Hi All,

Over the years, I have picked up records on Le Cam, Soft Records and Charay Records, all labels owned by Major Bill Smith out of Dallas, Texas. There are some great Northern Soul tracks, funk tracks, soul ballads, etc., which leads me to my question...

Is the ownership of the tapes murky? I'd love to see some of these tracks compiled!

Thanks, everyone!

Hi All,

Over the years, I have picked up records on Le Cam, Soft Records and Charay Records, all labels owned by Major Bill Smith out of Dallas, Texas. There are some great Northern Soul tracks, funk tracks, soul ballads, etc., which leads me to my question...

Is the ownership of the tapes murky? I'd love to see some of these tracks compiled!

Thanks, everyone!

Have you the Victor Johnson 45' ?

Hi All,

Over the years, I have picked up records on Le Cam, Soft Records and Charay Records, all labels owned by Major Bill Smith out of Dallas, Texas. There are some great Northern Soul tracks, funk tracks, soul ballads, etc., which leads me to my question...

Is the ownership of the tapes murky? I'd love to see some of these tracks compiled!

Thanks, everyone!

I don't know how he released so many records and different versions of things personally. I thought the Major was based in Forth Worth wasn't he? I seem to remember Brad from Burnely having contact with him in the mid 70's. There must be a story there, i.e. was he recording local talent? Who distributed his records? Did any of 'em actually sell? How many versions of "Soul Symphony" are there? Etc, etc, etc.

Sounds up Numero's street. Likewise a comp of all the Oscar Perry releases out of Texas too......

Ian D

Is the ownership of the tapes murky? I'd love to see some of these tracks compiled!

There were a few vinyl albums in the mid-80's released on Charly and licensed direct from Major Bill Smith.

Agree that a CD or two (or three!) would be an interesting project, as like Ian says there are so many alternate takes of this and that..a discographers nightmare!

Here's a scan of rather nice 1st issue of the Sons of Moses classic stomping piano-driven instrumental...awesome played loud:

Ian,

Yes, the label was based out of Fort Worth, Texas. The only reason I'm aware of Major Bill Smith's labels is because I bought a collection of 45s out of Texas that had some (but not a lot) of soul 45s on Charay. The Maj also had a few other labels such as Soft Records and Le Cam (and possibly others). Some of the pairings on those releases are dead strange. There was a release on Le Cam where the A side is a soul funk track, while the flip is some spoken word track about Elvis.

The plot thickens!

Hi everyone,

After doing a Google search, I found this rather interesting discussion on Soulful Detroit regarding these labels:

https://faac.us/adf/messages/150056/151437.html?1187197236

It sounds like Ace released some of the Maj's garage releases on his labels and licensed them from him, and when he died, they've been trying to work with the family.

Ace came very close to buying just the MBS catalogues about a decade ago, but the whole lot ended up being sold to a music publisher who subsequently sold on the masters without any knowledge of Ace's prior involvement.

We are now trying to work with the company that bought the repertoire to put some packages together...

Tony,

Excellent news! Please keep up updated!

Didn't he also get a lot of his artists to record a version of "Under The Pines"?

Can ANYONE help me with this question? I have the 2 Unity records on lecam. John anderson told me they had ANOTHER 45 on ANOTHER local ft worth label that he used to have copies of but didn't remember what it was. I know there were a lot of groups called "unity" but not other ft. worth ones that I know of. Does anyone know what John was talking about. DOES ANYONE HAVE ONE THEY CAN SELL ME? Thanks.

A few queries on the Soft label, i notice that Willie Hobbs & The Sleepless Knights Orch released "Under The Pines" three times on the same cat number 1018, but had three different flips! two questions.

1. Is "Under The Pines".any good ?

2. One of the flips is Cry, Cry, Cry, is this another version of the Bobby Bland release?

Lastly i notice in 1980 a group called "The Baritone Dwarfs" released a single on Soft called "Bomb Iran" (?).....this is listed in the same discography......... I haven't got a question on that, but i imagine it's below average.................

A few queries on the Soft label, i notice that Willie Hobbs & The Sleepless Knights Orch released "Under The Pines" three times on the same cat number 1018, but had three different flips! two questions.

1. Is "Under The Pines".any good ?

2. One of the flips is Cry, Cry, Cry, is this another version of the Bobby Bland release?

Lastly i notice in 1980 a group called "The Baritone Dwarfs" released a single on Soft called "Bomb Iran" (?).....this is listed in the same discography......... I haven't got a question on that, but i imagine it's below average.................

Brett,

Personally I think its a cracking double sider and yes its a cover of Blands Cry, Cry, Cry.

There was some dodgy numbering there.

PM me your email address....

Cheers,

John