remain known, used their earnings to produce easy-listening hits for Perry Como. But their supreme contribution to soul music came from their work with a young Sam Cooke, fresh from his Gospel days with the Soul Stirrers. The producers yearned to stay with a formula they understood: slick slop for goyem. But Cooke’s magic emerged in spite of their efforts to soften his edges. The result was a no-compromise combination for RCA that remains among the most passionate soul works ever waxed.

     Thanks to the pioneering work of these labels and producers, the foundation existed for the likes of Bobby Bland, Solomon Burke, Ray Charles and others to scale down the often ornate and lush arrangements while adding grit and husk to their own sound, thereby shifting the sound of R&B into a far more dance-oriented music that still retained the earliest jubilee effects of Gospel.

Ray Charles. Ray Charles Live! Atlantic. 1973.

     Before Ray Charles became a narcissistic, jingoistic pander to the worst aspects of the national character (and not coincidentally a recipient of Pepsi’s largesse), he earned his living as a big deal blues hound whose sped-up salties, deeply incandescent vocals and innovative piano figures made his disquieting physical jerks and spins acceptable to whites. He was, deservedly, the best-selling black performer of the pre-Motown1960s. Live!, which gives great moments from 1958 and 1959 (just when his career was crossing over and taking off), offers the playful, the serene, the caustic and bullying, the upbeat and the borderline psychotic. With two great versions of  "The Right Time," the gloriously agonized "Drown in my Own Tears" and the show-stopping interplay between Charles and the Rayettes on  "Wha'd I Say" the others stand out effortlessly and with grandeur. Music theorists may emphasize tension and release; Ray Charles the practitioner elicited a tension so pleasurable, the release was unnecessary. 

Bobby “Blue” Bland. The Best of Bobby Bland. MCA. 1974.

     To be smooth and to shimmy-grind at the same time, and to do both well is a rare thing. But “Blue” has been doing both extremely well since the late 1950s. He hasn’t had much pop success, but he sure do sound good, especially on  "I Pity the Fool,"  "Turn on Your Love Light" and "Farther on up the Road." The drums and trumpets on the latter song, for example, create an incredibly seductive tension between one another. Ta-daw tuh-da-taw tee-dah! scream the horns. The drummer takes his cue and rattles off the percussive opposites just as Bland sneaks in with the words “Somebody’s gonna hurt you like you hurt me,” as smooth and angry a moan as ever was recorded. The key to his artistic success is his ongoing ability to let the listener hear bitterness, tragedy and occasional rage behind the audial mask of total self-control.

Jackie Wilson. The Jackie Wilson Story. Epic. 1983.

     Everyone from Elvis Presley and Van Morrison to Chrissie Hynde has played homage to Wilson, an appropriate state of affairs given the strength of the man’s work (at least the work captured on this album) and the horrible, lingering debilitation that spent nearly ten years in causing Wilson’s death. But in his life there were orchestras happening in the high notes he reached on "Higher and Higher." Scaled-down symphonies duck-walked through "Reet Petite": and "Doggin' Around" and especially "That's Why." Most collections overachieve (after all, Jackie Wilson released ninety-nine singles and thirty albums, not counting posthumous issues) and include far too much of his overly polished work that reeks of someone trying too hard to go showbiz, sort of a black Bobby Darin, if you will. This is the ultimate, spared-down dream collection. 

Brook Benton.  "Rainy Night in Georgia." Atlantic. 1959.

     Tony Joe White, whose only other claim to recognition was in singing his own “Polk Salad Annie,” wrote this perfect mood piece for Brook Benton, whose only other claim to recognition was in writing “A Lover’s Question” for Clyde McPhatter.

Sam Cooke

"You Send Me."

"Only Sixteen."

"Wonderful World."

"Summertime."

"Chain Gang."

"Cupid."

"Twistin' the Night Away."

"Having a Party."

"Bring It on Home to Me."

"Another Saturday Night."

"Shake."

"A Change is Gonna Come."

All released on RCA.

     What we have here is a young man who had not only been raised singing in the church; he had become the star of the show with his intensity of spirit in the outstanding Gospel group, The Soul Stirrers. By secularizing (some said betraying) that talent, Sam Cooke moved into the ionosphere with the transcendent “You Send Me.” Never all that far from the showbiz brigands, he continued to record standards such as “Summertime” (done as well as could be, except for Billy Stewart’s superior version), and the topical, though questionable tribute to the Cha Cha. His passion, phrasing, range and specific sound influenced Rod Stewart, Graham Parker, Van Morrison and John Lennon, among others. “Bring It On Hone to Me” is his best song, particularly due to the call and response “yeahs” he does with Lou Rawls.

