Djmelismo

Hi all! Just uploaded a brand new mix! Alternative ways to access it: Zshare: https://www.zshare.net/audio/180176168e2056bf/ Sharebee: https://sharebee.com/9673bbcc Podomatic: https://melismo.podomatic.com/player/web/20...T02_33_37-07_00 https://melismo.podomatic.com PLAYLIST MIX #9 DARCUS - Your Love (1977) DILLARD & BOYCE - I Feel Your Love (1980) DANTE´S INFERNO - Open Up Your Heart (1979) DETROYT - I Been Wanting You (1984) WAYNE DAVIS - I Like The Things About Me That I Once Despised (1973) DREAMBOY - I Want To Know Your Name (1983) PATTI DREW - In Love Again (1969) DALTON & DUBARRI - Rainbow (1976) THE DIPLOMATS - Last Chance (1993) DEMO-BARRY - Funk (1980) THE DEALERS - This Way (1985) THE DETERMINATIONS - That Ain´t The Way To Love Me (1976) D¡KRASH - Dance With Me (1988) DOUBLE ACTION THEATRE - Good Love (1992) D´BORA - Where Can He Be? (1991) DEF CON 4 - Come To Me (1990) DOMINO THEORY - Where Are You (1990) DAKOTA MOON - Sweet Lady Jane (1998) Mix is about 77 mins. Hope you enjoy the selection... Cheers, Mel

Great, thanks for the info. That´s the one I frequented when I visited (the) London (area) several years ago, glad to learn that it´s still running. It´s the one organized by the guy who runs DT Records, what´s his name again?!?! Cheers, Mel

Hi Barry! Not been on holiday, quite the opposite in fact, I´ve been busy working...LOL... but finally got the opportunity to listen to your latest show. Great selection again, loads of top tracks, this is my top 3: Doc Peabody - Here Without You !Amazing record! There was a thread about it on here about two years ago. Nellie Tiger Travis & Stan Mosley - Who Knows You Bob and The True Hearts - Mansion In The Sky Truly great stuff! Best regards Melismo

Hi Mark! Loving those soulful sounds, in particular: Rufuss feat. Yuanist Woods - This Could Be Love 280 West feat. Diamond Temple - Fly Gabriel Rene - Spirit Terry Hunter feat. Charlotte Smalls - Follow You Chez Damier feat. Leroy Burgess - Your Love (Lifted Me Up) Kenny Bobien - Hiya Luv Thanks for sharing - great selection of tunes. Regards, Melismo

As has been stated before, London record stores may not be ideal for searching for elusive northern soul records, but places such as Soul Brother Records and Crazy Beat are perfect places to find all sorts of modern soul.. and more of course... Some place are cheaper than others, I´ve noticed that during one day in London you could find the same item several times, but at very different prices. Is there still a "black-music-only" record fair in the London area? I remember visiting one of those when I visited London several years ago. Remember picking up some nice stuff by for instance Geater Davis, Randy Brown, Dee Harvey and The Vibrations there. Best, Melismo, Sweden

Yes, that´s the one! Cheers, Melismo

Didn´t see this thread until now. Interestingly, today I listened to several Delegation 45s and LPs + the Denne & Gold album on which they do their own versions of some of those hits. Will perhaps post a clip tomorrow from that Denne & Gold LP, there was one track in particular that I really liked.

Jas, sorry unable to do label scan (maybe someone else can help with that?), but posted the two Al Johnson tunes as Refo-soul clips above. I´m a collector of LPs and I just may have some other things of interest. Just let me know if there is anything in particular that you would like to hear or want more info about, chances are I have many of those Al Johnson items in my collection and would be more than happy to oblige. BTW, I live in Sweden and the Damion & Denita LP used to be very easy to find over here. Loads of cut-outs in circulation and could be obtained extremely cheap. Not that common today though. Those deleted cut-outs were "stolen", nah ""rescued" from the US "trash bins" and shipped to Sweden en masse by two brothers! Those cut-outs, including the Damion & Denita one, are not that easy to find anymore, it has sort of dried up. One of those much-talked-about cut-outs was the very first Luther Vandross LP that he did with the group Luther. There used to be many copies in Sweden, but as time went by most of them were sold to serious record collectors in certain other countries who were prepared to pay a considerable amount of money for that elusive item which turned up at many junk shops and flea markets over here. That one along with most other interesting cut-outs (Dramatics, Rasputin Stash, Betty Wright etc.) has also dried up unfortunately. Hey, pass my regards to Al Johnson please. I´m a big fan of his work!!! All the best Melismo

