Johndelve

Good luck with this, Mark. It looks most interesting and you are featuring some books I didn't know..all best John.

I would also add that neither the recent Pied Piper CD from Ace nor the Soul Harmony Book from a few years back - and also McGrath's Soul Discography - makes any mention of anyone called Carnell Silver Butler in The Dynamics. I have no doubt he sings with a current line-up of The Dynamics but he certainly didn't seem to in the sixties and seventies.....

Harmon Bethea's "Got To Find A Sweet Name" and Ralph Graham's "Differently "would be nice.

I can't add anything about record shops north of Watford, but here's something I wrote for a Brighton website back in 2008 which will hopefully be of interest to some. https://www.mybrightonandhove.org.uk/category_id__1743.aspx?path=

A superb CD. One of the best ever put out by Numero. Highly recommended.

Very good and enjoyable book, with some excellent stories and interesting photos, and pleasing to see that the typos that slightly spoilt Detroit'67 have been sorted out.

I love these old regional soul charts, particularly interesting to see singles that did well locally, but never hit the national charts. e.g George & Gwen (McCrae), Holly Maxwell, Mary Holmes, Sam Baker, Johnny Williams and quite a few more from the one above.

Excellent LPs IMO. Enjoying them. And I counted about 8 unreleased tracks across the four volumes....the two Carl Hall tracks they claim are unreleased is wrong though as both were included on a CD on him recently...

A marvellous CD, one of the best this year, I'll wager. 'BIYMG' IS brilliant and "Don't Leave Me Baby" is just as good.

Fine review, fine release. Astonishing that so much good stuff lay unreleased for so long.

It's another lovely CD from what has been a great series and a fair few on here are new to me which is always a bonus.

Steve, thanks very much for kind words. It is much appreciated. I like the binding, too. I was determined to give this my best shot and I didn't want to stint on quality. Unless sales are absolutely disastrous - hopefully not of course - there will definitely be a Volume 2, and indeed, I am a little way along with it. Cheers John

Yes, Mike, absolutely right and my new top 100 in the book reflects this approach. The top 25 list I also include is one that DOES deal with retrospective sets as the likes of "Bill Coday" and "The Artistry of Brenda Holloway" are just too good to not deserve a highlight of their own....

Yes and no, is the answer to your question. I have deliberately avoided "various artists" compilations as I'm already conscious of the size and weight of book and this would have just pushed up time taken to write it, weight, cost, etc. etc up even further given there are so many various artists comps out there. However, on the other hand, I do refer to Big 16 as it is obviously not a various artists collection. But I don't talk about it much as I have chosen to spend more time on "albums as albums" rather than "greatest hits " and "best ofs"..

Thanks again, Mike. Yes, a top 100 list is included ( but one only taken from artists covered within this book, ie only from those from A - K. I've also done a top 25 'best of' list. The book hopefully make sit clear why I've done two lists... As I say in my preface, I've got fed up of waiting for someone else to do it, so did it myself !

Thanks Roburt and Mike. Roburt, very happy to send a copy for review. What address shall I send it to please ? Mike, yes, physically available right now. I've already shipped out a number of books... I think Volume 2 is probably at least a couple of years away. Volume 1 has 408 pages and 435,000 words. It took me three years. But I've learned a lot in that time about how to write a book and the countless hours i wasted by needless editing will save me loads and loads of time for Volume 2 , and I've already started it, but I don't expect it to take three years this time around. . John

I'm not sure if this is the right place within Soul Source to announce this or not. If not, apologies, but I did want to make people aware of a book I have just written and had published which is now available for sale. I'm attaching a handful of pictures which should give a bit more information but as I have said in my product description on Amazon : This is the definitive attempt in book form to list and discuss thousands of soul LPs that were issued in the vinyl era. Volume 1 addresses album releases by hundreds of artists from the famous - James Brown, Marvin Gaye and Aretha Franklin - to the much more obscure - John Byrd, Harmon Bethea and Geater Davis. Beautifully produced in hardback, including 108 colour photographs of LP covers, Spinning Around : The History Of The Soul LP, Volume 1 : A - K, is the first truly comprehensive study of this topic ever undertaken anywhere in the world. My plan was to announce this in conjunction with its availability on Amazon but trying to get it ready for sale there is proving to be a nightmare although I'm sure it will be sorted out soon. An alternative means of sale is simply for anyone who is interested in buying a copy to contact me directly at john.lias@googlemail.com and I can ship copies directly. Price is £20 + £2.80 postage anywhere in UK. Same selling price holds true for other parts of the world but postage is going to be expensive, I'm afraid, as book is heavy. But it really looks great, If I say so myself. Thanks John Lias

Nice article, Heikki, though I must admit I was flabbergasted to hear Phillip say that Huey Meaux was one of the nicest people he ever knew !

"Sweethearts Of Sigma" - Barbara Ingram, Evette Benton and Carla Benson.

I would agree with Sean and suspect it is Ian's mind playing tricks. No other copies of an original ever been seen by anyone in forty years. I know i had in my own mind pictures of LPs from four decades ago that I could swear I once saw but now realise do not exist.

And I've just dug it out for first time in years. In case anyone is interested here's what I said : "Until recently records like this did not really exist. The issue of a 15 year old, previously unreleased session of southern soul from an almost completely unknown female singer would have been commercial suicide. Hopefully, the recent re-appraisal of this type of music will mean that it won't be just such a disaster. It might even do Sandra Wright some good too. The sleeve notes by the producer of the session, David Johnson, relate how Sandra became the unwitting victim of his decision to pact the project with Stax at exactly the time they were going out of business and the whole episode so traumatised her that she refused to record anything else for some considerable time. Which is our loss, despite her style being fixed somewhere between Aretha Franklin and Shirley Brown, and thus prohibiting unrestricted eulogy, this is a most appealing record. Most of the tracks have actually been recorded by other artists: "The Sha-La Bandit" and "I'm Not Strong Enough " both appeared on Aretha's "With Everything I Feel In Me" LP from 1975 where they were presumably dispatched with all speed as soon as the fate of Sandra's versions became apparent. Wright's reading, by the way, is the real peach here - a gorgeous southern soul classic. Even the tracks that have not been recorded elsewhere have a familiarity not borne out of contempt but from the timeless echoes of the southern soul art. "Wounded Woman", for example, sounds much like Bettye Swann's "Make Me Yours", but is none the worse for it. One final point, Demon, is that far from being an "unknown" song, "I'll See You Through" is actually Luther Ingram's "I'll Be Your Shelter". It won't worry the late Raymond Jackson (one of the three composers) but I'm not sure how Homer Banks and Carl Hampton will feel. "

I reviewed The Demon release in Black Echoes at the time it came out. Very favourably, I might add.

I reviewed The Demon release in Black Echoes at the time it came out. Very favourably, I might add.

Indeed, he's great. His two sides on The Temptations One By One CD from 1996, I Feel Like Givin' Up and Once You Had A Heart, are brilliant.