PICKETT
music: "The
Sign Of The Judgement" - The Violinaires of
Detroit, Michigan (Gotham 776a)
Correc-tone’s
studio on 12th Street started out in
the music business with a bang. The first 45 on
the label was a storming number by a young
Wilson Pickett, who was making his solo
recording debut after splitting away from The
Falcons.
Born in Prattville, Alabama in
1941, Wilson had moved up to Detroit in 1955 to
be with his father. Suffused in Southern Baptist
gospel, the teenager was soon involved in the
Motor City’s church choirs and gospel groups. He
sang lead with The Pearly Gates and then joined
The Sons Of Zion, before becoming one of The
Violinares.
At that time, the
other members of this esteemed group were Isaiah
Jones (tenor), Robert Gandy (lead vocals),
Calvin Fair (tenor), Wilson DeShields (baritone
and guitar) and Leo Conery (bass). Although they
recorded numerous discs over many years, Wilson
Pickett only featured on their Gotham label 45,
singing second lead on the rousing “Sign Of The
Judgement”, which was cut sometime in 1957.
A couple of years
later Pickett switched to secular music, joining
The Falcons, a group that had had huge success
early in 1959 with a seminal slice of Soul
called “You’re So Fine”. Mack Rice had sung
lead, with Willie Schofield, Joe Stubbs and
Eddie Floyd backing him.
The recording was
from Detroit music entrepreneur Robert West
stable of labels - initially released on the
local Flick label. When United Artists picked it
up it became a national smash and its success
helped hone the sound of R’n’B.
Wilson Pickett wasn’t in the
group when these songs were recorded
In mid-1960, Don Mancha was a
vocalist with the pioneering Mr. West and was
about to join The Falcons, telling me: “I was
set up to sign with The Falcons, to replace
Eddie Floyd. Then Mack Rice found Wilson Pickett
and he took Eddie’s place.”
Wilson made his recording debut
with the group’s “Pow, You’re In Love” and
“Workin’ Man’s Song” that came out on the United
Artists label in January 1961. He also sang lead
(plus co-wrote) The Falcon’s big smash later
that year, “I Found a Love” - a 45 that launched
Mr. West’s Lupine label. In a strange twist, the
second Lupine release was “He’s So Fine” by The
Corvells - an ‘answer record’ to The Falcons’
hit of ’59.
“I Found a Love” climbed into
Billboard’s chart in the spring of ’62, but by
then Wilson was already thinking in terms of a
solo career. He did, however, continue to tour
with group to plug the hit and earn some cash.
Other Falcons started to record
by themselves and Lupine put out solo 45s on
Mack Rice, Eddie Floyd and Joe Stubbs. But being
highly ambitious, the 21-year-old Wilson was
lured away from Robert West by Wilbert Golden
and joined his newly formed Correc-tone
Recording Company.
A photo of Wilson
Pickett when he was a 21-year-old. His very
first solo recording - “Let Me Be Your Boy” -
was the disc that launched the Correc-tone label
around March 1962.
Wilson
appeared at the recently re-opened 20 Grand in
October ‘61, and then at the Parizian in January
’62 along with
Dianne Warwick’s cousin, Marva
Josie. The two gigged there for a couple of
weeks and that July Marva was back in Detroit. A
photo appeared in the Michigan Chronicle
showing her with Mr. Wilbert Golden, with a
caption saying she had come from New York to
record for Correc-tone.
By then Wilson’s Correc-tone
disc was already released – it came out around
March ’62. He wrote the slow-paced “My Heart
Belongs To You”, which he had already published
with Mr. West’s Lupine company. The studio’s
keyboardist Wilbert Harbert penned the electric
A-side, “Let Me Be Your Boy”, while Sonny
Sanders and Robert Bateman oversaw the sessions.
The 45 was also released on MGM’s Cub label, but
neither copy sold well; their failure due to a
lack of promotion.
|
“Pickett was
quite a challenge.”
Robert Bateman,
producer and songwriter |
Eager to make it, Wilson felt a
little uneasy about Robert Bateman - famed for
writing “Please Mr. Postman” - as he didn't
consider him to be the right kind of songwriter
to get him a chart buster: “Pickett was quite a
challenge. He said ‘Robert Bateman - I could
never get a hit with him, because I was too
pop’. Coming from Motown, I wouldn’t consider us
an R’n’B company. It only got tagged R’n’B
because we were black.”
But Robert knew he could deliver
what Wilson wanted and set about writing a song
that combined commercial potential with gospel
flavor: “I sat down and I had to start to think
R’n’B, and I thought of Sam Cooke’s ‘You Send
Me’. Then I just put down those chords and used
what we called the ra-ra.”
The ‘ra-ra’ means slightly
extending each word into a series, so ‘You
send me’, becomes ‘You-oo-oo-oo
se-se-se-end me-e-e-e’. This was how
Wilson’s “If You Need Me” was created and as
Robert rightly recalled, it started Wilson on
the road to fame.