Jason, just listened to the Damion & Denita LP (Rocket/MCA, 1980), which includes the tracks "Being Alone" and "Where Were We", written and arranged by Al Johnson. I guess you have these tracks already or you want me to post them? The Damion & Denita is kind of obscure, but of course very cheap and easy to find. BTW, Denita is Denita James from Hodges, James, & Smith. But who´s Damion? At first I thought it was Damon Harris, but it can´t be of course?! Regards Melismo

Hi PJ! It´s amazing how many great tunes you manage to cram into those two hours. Thanks for posting audio and tracklist! Great to hear this again: https://www.rudzysrecords.co.uk/1/prod_1110...KE-GENESIS.html Regards Melismo

An upload of the entire show courtesy of Zane Hunter (big up to you Zane for the recording) https://www.megaupload.com/se/?d=4T033X39 Cheers, Mel

Hi Bob! Recently revisited Patti Drew- In Love Again (1969), one of my personal faves. Have downloaded many of your interviews and listen to a couple of them every week! My Patti Drew file was very short, but I suspect my lappy got disconnected from the Internet while downloading, yesterday listened to Channel 3 and Teacher´s Edition, interesting to hear how those groups got their names. So appararently "your" Sounds Of Blackness has no connection with the well-known Minneapolis group Sounds Of Blackness who become huge in the 90´s on the Perspective label, but made their first local recordings already in the early 70´s. Your shows and interviews are very educational! Best regards Melismo

We´re on now! Would be nice if some of you could join us https://rare-rillen.de

Thanks for confirming. "Peaceful" is one of those soul albums that quite a few "beginners" have failed to spot, because there´s no telling from the front cover that it´s "black music", you have to turn the album around to see the pic of Al Johnson... I believe that many of the Japanese reissues were put out in limited quantities and since long deleted fetching large sums of money on the Bay and elsewhere.

Cheers. I´ve received a couple of PMs about the Symba LP from people who want to know if the rest of the LP is that good. Here´s my review track by track: SYMBA - BODY BAIT (Venture, 1980) Side A Body Bait (largely instrumenal disco track, not essential to me) Hey You (really nice soul track, also issued as a 45, and rightly so) You Know I Need You (disco-funk, a bit too catchy for my liking) Go Away Sad Memory (a slowie, doesn´t do much for me I´m afraid, just bores me) Side B Hold On (a nice danceable soul tune with some funk and jazz influences too, released as a 45 - good choice) Can I Get To Know You (the track posted as a Refo-Soul Clip. Timeless soul ballad - love it!!!!) Want My Love (soul-disco, a large portion of the song is made up of a disco-drum break) Time´ll Getcha (funk, ok if you like funk in other words) So for me "Can I Get To Know You", "Hey You" and "Hold On" are the ones worth having. Hope this helps. Best, Melismo

Al Johnson has been involved in many of Tata Vega´s albums. On Givin´ All My Love he is responsible for some of the tracks, however, he is NOT the duet partner on "(I´ve Got My) Second Wind", where instead the male vocals are handled by another great singer - G.C. Cameron! He has also arranged and conducted Tata Vega albums such as Full Speed Ahead, Totally Tata and Try My Love. Sometimes he is credited as Alfred O. Johnson. Cheers, Melismo

Yes, I was just about to say that. He was their manager and was responsible for many of their jazzy and experimental single B-sides! Hope he didn´t beat his kids though as Joe Jackson did when he "educated" his family group. Buster Pearson´s greatest claim to fame (apart from grooming his children into a hit making group) was that he used to be Otis Redding´s guitarist. Mel

