10 Tunes that create memories

I was asked to create a post featuring 10 Soul tunes that had significant memories for me over the years for the "Soul and Rhythm & Blues from the Vaults" on facebook. Here goes.

Joe Tex – Show Me – Dial

As a fresh faced 11-year-old in my first year at secondary school in the summer of 1976, this was a significant record for me in lots of ways. I had been exposed to the usual suspects of soul music via the radio and older siblings, but this had a major impact on me. Lunch break and some of the older boys had a turntable set up in the main area of our schoolhouse and were practising their dance moves. I had heard the term “Northern Soul” but didn’t really appreciate what it really was but what they were doing really fascinated me. Then this record came blasting out of the speaker and life has never been quite the same since. A couple of years later I was taken to “Colman’s”. A small upstairs club in a back street in Nottingham and walking through the door his other big NS track of the time “You Better Believe It Baby” was blasting out. Joe has a lot to answer for!!

Al Kent – The Way You’ve Been Acting lately

There was a guy in school who was about 3 years older than me who lived across the road, and he had a few records which he used to lend me. I would get my keyboard style cassette recorder and lean the microphone toward the speakers on my parents’ radiogram to record them. Major Lance, The Triumphs and the like. I put this 45 on and it just knocked me for six!! I still wonder why a 60s soul record from a place I never visited could stir that much emotion in a young 12–13-year-old kid. Still my all-time favourite NS record of all time and still makes my spine tingle to this day.

Charles Conrad & The Soul Bros. – You Got the Love – Shandy

A real oddball records out of Houston, Texas that I cannot really explain how I like it, but I just do. I was introduced to this 45 in the 80s by Nick Birch on C60 he gave me at the famous Sunday Ukrainian Club nights, and I have loved it ever since. The one thing about this 45 that has always stuck with is that I saw a white promo for sale back in the 90s and missed buying it. I have only ever seen one other copy in that time and that came when I had the chance to go through Greg Surek’s collection and found a copy for $15, which for me was the best find in a huge batch of 45s I bought that day. There was a debate about what is “Rare Soul” lately on some forums. For me rare soul was the obscure and often rare tracks being discovered and played post Wigan at Top of The World and other venues around the country at that time and just genuinely rare 45s that are not necessarily expensive but just incredibly elusive. Now its seemingly just “expensive” records now. For me the white promo copy of this 45 is true rarity and what collecting is all about. That’s Rare Soul.

The Precisions – Instant Heartbreak (Just Add Tears) – (Drew) (Stone)

For me, the precisions could and should have been up there with the Temptations in terms of just perfect male harmony group soul. You cannot really fault any of their releases and any of the unreleased tracks that surfaced, but IMHO this one outshines them all. It seems to have a real melancholy feel to it when you hear the first few bars, but it soon breaks into sheer Detroit brilliance. The usual story of a man scorned by the love of his life and only has tears to add to his heartbreak. With Mike Terry on the credits, you know you are in for a treat before you even hear it for the first time. I remember when they opened their performance at Prestatyn with this track, I stood on a chair next to Tim Ashebende and after the first 30 seconds tears came steaming down my face. A moment I will never, ever forget. Moments like those sometimes feel few and far between, and the fact that this music does that to you just cements your love for it.

Irma Thomas – Ruler of My Heart – Minit

I know some might not agree with me on this, but for me this is my favourite record from “The Soul Queen of New Orleans”. It has a real deep down and dirty sound of the south. Haunting backing vocals with a real mysterious feel to it. Just hits the spot in so many ways.

Moses Dillard & the Tex Town Display - I've Got to Find a Way (To Hide My Hurt) – Curtom

Deep soul at its absolute best. As soon as the track starts you know it’s going to be something rather special. A guy from Greenville, SC, and as a guitarist who also worked out of Muscle Shoals recording on Curtis Mayfield’s Curtom label there are a few influences to be drawn from his wealth of experience, I guess. This self-penned track often gets played on a loop in the record room and I never tire of it.

Darrell Banks – Baby Whatcha Got for Me – Revilot

Again, maybe not everyone will agree on this one but my all-time favourite track by the late great Darrell Eubanks. This flip to the classic 1966 track “Somebody (Somewhere) Needs You” really shows off his talent as a singer and if I had been lucky enough to have heard him perform this live, I would have died on the spot a happy man.

Thomas Cain – Try My Love – Soul Direction

I have a hugely personal connection with this track for so many reasons. Having acquired the acetate of this and other tracks I spent the best part 2 years of searches and phone calls and emails before getting to speak to Thomas about a potential release. After agreeing a deal on the release, I visited him in Nashville and met up with him for lunch to get some signatures.

We met around 12 noon and didn’t leave the restaurant until 4.45pm. He was one of the kindest, funniest and most engaging people I have ever met, and I just hung on his every word. Tales of his time playing and collaborating with Arthur Alexander and tales of playing n clubs around the south were just fantastic. His memory of the tracks was just amazing. He remembered everyone who was in the studio that day and since putting the tracks out he was contacted after 25 years from the studio engineer who still had the master tape of the days’ work so more to come from TC. We have since met up a few times and keep in touch frequently and I consider him a real friend that I am so lucky to know.

The Orlons - Envy (In My Eyes) - Cameo

I cannot explain this record easily, but ever since I first heard it, I always think back to when I first purchased this back in the early 80s from a mail order list via Goldmine Magazine. This 1965 composition has everything I like about female girl group soul. The melody and backing singers make this record for me and still has the ability to entice me onto the dance floor.

O.C. Talbot – Shooting High – (Acetate)

I first heard this track from a Poke sales tape back in the 80s. I missed out on it but never knew who bought it. Turned out some years later that my friend Richard Broughton had it (I had several conversations about the record as he was good friends with Poke, but I couldn’t sing it well enough for him to recognise the track in question) and he told me after I heard it played at a Rock City Soul Night that he had sold it onto Jim Wensiora. I missed it again when he sold up and it went through a couple of hands before finally bagging it for my collection. Originally played as “Cleveland Wilson” this Herb Miller penned track for the Dave Hamilton stable is a little different take from the Kent releases and a slightly unpolished version (which I like better).

His gravely soulful voice pierces through the basic but masterful backing track and vocals to deliver true mid-tempo dynamite. This 45 is what keeps me collecting soul music.