Agentsmith

top memory bro, albrighton...what a venue, times right and corey glover massive manor tune as well, must mention that to steve jeffries...river deep was also a big torch play as well....so, lp value whilst we're at it please?

paul i know its a view of the casino under sad circumstances, but in the bigger scheme of things, these are important & valuable documents..its really amazing to see these pictures for the first time, let alone not knowing that they existed...well done mate.. ive said before that a concise photographic almanac is a must as a preservative for future generations who wont just be influenced by the music, but can get the feel for the legend by what they view and a better understanding of why so many hold it in such high esteem...regardless of its less than complimentary discription over the years.

shouldn't that be pisstime forum?

wooosh!...well done swifty gettin that clip up and i didnt realise the other tune was on it as well....WE ARE THE MODS!!!

lp only and its les mccann ( oops!) same guy responsible for river deep, mountain high on mercury... strange little girl - fine crossover tune!

prices please for "ZOLA" in its formats e.g. canyon lp, canyon 7" and french vogue 7"

you're right carl, its so all about a lasting memorial, these people have given their everything in the belief that someone will listen and millions have down the decades. to us in the u.k., its never been moreso....motown has been the most powerful virtuoso in the orchestral diversity of northern soul.

ed bishop - call me & willie mitchell, almost anything by him, all saxaphone driven records

correct, wasnt sure if he was still around, but thats put that to bed. just echoing back to pete's response..its seems incomprehendible that the combined efforts of a group of people, should reveal a lifetime's work, the worth of which, is priceless and they've nothing to show for it...i dont know if they were living literally hand to mouth on a daily basis, or rather their families were but what they were taking home really couldn't have been up to much. whilst i know that these guys did have formal education in one capacity or the other, they turned up in detroit from different corners of the usa, looking for work with music in their blood and gordy happened to be in the right place at the right time. i guess bank accounts simply didnt enter the equasion or they'd never heard of them...putting money away for a rainy day was probably irrelevant, compared to just existing and they had the distraction of living the dream, whatever they kept in their pockets was digested, drunk or gambled away during their years on the road and in house. its taken the realisation of folk who have no connection with them whatsoever, other than their mutual love of the music, to make sure they're not forgotten and in doing so, are giving the immediate relatives the opportunity to see closure on a sad set of circumstances.

YOU'RE SO ANORAK.......YOU DONT EVEN KNOW IT!! :lol:

i think you illustrate a point that is quite easy to overlook, that all we see isnt necessarily what we get. in the 60's big bucks to these menial employees ( what im stressing here is that although they were seen as important for their creativity, when it came to the monetary pecking order they were "just staff" ) was probably nickels and dimes in a sense. some of the guys as is documented, left this earthly life in the wake of drug dependancy, they couldn't see their way through to making enough money to make a living and provide properly for their kin...or booze and their almost destitute, tragic demise is, to us a travesty...all the time we've been hero worshipping them, it aint paying the bills...but worse, their paymaster wasnt doing anything to rectify their situation. its a symptom all too familiar today, working long hours for comparitively low wages and little prospect of alleviating the fragile position. you know, the featured article intimates that there are any number of well known luminaries buried in the cemetary in unmarked graves, so its not an exageration to say that the relatives must be in such a poor financial circumstance, that it borders on humiliation that they cannot provide a lasting dignity for the deceased. when you consider that of the genuine original members, only three survive ( i believe ) jack ashford, bob babbit & and joe messina, it must seem inconsequential to them to be recieving royalties in their latter years when the truth of the matter is, they were deprived of it for decades,...and even then will the royalties be enough to support their next of kin?, whose going to be responsible for brokering a deal and for how many years would a deal be payable for?. they couldn't make it in life and in death, for their loved one's, its still a struggle to get recognition and be heard.

