Lost souls: 10 great soul records you might have missed

Though born in Mississippi,  Jan (Addie) Bradley was very definitely part of the Chicago Chess label scene of the 1960’s, with a soft lilting soprano voice that could melt your brain. Singing from an early age in church she originally sang lead with a Chicago group called the Passions before being spotted and linked up with Curtis Mayfield to give her recording material. This collaboration gave her US chart success in 1963 with Mama Didn’t Lie, which has remained her best known track, with the song also being covered by the Fascinations and becoming a Northern Soul favourite. A publishing dispute with Chess severed her ties with Curtis Mayfield and, unusually for the time, she took to writing her own material. I’m Over You from 1965 was one such self-penned song and was apparently inspired by the split with Curtis Mayfield and her determination to succeed as a songwriter in her own right. It  shows a Curtis Mayfiel...

The DC Blossoms seem one of those groups whose potential place in music history got knocked out of the ground by bad luck and timing. Even their limited output of what seems to be 2 singles ( from 1962 and 1966) is sometimes lumped in with the more famous Blossoms from Los Angeles, whose line-up included Darlene Love and who can be heard on many of Phil Spector’s recordings from  1962-64.The DC Blossoms started life in Washington as the Tropicals in 1958 and in 1962 made one record  ‘ I’m in Love’ , for the Okeh label  as the Blossoms, a four piece vocal group comprising sisters Jacqui and Vicki Burton, Jeannette Talley and Roberta Miller. The single sank without trace, the group lost their recording contract and it was not until 1966 they got another opportunity when the group –now a trio following Roberta Miller’s departure -  signed to a new  Washington-based soul  record label, Shrine, started  by Berry Gordy’s ex-wife  Raynoma Be...

In 1966 my elder sister went on a trip to Italy in the school holidays and brought back an infuriatingly catchy song  from the San Remo Song Festival  called Il ragazzo della via Gluck . I had no idea what the lyrics were but it sounded very Continental for sure. Francoise Hardy did a version and it became a veritable Continental explosion, Italian with a French accent. Inevitably, an English lyric was quickly penned, the song became Tar and Cement   and didn’t sound continental any more. However, it did provide the only commercial success for an American singer, Verdelle Smith, who scored a No 1 in Australia with the song.  She is another of those artists who released a single or two, maybe  even an album, that contained a few minutes of pure musical magic, and then vanished from sight. She had an extraordinarily compelling voice, powerful and wrap around warm at the same time. However, she didn’t fit easily into any genre and record companies did...

Like the DC Blossoms, Jaibi left a tiny collection of released recordings, less than half a dozen tracks, of which one has stood out as something special down the years.  Jaibi was actually Joan Pulliam, becoming Joan Banks after her marriage to Larry Banks, who had written the big hit Go Now, originally recorded by his first wife Bessie Banks before the Moody Blues version reached  the top of the UK charts in 1965. She had recorded a few tracks as part of a group called the Pleasures in 1964/5  before taking up solo work with Larry Banks as producer and co-writer. A couple of double-sided singles emerged, of which You Got Me  from 1967 was the one that has subsequently received most praise. Dave Godin, the blues and soul specialist who championed black American music in Britain, cited it as his all-time favourite record and James McKean of Stylus Magazine was even more fulsome in his praise: “Were it not for a slightly clumsy fade-out I would try to m...

The charts of the 1960’s contained a number of acts called Brothers. Some were real, like the Isley Brothers or the Chamber Brothers. Some weren’t, like the Righteous Brothers or the Walker Brothers, who could have been a 'brother' duo but added a non-singing drummer who strangely turned out to drum neither on their records or at live performances. One of this latter group were the Knight Brothers, a duo from Washington DC comprising Richard Dunbar and Jimmy Diggs who had sung together in a doo-wop group the Starfires in the late 1950s, with Diggs also singing for a group called the Carltons. Their sound was not dissimilar to the Righteous Brothers, with the baritone  Diggs singing lead  and writing some of their material and the tenor voice of Dunbar taking the higher harmonies, but  with a more intense  sound . Their best known track was the Diggs composition Temptation ‘Bout To Get Me, which was a minor national hit in 1965 on the Chess label. It was...

