Inspired by Ray Charles' female back-up trio, the Raelettes, Ike Turner created the Ikettes long about 1960. The line-up was ever-changing, mainly because Turner was given to violent fits of rage that few people besides his battered wife would put up with for long. It also didn't help that he was tight-fisted as hell with his employees' money.
By 1962, the Ikettes featured Dolores Johnson (lead), Eloise Hester and Jo Armstead. In January of that year, Ike produced them on his song "I'm Blue," whose mindless but irresistible hook went, "Gong gong gong gong g-g-gong-gong-gong-gong," and had a bunch of "doobie-doobie-doo's" tossed in for good measure. (Eat your heart out, Sinatra!) Turner leased the single to Atco and saw it climb to #17 pop and #3 R&B.
But when the royalty checks came in, the Ikettes found themselves continuing to receive only their regular salaries. Small wonder the Ikettes who went top forty with "Peaches 'n' Cream" in 1965 were an entirely different group! (Those Ikettes didn't stick around long either, not when Ike sent three other singers out on tour as the Ikettes to promote the single.)
At one point there was even a white Ikette--Bonnie Bramlett, later half of Delaney & Bonnie ("Never Ending Song Of Love," 1971). Meanwhile, Dolores Johnson's Ikettes became the Mirettes, who charted in 1968 with a sex-charged cover of Wilson Pickett's "In The Midnight Hour."
SOURCE: Joel Whitburn, ibid; Tina Turner, I, Tina
Curtis Mayfield was justifiably recognized as the pre-eminent talent and one of the principal architects of Windy City Soul. He wrote and sang deeply humanistic songs that represented the highest ideals and aspirations of African-Americans, evoking their pain, struggle and fortitude, and preached that with goodwill, love, pride and self-achievement, they could find a respected role in American society.
With his fellow high school student Jerry Butler, Mayfield (born June 3, 1942) formed the Impressions as a doo-wop quintet in 1957. A year later, their ballad "For Your Precious Love," one of the first true soul records, climbed to #11 pop and #3 R&B. The record's success caused lead singer Butler to go solo, but he remained in touch with Mayfield, who went on to write some of the Ice Man's greatest songs.
By 1961, the Impressions comprised Mayfield, Fred Cash, Sam Gooden, and brothers Arthur and Richard Brooks. That year, they went to New York to record their first song for the ABC-Paramount label, "Gypsy Woman." The evocative, dream-like ballad reached #20 pop and #2 R&B in December of 1961. Despite the subsequent creation of some fine doo-wop and early soul recordings, the Impressions found themselves off the national charts for the next two years, by which time they were reduced to a trio as the Brooks brothers had left.
In the autumn of 1963, the Impressions waxed the song that both changed and defined their sound. Unlike their previous recordings, which featured Mayfield on lead and the rest of the guys doo-wopping it up in the background, "It's All Right" sported tightly-sung unison vocals by all three members. The song also featured blaring horns and a forceful, percussive bottom that lifted its energy level right up into the clouds. "It's All Right" went to #4 pop and #1 R&B, and set the tone for many Impressions songs to follow.
Nineteen-Sixty-Four was an excellent year for the trio. They reached the pop top twenty four times, with "Talking About My Baby," "I'm So Proud," "Keep On Pushing," and "You Must Believe Me." The Impressions entered 1965 in grand style, too, when "Amen" hit #7 pop and #12 R&B.
But the trio's finest hour came later that year, with the gospel-heavy "People Get Ready," the first Impressions record to feature Mayfield's guitar in the break. Amazingly, this lovely ballad did not make the pop top ten, although it gets a whole lot of well-deserved airplay in the '90s.
In 1966, Curtis started his own label, Mayfield Records, and produced a female soul group called the Fascinations. Obviously, that taste of creative autonomy appealed to the man. Two years later, he started a new label, Curtom, and recorded the Impressions on it when their contract with ABC expired.
Mayfield used Curtom as a launching pad to musically express his political and social views. The Impressions' output from 1968-70 included such message-laden songs as "Choice of Colors," "This Is My Country," "Mighty Mighty Spade and Whitey," and "Check Out Your Mind."
When Mayfield went solo in 1970, it was expected that he would become a superstar. But he didn't. Oh, Mayfield had some hits, especially when he scored the 1972 blaxploitation film Superfly, but he achieved nowhere near the amount of artistic and commercial success that he had with the Impressions.
Meanwhile, his former group floundered. It wasn't until 1974 that the Impressions recaptured a taste of their previous success. With new members Reggie Torian and Ralph Johnson, the group, now a quartet, hit #17 pop and #1 R&B with "Finally Got Myself Together (I'm A Changed Man)."
In 1983, Mayfield, Cash, Gooden, and Jerry Butler all reunited for a reunion tour.
On August 14, 1990, Mayfield was at an outdoor concert in Brooklyn when a lighting scaffold fell on him. The tragedy left him permanently paralyzed from the neck down. Eight years later, Mayfield lost a leg to diabetes. But following the advice of his own lyrics, Curtis kept on pushing.
The Impressions were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1991, while Mayfield was inducted as a solo artist eight years later. Unfortunately, Curtis was too ill to attend the induction ceremony. He died on Sunday, Dec. 26, 1999, at the age of 57.
SOURCE: Robert Pruter, Chicago Soul
RECOMMENDED CD: The Very Best of the Impressions
(Rhino)
Luther Ingram was another outstanding soul singer who most pop fans know for only one song.
Born in Jackson, Tennessee, on November 30, 1944, Ingram cut his musical teeth in a family gospel group with his brothers. He first recorded in 1965, for the Smash label. By 1969, he was living in Alton, Illinois, and recording for the KoKo label, which was affiliated with Stax. His first hit, "Pity For The Lonely," reached #39 R&B in the summer of '69.
