Door 24 already, another Advent-ure over! It has really flown by this year.
A tradition that has developed here is to play out with a track from the classic Ronettes album A Christmas Gift For You.
All that is left for me to do is to raise a glass and wish you all a very Merry (and safe) Christmas.
Maurice Williams had started his recording career in 1957 as part of the group The Gladiolas (renamed from The Royal Charms as other groups were also using that name) they scored a sizeable R&B hit record straight away with Little Darlin' (Maurice wrote it and, yes, it is that Little Darling). The group morphed into Maurice Williams & The Zodiacs, and through the 60s Maurice released singles with The Zodiacs and also as a solo artist.
It seems we can't escape a Covid Whirlpool at the moment. Incidentally, in 1967 Maurice released a single on the Deesu label, one side of which was Don't Be Half Safe. Could be used as a call to arms for the booster drive, at least to the double shotted. As for those that haven't partaken at all yet, well isn't it about time you did?!
The early 70s was when music first became an essential part of my world, and the wah wah funk of this track places it unmistakably from that era.
Very little is known of Timmy Willis, or Henry Sapp to give him is real name. That information I found in this article which, amongst its many side turns, does a good job of mapping out his singing career, or at least as much of it as anybody knows. I notice he was, for a short time, in a group called The Suspicious Can Openers! (I would love to know how they came up with that name).
This was Timmy Willis' last of six single releases (the B side actually), released late in 1972 in the US and getting a UK release in the Spring of 1973. I guess you would call him another journeyman in the Soul world, but all his singles are worth picking up and I'm looking out for them.
There aren't any track-listings for these shows so I can't tell you which one this came from now. That's a shame because I want to listen to it again. From memory, there were a few tracks like this included in it and playing this one again I now want to take a stab at hunting down physical copies of a few more of them.
This one proved pretty easy to find (not always the case, I can tell you!). It's not expensive in itself, although after factoring in the postage cost it wasn't so cheap. I did have to get a copy from America because it does not generally seem to be in any UK dealers' stock.
This one arrived in its original sleeve, which is in fantastic condition considering its age. It looks great!
Ella Johnson with Buddy Johnson & His Orchestra - Don't Fail Me Baby 1958
Earlier in this series I featured “The New Bloods” covering one of the Wicked one's songs, so here he is covering someone else's song. A mighty fine version that I admit I had not come across before, crazy really as it was recorded at Fame in Muscle Shoals, probably my favourite studio.
(The) Natural Four hailed from Oakland, California and formed around 1967. Their first (or possibly second) 45 was released on the wonderfully named Boola-Boola label in 1969. It is a seriously rare and expensive record nowadays. It is also seriously good.
He tends to be on the lookout for rockabilly, country boppers, loner country, white gospel, that sort of thing – and 78s, but his antennae twitch for soul and garage too (he knows his stuff, turning records for a living). To me it doesn't really matter that his “gold” is typically not aligned to my taste, nor in genres I know much about, it is his unfailing documentation of “the chase” and the occasional thrill that entails that has me completely hooked. All this and Mack is a funny guy and a great raconteur too; and I get to enjoy the sunshine and the off highway open road of the southern USA. Whenever I tire of trawling around the same old chazzas on my patch I know I can happily go virtual digging with Mack.
Anyway, I had my very own Mack Stevens moment (in microcosm) back in late September when in a Bristol suburb chazza I found a copy of a 1961 New York Doo Wop record. You have to agree that doesn't happen every day here in Blighty. A rare find and, although not a valuable one in monetary terms, a find like this is priceless in other ways. How it managed to find its way into a stack of the usual 60s-70s-80s UK pop detritus I have no idea - as is usually the case with finds like this nothing remotely like it was keeping it company.
Doing a bit of research – as you do - The Craftys were better known as The Halos and at one time included JR Bailey in their ranks who went on to release some mighty fine soul 45s and one killer (and rare) album in the 70s.
This is a styrene copy - I hadn't realised styrene was already well established by the early 60s.