i think we'd all agree on that one pete,.....but to all intents & purposes it appears from personal affirmations by various members and accounts from the now, numerous publications that all point to the same thing,...that berry gordy was more frugal about the distribution of what makes people wealthy, that we could possibly ever imagine. there is no more stark contrast to the success that he achieved, than how he squeezed every last drop of genius from the obvious talent he had at his disposal. the lucrative arm, as cody black illustrated, most definitely avoided the musicians, despite the fear that they would take their wares elsewhere. this is where the biopic laid bare the brutal truth, that this organisation was literally running itself on a shoestring to get a hit. undoubtedly, gordy came out of it extremely wealthy, but at the expense and sadly, in some cases, the deprivation of the very people he relied on to create his sound and his fortune. afterall, lets remember...these were still BLACK AFRO-AMERICANS....even the artists who made it, had a long hard struggle what with racial segregation and the likes...only when motown was accepted as a middle of the road concept, did the outside world, in essence, turn a blind eye to the colour issue, opting to embrace the "in sound",...but it was still pasting over the inherent cracks. meantime the musicians were even worse off, bottom of the breadline. to everyone's detriment, the finishing line, that ray of hope, a paycheck for all the endeavour , came too late for all. i guess their greatest contentment was in the fact that alan slutsky stuck it out for 14 years to drag their story up by its bootlaces, culminating in a film, in recognition of their unselfish commitment to the cause, void of the remuneration they so richly deserved.

just been browsing the article on here and the attached tags from detroit.....its a sad but all too familiar representation of the day and age we live in, that a person who has given so much during the course of their lives, so unselfishly, can be interred with no visible testimony to his/her worth. such is the case in hand of uriel jones. now that tangible requisite is within reach and rightly & justly so,...our icons shouldn't be consigned to insignificance, when their work is done. here, is a man , quite without us realising for so many years, who has interpreted our musical soundtrack...his trademark now, instantly recognisable as we have come to read and learn. some of us were fortunate to see and hear the man perform some five years ago now...for me, those occasions were in manchester....a more fitting epicentre for he and his colleagues to demonstrate their unique sound, there couldn't have been. the funk brothers, were the exponents of the motown brand, that berry gordy could not do without. anyone with an ounce of common sense would understand what he meant by "its whats in the grooves that counts", for these guys gave his vision its originality. uriel jones was a kindred spirit amongst his worldly wise brotherhood, the foundations of heaven are shakin' under the strain of his incessant beats...of that there is no doubt, but he must be looking down with some trepidation that the human race can mark his passing with a resigned air of inevitability, not even a query as to who's going to pick up the tab for a slab of marble with his name carved on it. well, fortunately for this good earth, there are still some samaritans amongst us and the wrong is being put right, hopefully, others,...who doubtless are also our hero's, will recieve the same just recognition, eventually, the cemetary may become a focal point for pilgrims, much in the same way as detroit's historical motown museum. lets ALWAYS remember exactly WHAT motown is about and who the people were behind THE SOUND,...we owe it to them.

i was talking to richard about it last night, he didnt recall it at first but when i mentioned andy rix, he seemed to agree...know andy's on here, perhaps he can shed some light on the subject?

sorry ian, thought i had it but unfortunately not, somebody out there will almost certainly be able to help you out. just checked the 2005 cd comp of dee dee sharp, 24 track but not there and neither is comin home baby which i find strange.

blow me down mate, i thought you were the oracle! i think i may have it on cd somewhere, not sure...if i can find it ill run a copy off, either way i'll let you know. im pretty sure that ive heard it played out at tsop some years ago or possibly by andy rix or rob thomas at one of the ritz all-nighters. to be absolutely honest i dont think it matches up to doris's interpretation and im not knocking dee dee,...she has a tremendous voice amongst her own attributes but in the golden age, doris troy carried a powerful range and yes, its one of my all-time favourite spine tinglers!. you know ian, despite the fact it didnt make the charts in 65, i distinctly remember it got national airplay...yes, i know that means before radio 1 and im not talking about the broadcasts from caroline or luxembourg, though doubtless, they would have championed this.

that seems odd ian, especially as he later married dee dee sharp,who, as you know, also cut an unreleased version of the record and still to this day has never seen a cd or vinyl release....perhaps he ACTUALLY wrote it for ms. sharp prior to their relationship?,but it didnt work out, so they gave it to doris?.

for a convoluted affair, it is about informative, enlightening and refreshing as it gets!, the knowledge kenny displays, rolls off his tongue like the slick philadelphian production line that was...a thoroughly entertaining and invocative slice of nostalgia...congratulations to all concerned.

