Jimmy Reed Junior just died 10 months ago. What a sweet voice. Great background group. How come Mercury didn't release at least the traditional contract's second 45 on him? He was so good, I'd have guessed he'd have had a long, successful career. Certainly, he must have recorded some other songs. Great mid-'60s Chicago Sound to a tee! Written by Terry Callier, Produced by Al Smith, arranged by Phil Wright, all VJ and Chess people. I've been trying to find other cuts by him since I found this in a Chicago record shop bargain bin or thrift shop in 1967, and seen nothing more.

I know he spent a lot of years as a bass guitarist playing on his father's tour. But he should have had a big singing career of his own. Does anybody here know about any other releases he had, and more about his career story?

Edited Monday at 18:322 days by Robbk
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Ruppli's Mercury discography includes two unissued songs by Jimmy Reed Jr. from the same session:

1-40318 I'm in love with you

1-40321 Only in time

In addition, Jimmy Reed Jr. filed copyrights on two other songs at the same time the two songs on the Mercury 45 had copyright filings. There were:

Heartaches And Troubles

Got Nowhere To Go (co-written by Al Smith; different from the Johnson / Collier song)

Perhaps someone with access to Ruppli's Mercury discography can check to see if there was another recording session.

The voice on the unreleased acetates sounds like him, and so does the guitar playing. I wonder if the background singers were The Dells. They worked with Al Smith at VJ for many years, and also with him at Chess (which is where they all were during the time Jimmy's Mercury record was made). Mercury likely used Chess' studio to record the Mercury record. The background singers don't sound as "full-sounding" on this as they do on some of The Dells' VJ/Vivid and Chess releases, but their harmony is good, and they sound like The Dells in a few places.

What a shame that Mercury didn't release the second 45 on Jimmy. I guess the fact that it didn't get any marketing push, which was their fault, doomed the record to almost no sales. To be honest, I don't remember hearing it on Chicago radio stations, or seeing it in the new/current section of local record shops. I'd doubt if it sold more than a couple hundred at full price, if that, and can't remember if I found it in a thrift shop or in a record shop bargain bin. It certainly was good enough to get a few test plays by local DJs.

Jimmy was good enough to have a good career as a Soul singer. I guess Jimmy was satisfied just playing in his father's band, touring, and when home (was it Detroit or Chicago?) also moonlighting playing bass guitar on a lot of local recording sessions. Personally, knowing that he worked on a fair amount of sessions in Chicago around that time, my guess is that he resided there, rather than Detroit, where he grew up.

His style on "I Ain't Goin' Nowhere" is great, and right up my alley (one of the best of the pure mid-' 60s Chicago Sound). It's certainly very memorable.

Edited Monday at 18:342 days by Robbk

17 hours ago, jukeboxgeorge said:

In addition, Jimmy Reed Jr. filed copyrights on two other songs at the same time the two songs on the Mercury 45 had copyright filings. There were:

Heartaches And Troubles

Got Nowhere To Go (co-written by Al Smith; different from the Johnson / Collier song)

Must be these two, which were included on his fathers' "The New Jimmy Reed Album" from 1967:

As Robb & Sebastian have said, Jimmie Jr was an integral part of his dad's blues band & Snr was signed to ABC Bluesway. Jr was cutting tracks behind his dad for ABC in 1967.

Jimmy Snr had 2 albums out on ABC Bluesway (& 2 x 45 + a 45 on EXODUS) and Jimmie Jr featured heavily on all these tracks (as one of his dad's backing musicians). The 2nd ABC album was SOULIN (however just about all the tracks are just Jimmy's usual brand of blues, no real SOUL on show at all) ... ...

Edited Tuesday at 09:252 days by Roburt

20 hours ago, jukeboxgeorge said:

Ruppli's Mercury discography includes two unissued songs by Jimmy Reed Jr. from the same session:

1-40318 I'm in love with you

1-40321 Only in time

I noticed that two acetates were sold in January 2020 on ebay containing crude demo versions of these four songs:

https://gripsweat.com/item/383351099875/unknown-i-am-in-love-with-you-on-acetate-soul-demo-45-vg-hear

https://gripsweat.com/item/362869417702/unknown-i-aint-going-nowhere-on-acetate-soul-demo-45-vg-hear

I have uploaded the demo versions to YouTube for posterity's sake:

It is also interesting to note that Leroy Barbour cut a version of "I Ain't Going Nowhere" in 1975 on the Frontiersman label, entirely omitting details of the original songwriters. Produced by Phillip Mitchell.