Arthur Alexander.

"Anna (Go to Him)." Dot. 1962.

"Soldiers of Love." Dot. 1962.

     Most Beatles fans are aware that the Fab Four covered Alexander’s remarkably fine “Anna.” Fewer may know that they also recorded (but while still a legally recording entity did not release)his other soul single, “Soldiers of Love,” a fact made significant because of the way they point up the R&B roots of The Beatles early recordings. In the original versions by Arthur Alexander, both songs croak with a portliness, yet moan with frailty the way few others could, a feat made all the more remarkable considering that he recorded these for a label best known for its soulless cover versions. Johnny Rivers, among lesser talents, learned country-soul phrasing here. “June,” as friends called Arthur, was the first artist to record at Rick Hall’s Fame Studios in Muscle Shoals, Alabama. The money Hall earned from those early recordings enabled him to improve the technical quality of his operations, which in turn gave him the opportunity to record dozens of first-time artists, including a then-young and timid Aretha Franklin.

Solomon Burke. "Everybody Needs Somebody to Love." Atlantic. 1964.

     Anyone holding Barry White in esteem as a good singer will turn stiff as a rocket and passionate as a puma after hearing just the first few seconds of this song. Burke was, however, as shameless as Barry White.

     Burke’s considerable girth was used neither as humor nor as salacious entrée. It simply provided his voice with a powerful resonance. He didn’t sing words; he sang syllables: “Ev er ee bod dee (bu-bum bu-bum) needs sum bod dee.” He didn’t pander. He convinced us we were every bit as lonely and desperate as he claimed to be. Without saying it, the attitude of his voice declared that he had been to the mountaintop, that he had looked over at all his yearning throngs of children, and that they had cried out, begging for the answer. “You people want to know if it’s gonna be alright? Reverend Solomon is here to tell you people it’s gonna be all-right.”

Ben E. King. Ben E. King’s Greatest Hits. Atco. 1964.

     As a member of one incarnation of The Drifters, King sang lead on what many people consider to be the first soul song, “There Goes My Baby.” He achieved even hotter success on his own with priceless times like "I Who Have Nothing,"  "Don't Play That Song" (also well done by Aretha Franklin), "Spanish Harlem" (ditto), and the beatific "Stand By Me." The latter song, with its cricket punctuation and open road at midnight ambience, brings up from a deepness beyond the singer’s testicles a bargain on a parallel with the kind we might make with God when we are so desperate that nothing else can protect us. In the first verse, King surrenders with something beyond humility to powers greater than himself (be it the force of friendship, the draw of romance, or deal-making with a Deity). Then in the final verse, he makes it clear that the gate to this relationship swings both ways. “If the sky that we look upon should crumble and fall/Or the mountains should tumble to the sea/I won’t be afraid/No I won’t shed a tear/Not as long. . . ” He comes back in the chorus with the clincher: “Whenever you’re in trouble you can stand by me!” Trouble or not, who could refuse such an offer?

Al Green.

"Tired of Being Alone."

"Call Me."

"I'm Still in Love with You."

"Love and Happiness."

"Let's Stay Together."

"I Can't Get Next to You."

"Look What You Done for Me."

All released on Hi Records.

     The Reverend Al Green is a modern anomaly: an R&B wonder who made it big in the secular world, took his earnings and went back to the church. Like a soaring and raspy-voiced Sam Cooke, Green seduced in every vocal and musical nuance, bleeding proudly in “Tired of Being Alone,” pleading loudly in “Let’s Stay Together,” and even outdoing the Temptations with his version of “I Can’t Get Next to You,” as secularly celebratory a song as ever hit the charts. His other hits rely a bit more on the singer than the song, but one could substitute the Lord for the Girl and the tunes would still be revelatory. In “Let’s Stay Together,” Green sings of his commitment to a woman with the same emotional tenor many Christians use to describe the sensation of being saved. “Call Me” even has the studio equivalent of an Amen Choir humming in full support, devotedly waiting for their time to respond to the Reverend’s call. If anyone ever learned his trade from the angels, it was this man.

Chapter Three

Girls Can Do What the Boys Do: Female Soul Singers Go It Alone

     With sweat beading up from the roots to the tips of their hair, their eyes focused on a single spot beyond the recording studio, tight neck muscles cascading along their throats, and with nothing to lose except their will to live, these women dragged Gospel music licking and screaming into the secular world. From lives rife with hard times in Newark, Memphis, Tidewater, Chicago and other blurs in between, where the church provided the only legitimate solace, to the smoky jazz rooms where even the best Charlie Parker sound-alike couldn’t compete with the laughter of drunks at the bar, the earliest and best female soul singers awakened within themselves the original pain that their spirituality had so successfully anesthetized. It was scandalous, it was temptation personified, and the best of it was very, very good.

