Ady Croasdell

I just spoke with John Poole and he assures me it's a family type entertainment Motown weekend thing that some of the advertising staff got a bit mixed up with. It's not aimed at the Northern crowd in any way. So goodnight to this one!

The Camber Sands 50s weekender was/is brilliant and has been established for many years but I did hear that even they didn't find the Pontins management easy to deal with.

Of course that's the exact weekend we're on, but since past dealings with Pontins have been so rubbish, I'm not exactly reeling.

Very sad. He also did some great tracks with Bessie Banks and Herman Kelley in the early 70s.

Or even Wylie/Hester! It is 'round midnight. I dig Banks/May Banks/Kelley Shirley Matthews songs produced by Fred Smith arr by James Carmichael And Bacharach/David take some beating.

But as a promoter you should try and get the music to your audience in the best possible quality and bootlegs are lower quality than originals.

It's a reissue Pete, you'll have to come down on that. I put YFMH as 3rd track on Kent's Magic Touch CD over 10 years ago so it's not that much of a secret!

Not neccesarily, I think any estimates from pressing plants are a bit spurious and aren't great indicators as to rarity. Someone might press 5000 and trash 4900 of them a couple of years later. 2500 is quite a high first run, it was probably just a number Eddie remembered from one period in the label's history.

I don't think so Eddie probably made a general remark about the 2500 of each, I think it was with reference to a certain batch, not all of them.

I wasn't sure when he died, Andy only found out from Harry this week so I left it open. I don't think we've had a tribute to him on here before have we? It was just a way of paying my respects.

I think the theme is ballads you can dance to as opposed to ballads like Big Maybelle. Some of them may well be mid tempo but they must have that ballad feel. It's a hard one to lay down rules for, not that we particularly need them; any suggestions though? I always associate these with that big NYC early 60s sound, LA did plenty too but not so many out of Detroit or Chicago or even Philly.

Andy Rix just passed on this sad news from Harry Bass. Eddie had been living in South Africa for several years. He was most famous on our scene for his magnificent Shrine record label that created some of the most exciting, and beautiful soul music of the 1960s. Shrine has become a byword for top quality rare soul and is now spoken of in awe and affection. I had the honour of releasing the first Shrine recordings in the UK in the mid 80s with two LPs and two singles on the Horace's label. Andy Rix researched and recorded for posterity the story of the Washington DC label that featured Ray Pollard, Eddie Daye, The Cautions, The Cairos, Shirley Edwards, The Prophets and JD Bryant among its releases. This detailed history was documented in the booklets to the two volumes of Kent CDs "Shrine: The Rarest Soul Label". The quality and rarity of the Shrine records combined to make the label a Northern Soul collector's Holy Grail. Eddie had been a successful writer, producer and artist in the late 50s and early 60s working with Barbara Lewis, The Matadors and Marie Knight. He later wrote for Motown contributing 'Don't Bring Back Memories' for the Four Tops and composed the great Northern Soul classic 'The La Rue' for Lada Edmund Jr. He married Berry Gordy's ex-wife Raynoma in the early 60s and she was a cornerstone of his Shrine operation being a very musically talented lady. Harry Bass was Eddie's right-hand man throughout most of his musical endeavours and contributed songs and business skills to the label. In later years he was re-married Motown singer Barbara Randolph who pre-deceased him by about ten years. He was a warm talented man who was very happy that his commercially unsuccessful work at Shrine was eventually appreciated overseas.

The Scene DJ is Brian Peters who may well be down there on Saturday, if you're ever in the same room together I'll introduce you.

Update on this Saturdays 100 Club - 19 Jan 2008 View full article

I always thought it was the epitome of it, admittedly it has a good dance beat but I think that's the point. I remember thinking "Great you can play this style of record now and it won't clear the floor". It's that NYC slightly Latin feel a la Drifters and Ben E King that it has. Faye Crawford is more of a pure ballad which I also loved and was refreshing to hear out. Rod's right about Roger Banks he went for it big time and must have launched quite a few on the scene. Guy put them in as occasional spins but Roger probably played a full hour some nights!

What was the Chris Clarke, a live appearance in the living room?

Great show about a top geezer and one of the few acts to properly get what Northern is about.

The 100 Club was probably associated with Beat Ballads as much as anyone and the one that got me on that track was Tommy Navarro, I think Guy played the first and I had the second. After that there were a lot but Johnny Maestro, Kurt Harris, Chuck's Loneliness and Millionaire, Annabelle Fox, Trends Not Too Old To Cry, were the big ones for me down there.

New York Soul Serenade on Kent is a good one.

If there weren't any other dodgy presses in the lot I would tend to agree with you. Ady

That's funny

ta Linda x

Hi Steve, I've got one and I reckon it's a bit pony so i wouldn't say more than £20-£30.

Please Ady