VARIOUS - SPRING NYC SOUL

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VARIOUS - SPRING NYC SOUL

  • VARIOUS - SPRING NYC SOUL

  • 2020 Ace Release
  • £12.00

:  at  £12.00  each

Rarities from New York’s Spring, Event and Posse labels. 23 tracks on Kent CD for the first time, including six previously unreleased.

New York label Spring, and its Event and Posse subsidiaries, were very active from 1967 up to the late 80s. They specialised in the city’s black music and tried most variations, including soul, gospel, disco, show tunes, funk, harmony and later electro and rap.

We have chosen the most soulful tracks that have not appeared on Kent CDs before, including six completed recordings that were previously unreleased. Two of these are ballads: a stunning version of Ray Godfrey’s song ‘I’m The Other Half Of You’ by Maxine Weldon and an unknown sweet soul number from one-time Tavares member Victor Tavares. Ray Godfrey himself features with ‘I Love You More Than Anything’, as covered by Joe Simon, and the unheard song ‘Hold On’, both previously unissued dance tracks. The Determinations’ opener ‘Save The Best For Me’ is another of Ray’s great songs, previously only on a rare LP. Other 70s dancers come from Ronnie Walker, Act I and the Joneses. More ballads are provided by Joe Simon, Leroy Randolph and, surprisingly, the Fatback Band, while uptempo 60s soul comes from Prince Harold, Little Eva Harris and Richard Barbary.

The offerings of the Internationals, US and Vernon Brown are harder to categorise – quirky and worthy but in their own individual styles. The great songwriter Phillip Mitchell went funky on his “Jody” song ‘If We Get Caught (I Don’t Know You)’, as did Phil Flowers with his heavy guitar-infused ‘Kill The Monster’. Philly girls the Equations sing the poppy and catchy ‘Boiling Like Water’, Jackie Verdell gives us gospel in a modern soul setting and C-Brand take us into the 80s with their two-stepper ‘Plenty Of Love’. Altogether a catholic selection for lovers of soul music through its most interesting eras.

 

  • 01 Save The Best For Me - The Determinations

     02 Do You Feel It - Act I

  •  03 I Love You More Than Anything - Ray Godfrey

  •  04 Since You've Been Gone - Garland Green

  •  05 Magic's In The Air - Ronnie Walker

  •  06 If You Could Turn Into Me - The Fatback Band

  •  07 Your Time To Cry - Joe Simon

  •  08 I'm The Other Half Of You - Maxine Weldon

  •  09 Forever - Clare Bathé

  •  10 The Storm Is Passing Over - Jackie Verdell

  •  11 Plenty Of Love - C-Brand

  •  12 Beauty (Is In The Eye Of The Beholder) - The Joneses

  •  13 Hold On - Ray Godfrey

  •  14 Kill The Monster - Flower Shoppe

  •  15 If We Get Caught, I Don't Know You - Phillip Mitchell

  •  16 If You Say You Love Me - US

  •  17 Falling In Love - Victor Tavares

  •  18 (I Have Fallen Into) The Tender Trap - Leroy Randolph

  •  19 Boiling Like Water - The Equations

  •  20 Sugar Plum (Give Me Some) - Little Eva Harris

  •  21 Get Right - Richard Barbary

  •  22 Daddy's Coming Home - Prince Harold

  •  23 Of Your Life - Vernon Brown

  •  24 I Ride Alone - The Internationals