Needing cash, Mr. Golden sold
the publishing rights to the song, which came as
something of a shock to Robert: “I was over in
Chicago at the time, at VeeJay. Mr. Abner was
only interested in the Wilson Pickett material –
‘If You Need Me’. I called back and talked to
Wilbert, and he tells me he has sold the
publishing to “If You Need Me” to Atlantic. I
said, ‘Wilbert, how could you sell the
publishing if you are not the publisher?’ and he
says, ‘Well, we all get some money, man. There’s
money for the writers too’. I could have nixed
that. I had already copyrighted it. But I
thought I wrote that and I can write another
one.”
Instead of
Wilson’s song, Robert Bateman managed to sell
Mr. Abner a Pyramids’ Correc-tone recording
instead – “What Is Love” – that subsequently
came out the VeeJay label. And he felt a bit
better once he got paid from Atlantic via
Wilbert Golden: “I think they gave him about
$1,500-$2,000 dollars and the writers; I think
we got about $1,000 a piece, as an advance. It
didn’t seem too bad to me, but I didn’t realize
the value of publishing at that time. Back then,
we were only paying musicians $5 a side, so
those tunes only cost about $30 (to record).”
Without the
publishing rights, Robert decided his best bet
of getting royalties was to travel over to New
York and agree a deal with a big national label
to release it. However, with Atlantic having
earmarked "If You Need Me" for their established
star Solomon Burke, few recording companies were
eager to take it.
|
“The record came
on and he fell over backwards”
Robert Bateman,
producer and songwriter |
“I took Wilson’s record - ‘If You
Need Me’ - to New York. I went to Cub; they
wanted the record, but I said Solomon Burke was
going to cover it and… Then I went to ABC, and
they loved it, but… I went to all the majors
first. Then I went to the small labels, but
nobody wanted to fight with Atlantic. Then I ran
into Lloyd Price on the street, and he was just
going into the business. By then I said, ‘Shit,
I’m not going to tell these guys about Solomon
Burke’. We went over to Bell Sound and had about
five acetates cut.”
Armed with these five discs,
Robert went to New York’s number one radio jock,
WWRL’s ‘Burn, baby! Burn!’ Magnificent Montague.
“He was the hottest thing to hit
the radio - played that record that record back
to back. (Atlantic boss) Jerry Wexler tells me
tells he was in his office the next day, leaning
back in his chair, and the record came on and he
fell over backwards.”
“If You Need Me” was released by
Lloyd Price on his Double L record label and
sold well. It didn’t, however, quite outdo
Solomon Burke’s cover, which reached number 2 of
Billboard’s R & B chart in May ’63 - Pickett’s
original peaked at 30 that same month.
Instead of this success being
the start of Correc-tone’s rise to fame and
fortune, things began to unravel. What Mr.
Golden hadn’t done was get Wilson to sign a
contract - the two simply had a handshake
agreement along the lines of if Wilson hadn’t
tasted success within a year, he was free to
leave. Very honorable, but not very
professional.
To compound that error, Mr.
Golden confined the fact to Wilson Pickett’s
ex-manager, Mr. West: “Robert West was supposed
to be a friend of mine. He used to come and we
talked to each other.” No doubt Mr. West was
pretty unhappy about Wilbert having lured Wilson
away from his Lupine label and he soon let
Atlantic boss Jerry Wexler know. He in turn
informed Pickett and Wilbert then got a
telephone call from New York: “Wilson Pickett
called me up and said, ‘What are you trying to
do? I said, ‘I’m not trying to do anything. I
fed you when couldn’t feed your family.’
These two 45s were recorded in
New York
Wilson opted
to leave Correc-tone and Robert Bateman opted to
stay in New York to produce other songs on
Wilson Pickett (also Buddy Lamp & Shawn Eliott)
for Double L at Bell Sound, most famously “It’s
Too Late”, which became a massive hit for Wilson
in August 1963.
With Wilbert
Golden lacking funds, Wilson had paid for some
the sessions out of his own pocket and felt no
guilt about leaving Correc-tone. The songs he
cut formed an LP that Double L released soon
after “It's Too Late” charted. However, the only
other 45 on the label was “I’m Down To My Last
Heartbreak”, which came out towards the end of
’63.
Wilson inevitably
decided to sign with Atlantic to further his
career. His first record on the label - “In The
Midnight Hour” – topped Billboard’s R & B chart
in the summer of ’65. And the rest, as they say,
is history.
Don
Mancha penned an answer to Pickett’s hit - “I
Need You” - that Lillian Dorr recorded for
Correc-tone and empathized with his pal Pickett,
as he had seen what had transpired at Correc-tone:
“Little did they know that Pickett was cutting
his own deal (with Atlantic). Pickett was
desperate; he had took his last $700 - it cost
to do the album – his last bit of money that he
had saved up. He paid for his own sessions,
cause Wilbert was out of money.”
Minus Robert Bateman and Wilson
Pickett and short of dollars, Correc-tone’s
future looked bleak. Surprisingly, Wilbert
Golden kept going and Correc-tone got a hit in
‘64.
To Be Continued