Faye Adams. "Shake a Hand." Herald. 1953.

     There may be more than one reason why this song isn’t supposed to be here. For one thing, it’s early. For another, a lot of knowledgeable folks have argued that it isn’t rock ‘n’ roll. It is, however, beyond any doubt, either Gospel, R&B, pop, or a strong candidate for the first soul song. The Gospel claim is the most tenuous. Adams packed rawness beneath her pristine delivery, a serrated edge that gleamed as it froze listeners to their own thoughts. The R&B tag is nearly as hard to justify because, while the rhythms are right, the production mutes the punch and dulls the impact, letting the singer’s pitch suggest its own beat. Such an approach allows the listener to connect with Adams more directly. Unfortunately for the singer’s financial considerations, her sultriness and the phrasing that elevated it from the music’s mediocrity conveyed a decided blackness that queered the song with pop radio. And while “Shake a Hand” clearly does hold fragments of each of these genres, it is the way Adams shrugs off her flirtations with timidity that edges the song over into the soul domain, a world that did not properly exist until this song defined it.

Ruth Brown.

"Mama He treats Your Daughter Mean." Atlantic. 1956.

Blues on Broadway. Fantasy. 1989.

     Blanche Calloway, sister of Cab, introduced Ruth Brown to Herb Abramson and Ahmet Ertegun. Hot off the success of Stick McGhee’s “Drinkin’ Wine Spoo-Dee-O-Dee,” the Atlantic Records team was eager to record Brown. Like jazz vocal stylist Dinah Washington before her, Ruth Brown started singing when she was old enough to vocalize, first in churches and later in nightclubs. Encouraged by a job offer with Lucky Millinder’s band, an abrupt firing by that temperamental bandleader left the singer to the tender mercies of Blanche, who brought her to Atlantic.

     At this time rock ‘n’ roll was largely unknown and rhythm and blues was music considered by the white establishment to be for blacks only, not unlike certain restrooms and drinking fountains. But Abramson and Ertegun did not intend for things to remain that way.

     Ahmet Ertegun had contacted Herb Abramson back in 1947, suggesting that a good way to stay out of the army and avoid work would be to form their own independent record company. Atlantic’s first hit, as mentioned, was “Drinkin’ Wine.” While the two executives sat around wondering what would happen next, Blanche came in the door with Ruth Brown. Since the two executives were jazz fanatics, they gave her a great pick up band. Her first recording, “So Long,” featured Eddie Condon and Sid Catlett. The song itself wasn’t a risk, though it did contain elements of both blues and pop. “Mama He Treats Your Daughter Mean” was a much better recording—perky, possessed and driven. Brown doesn’t display a great vocal range but she sure makes the most of what she has. “Mama,” she sings, and her voice tightens just the way a frustrated nineteen-year-old’s would in that situation. “He treats your daughter mean”: drums and piano pound together in a perfect twelve bar blues at twice the normal pace. “He’s the meeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee-nest man I’ve ever seen!” The top of the vocal is so shrill it’s tempting to check windows for cracks, but the bottom growls out a sense of security, of confidence—it’s the part of her voice she inherited from her maternal parent.

     The Broadway recording, from late in her career, is occasionally campy but mostly bops and swings. By the time she reaches the song about not being able to break dance, it’s obvious that such theatrics are unnecessary for someone who’s grinded with such vocal gusto for so long.

LaVern Baker and the Glides. "Jim Dandy." Atlantic. 1957.

     LaVern Baker possessed so much sex appeal, she could simply look with small interest at a man and the night would be over before it began. Musically, she tended more toward the sing-songy novelty numbers of which “Jim Dandy” remains among the more memorable. Nevertheless, she could not quite shake that ability to stir up the loins of her audience. Even as she squeaks about Jim Dandy swimming the seas, rescuing mermaid queens, and essentially showing himself to be Superman’s better, an indefinable husk envelops her pitch and—however breathless she should be after reciting the litany of feats—she doesn’t even need to inhale to start all over again. Now that’s intimidating.

Barbara Lynn. "You'll Lose a Good Thing." Jamie. 1962.