Laura Lee is one of the few artists  to have another group name themselves after –in this case The Division of Laura Lee, a Swedish post punk band. She was the inspiration for Al Green’s Tired of Being Alone . She is also a singer who should have been one of the biggest names of 60’s and 70’s soul but somehow didn’t quite make that leap. Yet to my mind, she ranks as one of the finest soul singers of the last 50 years Born in Chicago and brought up in Detroit, Laura Lee had a powerful, gritty voice with a strong influence of gospel first shown on a number of Chess recordings in the 1960’s. Her main commercial success came in the early 1970s following a move to the Hot Wax label set up by Holland-Dozier-Holland when they left Motown  and  she released  a string of records, such as Wedlock is a Padlock and Women’s Love Rights, that were in tune with the  feminist movement and vocalisation of women’s independence and choice, foreshadowing the late...

Of all the artists mentioned here, Sonia Ross is the most elusive. She left a legacy of 2 stunning singles, one of which was only issued at a later date, but seems to have  left no other imprint on musical history. Her full name was Sonia Rossman and came from Atlanta, with a background of singing in the Baptist church. In 1969 she recorded a couple of singles for the small Southern soul Tragar record label in Atlanta set up  by  former saxophone payer Jesse Jones, Let Me Be Free and Breaking My Heart. Let Me Be Free , a self-penned number, was itself a standout track, an uptempo number with prominent horn backing. Breaking My Heart was an aching, shimmering track with Sonia’s voice heading towards a Minnie Riperton – like  stratosphere at times above the horn section and backing singers. However, Jones apparently felt that the ‘oohs’ and ‘aahs’ in it were much  too  sensual  for Southern ears and it wasn’t released until decades later. ...

Debbie Taylor  was another name that had seemed to vanish from history after a few years in music  in the late 60’s/early 70’s,until a resurfacing a few years ago. She  was Maddie (Maydie) Galvin from Norfolk, Virginia and ,like many of her contemporaries, had developed her singing skills in gospel before crossing over into soul. Between 1968- 1975 she released a number of  singles and albums on at least 5 different record labels, with the final offering I Don’t Wanna Leave You , an intense and tearful ballad, often being considered her finest performance and the only track to get international release at the time.My preference is for Never Gonna  Let Him Know , which launched the GWP label in 1969. It was a mid-tempo tune, with vocal backing from the Hesitations and Debbie Taylor showing an astonishing range and depth in her voice.  The track is worth it just for the way she drags out  ‘yeah’  every so often. The end result is a rather ...

Ebony Alleyne is a 21 st Century  British singer/songwriter  but both her sound and the problems surrounding her sole album release harked back to American soul artists of the late 60’s/early 70’s. She was signed to Sony at the age of 19 and put together in 2002 a stunning album with track after track that showcased her expressive, smoky  voice, strong melodies and full string and horn backing, with the overall effect having hints of  Dionne Warwick , Swingout Sister and Sade amongst others  but remaining its own sound. Some tunes, like Walk Away and Never Look Back , were self-penned but also included was a cover of the Barbara Lewis classic, Hello Stranger . For me, the standout track was In Love With A Stranger,   with a killer intro and a lighter, floating sound that reminded me at times of Corinne Bailey Rae. It was one of those albums that could have been huge, reviving the ‘old school’ soul of the 60’s and 70’s at a time when few other c...

Laura Izibor  was not the first black Dubliner in music - Phil Lynott of Thin Lizzy and Samantha Mumba came before – but  initially her Irish accent sometimes caused surprise. In an interview in 2009 she reported a typical response in America: ‘They've got black people in Ireland? Y'all live there ?'  I  first saw her as support act to the Blackbyrds at the  Camden Jazz Club in 2008: just herself, a portable keyboard, her voice, a lot of hair and an infectious smile. She had a string of great original songs mixing soul, pop and jazz that put me in mind of  a soulful Carole King at times: Don’t Stay, I Don’t Want You Back, Shine.  Her repertoire also included Mmm , a slow, gospel-infused track that has an almost ethereal quality. The live version has audience participation replacing the gospel choir. Record companies sometimes have a problem with artists that cross a number of genres and some of Laura Izibor’s later work suggested she was ...