Here´s the Al Johnson entry of Toby Walker´s "Soul Walking" site. I am fully aware that these are very basic facts, so you are bound to know all of this by heart, but it´s easy to cut and paste and this is for everyone to read. Toby Walker´s site is brilliant, but sometimes I´ve spotted factual mistakes in some of the artist bios, hopefully not in this one?! al johnson b. Alfred Orlando Johnson, Washington, U.S.A. Al Johnson began his career as lead singer with The Unifics in the mid '60's. In 1968 the group recorded 'Sittin' ln The Court Of Love' for the Kapp label. Singles 'It's A Groovy World' (1969) and 'Got To Get To You' (1970) were released before they switched to the Fountain label for 'Dawn Of A New Day' in 1971. In 1978, Al became part of a group called Positive Change, who released one album on Fortress Records, including 'This Is Where I'll Be (Till You Return)'. Also in 1978, AI recorded his debut solo album 'Peaceful' for the Marina label (including his original version of 'I've Got My Second Wind'), following which he played keyboards on Bobby Thurston's 'You Got What It Takes' and The Main Attraction, and with Gayle Adams on 'Stretchin Out'. The following year he teamed up with Norman Connors to be lead vocalist on the song 'Your Love' for Norman's album 'Invitation'. In 1980, Norman produced AI's CBS album 'Back For More' which included the duet with Jean Carne 'I'm Back For More' and a new version of 'I've Got My Second Wind'. The same year AI sang lead on 'I Don't Need Nobody Else' from a further Norman Connors album 'Take It To The Limit'. AI co-produced tracks with The Whispers on their album 'Love For Love' (1983), sang lead with CJ's Uptown Crew ('Forever On My Mind'), released by Washington Hit Makers in 1990, worked as arranger for Tata Vega, Bloodstone, Evelyn King, Peabo Bryson and Roberta Flack, while also writing 'We Have Love For You' for Deniece Wilillams and 'Trust Me' for Jean Carn. In 1998, after an eighteen year break from solo recording, Johnson returned with the highly regarded, 'My Heart Is An Open Book' for the Committee Records label. Albums: Peaceful (Marina 1978) Back For More (CBS 1980) My Heart Is An Open Book (Committee Records 1998) + MY OWN ADDITIONAL COMMENTS: The album by Positive Change is very rare in its original format, but has been reissued on vinyl. Very low volume on that recording, but otherwise great sound. "Back For More" was reissued in CD format by the Japanese division of the record company. Not sure, but don´t think "Peaceful" got a CD reissue?!

I also have a thing for jazz-funk. However, the problem back in the day was that the jazz purists thought it was too funky (people like Herbie Hancock and others were shunned for going in the direction of pop/funk), whereas some of the die-hard funk fans thought jazz-funk was too jazzy and lightweight, so quite a few people were alienated. But personally I think it´s a great genre and if I weren´t so lazy I could´ve made a very loooooooong list of jazz-funk tunes that I would love to hear played today. Cheers, Melismo

Great group! Hard to list favourites because there are so many. Their biggest commercial success was "I´ll Be The Other Woman". I have their original albums, but most (all?) of them have also been reissued as CDs so have them in that format too. Their brand new album which was released just recently is an ok album, but not on par with the old classics IMHO. I guess the music of Soul Children will be included in some of the Isaac Hayes tributes that are now being broadcast. Cheers, Melismo

Yes, it was a sad day when Ellas Otha Bates aka Bo Diddley passed away just a couple of months ago.

I´ve got the Symba LP, so if you want any more info on that I´ll gladly help. May have an mp3 of a track that I ripped of that album, can post that as a refo-soul clip. The group Symba was from Washington DC and consisted of eight members featuring lead vocalists Gerald Hollan and Cheryl Hawkin. In 1980 they released the album Body Bait and a couple of 45s on Venture Records. Al Johnson was the arranger. BTW, the record cover features a black woman + a white woman + a lion! Best, Melismo

At a record fair I once found a fairly rare 45 on which the former owner had not only written his name in the run out of the record, but also carved into the actual record (the B-side only) with a sharp object (right across the grooves...bu-huh)... "This side sucks!". Well it definitely prevents you from playing that side since it´s seriously scratched/carved in like that...hmmm...

All down to personal opinion of course, we can never "agree". I must confess that I am a Donny Hathaway fanatic. He is my #1 soul brother actually, and my main reason for saying that is because of his VOICE!!! It´s heavenly. Me a fanatic? Yes, one of his albums I have on original vinyl + original cassette + reissue CD + the original poster for the album + all the 45s from that particular album, since I once tried to be a Donny Hathaway completist, but I´ve given up. For instance I do not own the June Conquest 45s, and there are plenty of production work he did that is very obscure which I´ve never considered buying. So just in case you´ve missed it (LOL) - the best soul artist is (IMVHO of course) DONNY HATHAWAY!!! ... and the legacy goes on, his daughers Lalah and Kenya Hathaway sounding just like him... Cheers, Melismo

Dear member PJ4533! I´ve sent you a PM! Great show BTW, enjoyed it immensely. PS. This is a very busy thread...