     It’s a dark room. A bored crowd buzzes listless and tired. Without fanfare a golden ring of light slaps the face of the curtain—it hardly interrupts the crawl of half-words and coughs nattering throughout the room. From offstage the singer glides across the platform to that golden ring, snaps her fingers once, softly, and the insect sounds fussing through the audience are crushed by the tender swat of the horn puffing behind her. She stares through the darkness beneath weighty eyelashes. The smoky saxophone and barely audible rattling percussion taps out her cue and she moves down into the crowd, just like the featured entertainer in a John Ford western. The audience is at sudden attention, but they remain unconvinced—until she sings. Port Arthur’s finest vocalist hangs the notes out across their tables, begging one and all to raise their hands and seize them. As they do indeed reach for the full effect, she bends those same notes just beyond their reach, reminding the onlookers that nothing they have ever experienced has prepared them for this exquisite torture. The truth of the title engulfs the patrons, one and all, and as the song fades, her image dims to translucence and is gone. No one can even think to demand an encore.

Barbara Mason. "Yes I'm Ready." Arctic. 1965.

     This hard-breathing Philadelphia songstress consciously expressed her sex appeal on any number of soul singles from the mid-1960s through the early 1980s. However, this initial abandonment of innocence finds her young voice with more dimensions of expression than any of her other presumably more sophisticated releases. Listening to Mason today, it is easy to write her off as a pleasant anachronism because in this, her only substantial hit, she seemed totally committed to serving her man. But upon closer listening to the sultry confidence in her delivery, it’s impossible to dispute the idea that while she was admittedly “ready—to learn,” she was more than capable of teaching the object of her affections to please her as well.

Shirley Ellis. "The Name Game." Congress. 1965.

     This song’s popularity came from singer Ellis’ clever ability to put any listener’s name in a song and make it rhyme with the banana-nana-bo fee fi fo lyrical gyrations. So even if your name was Kzlytcietz, Ellis could whip you up into a frenzy of nonsense syllables sure to delight anyone self-assured enough to create their own brand of hip. Anyone stuck in a car for three hours listening to their kids finagle this song across the back seat will be forgiven for changing stations.

Barbara Lewis. "Make Me Your Baby." Atlantic. 1965. Baby, I’m Yours. Atlantic. 1966.

     Fantastically smooth R&B songstress from Detroit who ran ballads across her tongue the way a child does a Red Hot candy. “Hello Stranger,” “Baby, I’m Yours” and “Make Me Your Baby” were her biggest hits, and deservedly so. One of the key elements of soul music lies in the ability of its practitioners to emote vulnerability with voices that imply a sudden sense off all-encompassing rapture has seized them. If they don’t get it right, this time, this one and only time, they may never get another chance. This overriding hunger consumes Lewis. She is so certain of the power that her hunger possesses, she relays it with a passionate somnambulism.[i]

Koko Taylor. "Wang Dang Doodle." Checker. 1966.

     Koko’s version of the Willie Dixon song is a good contender for one of the most dangerous recordings ever sung by a woman. The cast of characters she invites to the bash suggests it might be a good idea to pack protection: Automatic Slim, Razor-Totin’ Jim, Butcher Knife Cuttin’ Annie, Fast Talkin’ Fannie—and that’s just in the first verse! What does Taylor have in mind? Amidst the ominous piano trills and Willie Dixon’s chants, she announces they’re gonna romp and stomp til midnight and fuss and fight til daylight. It’s really just a song about pitching yet another wild party, but Taylor shouts it with such conviction you’d swear they all plan on burning down the factory because the bosses rescinded the union contract. Either way, there won’t be much left of the building once that party’s over, at least not if the sax player has anything to say about it.

Barbara Acklin. "Love makes a Woman." Brunswick. 1968.

     Chicago native Acklin was an R&B singer as far back as 1964, and she even recorded some fine duets with Gene “Duke of Earl” Chandler. Her biggest accomplishment, however, was as the singer of “Love Makes a Woman,” which she co-wrote with Chi-Lites lead singer Eugene Record. Here she sounds like exactly what she way: a background singer who expended herself on this one opportunity to shine.

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[i] Barbara Lewis, a soothing yet invigorating singer, was one of Atlantic Records least valued yet unfathomably amazing talents. So was producer (and sometimes composer) Bert Berns, who had enough sense to make “Make Me Your Baby” everything it could be. But that was nothing new to Berns. He produced “Under the Boardwalk” for The Drifters, “Brown Eyed Girl” for Van Morrison and “Everybody Needs Somebody to Love” for Solomon Burke. If that is not enough pop and soul credibility, he also wrote “Twist and Shout” for the Isley Brothers and composed and produced “Here Comes the Night” for Them, a band featuring a young Van Morrison. Of course, one listen to Lewis’ “Make Me Your Baby” and the falsity of the title is apparent. No one who sounds this alive would ever have to plead. But she does. She pleads with only the scarcest of restraint. She wants to give herself over and be remade in the process. The bass line contrapunctual pattern against her vocal confuses the issue, because it adds a richness that—once again—makes the argument that she needs anyone seem absurd.