Robbk

I have the patch from Wigan's last all-nighter. But it's sewed onto my skiing jacket.

I think you are confusing Carol Hughes' release on Corby Records, which was distributed by Vault Records. I lived in L.A. at the time of the releases of both records. I never saw, nor heard of The Wooden Nickles' cuts being on Corby Records, nor any third label. Vault and Omen were the only issues I have ever seen. And I've looked through literally millions of 45s, and hundreds of thousands of them in L.A. between 1965 and 1972.

Hey! Don't you call me no CRACKER!!! I was a GHET-TO CHILE!

This isn't Northern Soul, but, back in the early sixties, when I was regularly checking out thrift stores, I used to pull out heavy bookshelves and standing wall cabinets, to see if any 45s or LPs had fallen in the crack behind when record scroungers had been shuffling them quickly. This was a wise decision, as IF any WERE behind, they'd have gone through most of their time there unseen by the many collectors who had been to the store in between my regular visits and seen any records before me. To my surprise, I found an extremely rare 45 from 1952 by The Royals on Okeh Records, which had reached a high of $1,000 US in the 1990s (the height of the R&B collector record values, (before we oldies started dying off in droves). I also found a couple Five Keys' 45s on Aladdin along with an Aladdins on Aladdin (all from 1954) in on thrift shop find, in that same manner, as well as an original Five Royales 1953 LP on Apollo Records. Those were more unexpected finds than any Northern Soul I ever found. Of course I spent a lot of energy moving bookshelves and finding nothing but yellow thick-waxed kiddie records on hundreds of other days (but that helped build my arm strength, needed for crosschecking opponents in my ice hockey games 2 times a week. Of course, I did find thousands of Northern Soul 45s from 1962-1972. But most of the most valuable of those were not special records to me any more than the other Soul records I was finding. On the contrary. I would guess that most of the biggest, most valuable NS 45s I found were, on average, far less liked by me than the average record in my collection (Soul or other style (e.g. Jazz, Blues, R&B/DooWop ballads, Gospel).

I've always liked this one:

We had a discussion about this on Soulful Detroit. With Gary Pipkin and Brice Coefield involved. and the longtime rumour that Dorothy Berry, Oma Heard, and Zelpha Crawford were the group members, I think that that rumour might be the real answer. But, I don't think anyone ever got a definitive answer from parties involved. There also was a rumour that the members were The Holloway sisters and Pat Hunt with Hunt on lead. But I've ruled out the latter, given that Pat's voice isn't even close to The Wooden Nickle's lead singer's, and Brenda's and Patrice's voices are unique and easily recognisable, and, thus, are clearly not on that recording.

Interesting that Wand is listed among Gusto's record labels, but NOT Scepter. Both Musicor and Dynamo are, and for King, they list King, Queen, Federal and DeLuxe. So, why would Scepter not be included together with Wand? Both were owned by Florence Greenberg (as was Flomar Music). Did her heirs sell off the subsidiary to one purchaser and the flagship label to another, or not sell it off?

That is NOT a '60s Motown recording. It is NOT as old as even the early 1970s. It sounds like an '80s or '90s recording (reminiscent of Ian Levine's recordings, but more simple, and not very good quality.

Betty Jean Taylor, Linda Hayles, and Tamala Lewis were The Parlettes at one time, but that group was around for several years and had a couple other members at other times, while they only had that one record (as far as I know) as The Pets released on Carnival. The Parlettes were the female group in George Clinton's show, analogous to The Parliaments as his show's male group. Tamala Lewis, Clinton's one-time ladyfriend, was in that group throughout their existence. I'm pretty sure that The Parlettes on Jubilee had no connection with Clinton or his Parlettes group. I'm sure that some big Clinton Funk fans can fill us in on The Parlettes' history.

Neither is rare. I think I've seen more of the plain pink than the multi-coloured. But, as we all know, most of the records I've seen were observed by me between 1953 and 1972, and most in USA and Canada. Many were seen within o to 5 years after their release, and before some of them were melted down or lost to mold. And how many I saw in North America, including in people's collections, has no bearing upon how many found their way to The Northern Soul community in The UK.

If you're going to use those 2 criteria, rather than trying to make a convert, I'd use the Margaret Whiting "stomper" "Nothing Lasts Forever", that was played on the scene as an example to show that "Northern Soul" was a completely different movement from that of the development of Soul music and the communities it "served" in USA, as Margaret Whiting was a lily-white MOR singer known as a purveyor of milque-toast watered down"Pop music" that was to vocal music as Muzak (elevator music) is to The Funk Brothers.

I saw a few of them back in the day. But they were fairly rare.

Nor have I.

Hi Ady, I sent a scan of The Steelers' in a Soul-Source PM to you. It should be high enough res.

Well, if so, they did a lousy job on the new words and the singing style. It sounds like one of those run-of-the-mill New York 1964-65 songs. They should have made it a Detroit Motown-style vocal.

Here are some label scans:

The Hit Pack were, apparently, Staunton and Walker's group - a vehicle to get their songs out on the market, perhaps as a "demo" to be picked up by a major artist to garner more sales for the writing team (Robert Staunton and Robert Walker). It was a combination of a house band and singers. On Colpix in New York, in 1964, the singers were Caucasian (I think the musicians were mixed). They worked with Artie Kornfeld, making Pop music for the teen/surf cult. After Staunton and Walker were signed by Berry Gordy to Motown (1965-66), Staunton and Walker used Black singers, with Robert Dobyne (of Chicago) on lead (and, I believe, with Staunton and Walker, themselves, as the background singers), and they worked in Detroit. After some months with Motown, Staunton and Walker had a big problem with Gordy on producer credits, and Gordy and Dobyne had a falling out, as well. So their tenure at Motown was a lot shorter than it might have been.

I don't know what mix of them made their way to The UK from the ;70s till now. But, when the record was out, I saw many, many more white DJ issues than orange store stockers. The latter was always very rare.

Interesting that that background sounds so very like "The Touch of Venus". Is it the actual same backing tracks? Can we see a scan of the Linette Darnell release. Was it also produced by Edd Cobb? Did Jobete Music get publishing credit?

I can tell that the background singers or group on that song are different from those Juggy Murry used on "You're Absolutely Right". Murry used a lot of different background singers on his various Sue, Symbol, Crackerjack, Eastern, Broadway, Juggy and other productions in the '60s. So, it would be very difficult to "guess" who they were. Anyway have actual information on who they were? Does any source exist documenting Murry's recording sessions (studio used, producers, arrangers, background singers, etc.)?

The only one I knew of was "I Misjudged You". Where can we hear "You're Not Hurting Her (You're Hurting Me)"?

I think the blue is the older.