I THINK IVE POINTED THIS OUT BEFORE....but for the uninitiated...my theory is, that even in 1971 a white singer was probably told that "BETCHA BY GOLLY WOW" as a song title wasn't suitable and sounded too black....turn-a-blind-eye-discreet-racism perhaps?...or maybe not. either way the title changed. perhaps it was changed from the former for THE STYLISTICS debut single, ironically in the same year. funny isnt it?, they had a smash hit and ms. stevens offering sank without trace, yet it remains that thom bell was at the helm and you can see, hear & feel his stamp of authority on the disc...so much so that he conspired to record several other uptempo b-sides on other artists including philly's first super group, THE DELFONICS...check out "LOOKING UP IS DOWN".

seems like her warner bros output is sensible acumen for anyone wanting to put them into a crossover set... not a bad track amongst them including "TAKE IT FROM ME" which has that trademark philadelphian soundtrack and, of course...."MOVE ME NO MOUNTAIN"..LLLLLUUUUUUURRRRRRVVVVVE THAT BAAAAAARRRRRYYYYYY WHITE TUNE!!!

yes thats me......i could do with the syrup!! :D

hats off to you again len, a well documented post,...conjugated to tax the brain slightly less, unlike yours truely who insists on eulogizing in a 605-page-hardback-novel-stylee !!....one can quite easily see the effort that has been infused over a short period of time, and as you expressed, attention to detail is elaine's persona. I REALLY DONT SEE THE MEDIA ATTEMPTING TO MAKE A MOCKERY OF US A SECOND TIME, BECAUSE THEY HAVE LEARNED THAT WE ARE A BREED OF HUMAN WHO DID NOT "CREATE" THIS MUSIC,...unlike every other genre that has come and gone since....WE TOOK A FORM OF MUSIC THAT WAS ALREADY THERE FOR SEVERAL GENERATIONS, AND ELEVATED IT TO A LEVEL WHERE IT WAS IN THE SPOTLIGHT AND WE WERE ABLE TO SAY..HERE'S A STYLE OF MUSIC THAT WE THINK IS GREAT,..that has attitude, that is never -say -die, that you can dress, act & dance sensible to and we believe, will be around as long as god's dog...and as time has drifted on the intelligencia frequenting the newsrooms, have little by little, gained appreciation of our mantra...to such an extent that the vast catalogue we have all helped to compile has gained favour with advertising and the likes. posts on here amongst our own breatheren pay testament to that fact...because shrewd intellectuals who, previously had kept their closet under wraps, have gained leeway and expressed their idealogical nous using northern soul music to promote their products in a more orthodox and acceptable manner. i cant honestly say that i have noticed anything inept in press articles in any of the broadsheets or tabloids for at least.....an epoch!...and thats a long long time.

cheers pete, i would like that very much and no, it wasn't mine which begs the question..so, it WAS bryn's copy... if so, did his sister sell his record collection after his untimely death because he would still have been in posession of this?. also, he had the ORIGINAL cut of footsie, WITHOUT soussan's crowd & horns remix...i believe he definitely bought them off max, circa 75/76 along with a host of things like popcorn wylie, porgy & monarchs, obrey wilson etc. i distinctly remember richard playing the belles band at wigan, so he must also have posessed an acetate. bit of a grail this one, pete, much in the same as the detroit rythym section is...would love that as well.....preferably on discs!!

pete, cast your mind back, the late bryn lane had the original studio cut of dont pretend on an acetate, think he bought it off max when he first sold up in the mid-70's.....thats a funny one isnt it?, never heard it since, apart from the soussan remix and whatever happened to bryn's record collection?...he had loads of originals.

same old thing - olympics ( fred smith orch )