Just noticed that Leroy Barbour even copyrighted the song as his own!

The original copyright info (and label info) miscredits Terrence "Terry" Callier as Terrance Collier.

Spelling Terry Callier's name correctly has seemed a hard task for many in the US ...

in the UK, we were a little better ...

To further complicate matters over this song ... BMI / ASCAP have just these 2 entries ...

there's lots more of course, but for other songs with the same title ... none registered to Johnson / Callier.

Edited Tuesday at 14:111 day by Roburt

Barbour's version is clearly the same exact song as Jimmy's. So Callier should be listed as the writer.

It is strange nothing happened with Jimmy Reed Jr.'s career. Versions of this press release were in Billboard, Cashbox and Record World in March of 1967. After such a big announcement , you would have thought more would have went into the promotion of this artist.

1 hour ago, The Yank said:

It is strange nothing happened with Jimmy Reed Jr.'s career. Versions of this press release were in Billboard, Cashbox and Record World in March of 1967. After such a big announcement , you would have thought more would have went into the promotion of this artist.

Mercury had several very good Soul Music producers and lots of good artists, but their promotional people didn't have the right connections in The Soul field, so they couldn't really compete for radio airplay, or push from their distributors. Their executives were businessmen first, who happened to work for a national record company, and didn't have experience in The Soul Music industry. They had no knowledge of that industry happenings "on the ground". So they didn't hire the right mid-level executives, who had connections with The Black community. So, they couldn't find the best promoters, with the strongest connections to the people who got things done.

Mercury records that were excellently written , produced, and sung, on the whole, (Andre Williams, Al Smith, Gamble & Huff, Robert Bateman) (except for superstars like Jerry Butler) only reached moderate chart level and sales, while Chess', VJ's(until they moved to LA), Motown's, and Atlantic's best releases became regional or national hits. Most of Mercury's average quality Soul releases hardly produced any sales, and were lucky to get airplay, while even the average productions from Soul Music labels, who had the better connections, got modest-to moderate airplay, and charted locally, and some regionally. The only Mercury Soul records that sold well were the very well-known singers and groups that had had long, successful careers before Mercury enticed them away from record companies with good promotion in The Soul field, such as Jerry Butler from VJ. Promotional blurbs in the trade papers and magazines wasn't nearly as important as the right promoters with the best connections to the better national and regional distributors, and connections to the big city and other influential DJs.

And Jimmy Jr. being satisfied to play in his father's band, and Jimmy Senior having such a long career, didn't help entice Jimmy Jr. to put his heart and soul into trying to make it as a Soul singer. IF VJ had stayed solvent and well-run (as in 1963 and '64), and Jimmy Sr. had stayed with them, they might have given lots of push to his first record, produced a better quality 2nd records, both of which would have charted, and sold well at list throughout The Midwest, if not nationally. And in that case, Jimmy Jr. could have gotten a lot of gigs locally, and in The Upper Midwest. That probably would have pushed him towards sticking with it much longer, and maybe for a full solo career. Sometimes a small event is a turning point in life.

17 hours ago, Roburt said:

To further complicate matters over this song ... BMI / ASCAP have just these 2 entries ...

there's lots more of course, but for other songs with the same title ... none registered to Johnson / Callier.

Around 25 years ago I had a email chat with Leroy and he claimed he wrote the song and the suggestion was that songwriting credits were often stolen back then. Seemed a decent straight up guy from what I remember certainly he was happy that the record was being played over here..

I agree with Robb about the majors not having the people / expertise to market soul records to US black audiences.

The likes of Mercury / Fontana / Phillips + RCA + Uni / MCA + Columbia (apart from their Okeh division) + Warners + (to a slightly lesser degree) Capitol never had the right promotion guys to get to R&B radio jocks. AND It was R&B radio stns that broke just about all soul 45 hits.

ABC did much better with black audiences & Liberty / Minit / Imperial were a bit better but I'm unsure if you'd class them as being in the same league as Mercury, RCA & the like back then.

The likes of Chess, Motown, Atlantic, Stax, Amy / Mala / Bell, Modern & many more did know what they were doing when it came to getting airplay on their soul singles.

The Flamingos were a big group of long standing by the mid 60's but Phillips (part of Mercury) only really managed to get chart action on their "Boogaloo Party" 45 and then it got nearly as much airplay on US Top 40 stns as on R&B stns. About the best it performed on an R&B stn was up in Cleveland ..

Edited yesterday at 07:401 day by Roburt