Three years went by, during which Ingram racked up eight top forty soul hits. One night, he was at the Stax studios and came across a two-year-old reel of tape. It contained an unreleased track, "If Loving You Is Wrong," by the female trio the Emotions. They had sung it uptempo. Ingram took the tape home and played it for his brothers and sister, after which they began to experiment with the song. Ingram remembered Gene Chandler's hit "Man's Temptation," and had his brother Jesse to play scales on a bass line. What they came up with had a distinct gospel feel.
When Ingram felt the song was right, he went to the Muscle Shoals Sound studios in Alabama to record it. KoKo released the single under the title "(If Loving You is Wrong) I Don't Want To Be Right)." It climbed to #3 pop and spent four weeks at #1 R&B. While it was Ingram's only major pop hit, he made the R&B charts eleven more times through 1987.
Luther Ingram succumbed to kidney disease on March 19, 2007. He was 62.
SOURCE: Adam White & Fred Bronson, The Billboard Book of #1 R&B Hits; Joel Whitburn, ibid.
Not to be confused with the white rock trio of the same name, the Intruders were one of the earliest proponents of Philly Soul. They also were the first act ever produced by Kenny Gamble and Leon Huff.
The Intruders formed in 1960 and comprised Sam "Little Sonny" Brown, Eugene "Bird" Dougherty, Phil Terry, and Robert "Big Sonny" Edwards. Their first chart hit, "(We'll Be) United," came out on the Gamble label in 1966. It reached #78 pop and #14 R&B. Over the next two years, the Intruders made the R&B charts an additional four times. In 1968, the group had their biggest record, "Cowboys To Girls," which went to #6 pop and #1 R&B.
While the Intruders had only two additional top forty pop singles, "(Love Is Like A) Baseball Game" and "I'll Always Love My Mama," they placed six songs in the R&B top ten from 1967-73, and racked up twenty-four chart entries through 1975. Meanwhile, Gamble & Huff started Philadelphia International Records and became the hottest R&B production team of the 1970s.
SOURCE: Adam White & Fred Bronson, The Billboard
Book of #1 R&B Hits
RECOMMENDED CD: Super Hits
(Philadelphia International)
"Unhinged. That's why the Isley Brothers were so compelling for so long. On their greatest records, they sounded demented, frenzied, deranged. Which was precisely why those records cast a spell over a generation of rock 'n' roll musicians worldwide."
--Adam White
CD liner notes, 1990
As kids, the Cincinnati-born Isleys--Ronald, Rudolph, O'Kelly and Vernon--performed as a gospel quartet in churches in Ohio and Kentucky. When Vernon died in a car crash in 1954, the remaining three carried on as a trio.
On April 17, 1956, Ronald, 15, Rudolph, 17, and O'Kelly, 18, boarded a bus for New York City and hustled to make the big time. They made records for a number of independent labels, like Teenage, Mark X, Cindy, and Gone. The results were mixed, but at the same time the Isleys developed the reputation of having a killer live show. In 1958, they signed with General Artists Corporation, which led to a contract with RCA.
On July 29, 1959, the brothers recorded their five-minute milestone, "Shout." The song had come about during a show at the Howard Theater in Washington, D.C. As the Isleys performed Jackie Wilson's "Lonely Teardrops," they improvised after the line, "You know you make me want to shout," and delivered a gospel-charged climax that drove the audience wild.
The single, in two parts, came out in August of 1959. It reached #47 on the Billboard Hot 100 and sold very strongly in the R&B market. Oddly, the single never appeared on Billboard's R&B charts. The Isleys' follow-up was the equally frantic "Respectable," which, alas, failed to chart until the Outsiders covered it seven years later.
RCA released several more Isley Brothers records in 1960, but the end of the year found the trio newly signed to Atlantic. They hooked up with master songwriters/producers Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller, but the union never lived up to its promise. A year later, the trio split for Scepter/Wand, home of the Shirelles and Chuck Jackson. In a matter of weeks, the Isley Brothers were chartbound with "Twist and Shout."
In 1963, the Isleys changed labels again, and ended up on United Artists. Despite some fine efforts--including the original bossa-nova version of "Who's That Lady"--the trio's tenure on U.A. garnered little in the way of sales. By late 1965, they had moved on to Motown.
Tamla released the single "This Old Heart Of Mine (Is Weak For You)" in January of 1966. Billboard praised it as a "powerhouse comeback" by "the wailing, rocking trio, who should fast find their way up the R&B and pop charts." America must have agreed, for the song climbed to #12 pop and #6 R&B that spring. Unfortunately, the Isleys were unable to maintain the momentum. In 1968, they moved on again, but this time to their own label.
The trio had originally started T-Neck in 1964 with a wild-assed six-minute workout called "Testify." Four years later, they reactivated the label and almost immediately created their biggest hit, "It's Your Thing" (#2 pop, #1 R&B, 1969).
In 1973, the Isleys added their younger siblings Ernie and Marvin and their cousin Jasper to the line-up. The newly-created sextet enjoyed one hit after another, including "That Lady," "Fight The Power," and "Don't Say Goodnight (It's Time For Love)." In 1984, the three youngest members began recording as Isley, Jasper, Isley, and hit #1 R&B with "Caravan of Love" a year later. O'Kelly Isley died of a heart attack on March 31, 1986. He was 48.
Ronald and Rudolph continued as the Isley Brothers through 1990. In 1991, Ronald, Ernie, and Marvin reunited as the Isley Brothers. The group was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1992.
SOURCES: CD liner notes (see below)
RECOMMENDED
CDs: Rockin' Soul, 1959-1968 (Rhino), The T-Neck Years,
1969-1985 (Rhino)