Many other sessions followed, but it wasn’t until a visit to Detroit’s famed 20 Grand nightspot by legendary vocal group The Drifters that events took a fortunate turn for Frank and Jimmy Bryant.

One of the group members, Winifred ‘Johnny’ Terry was a native Detroiter who wanted to record some of his own songs whilst in town, and needed local musicians to perform at the session.

Bryant recalls his early contact with Terry, ”Johnny had been in the business for a long time. He knew James Brown coming up, and Bobby Byrd. He wrote James’ first hit ‘Please, please, please’. We hit it off straight from the get go.”

The Drifters’ tour drummer was none other than ‘Funk Brother’ Richard ‘Pistol’ Allen, and it was to him that Terry gave the task of assembling the players. Allen approached fellow Funk Brothers’ guitarist Eddie Willis and keyboard wiz Joe Hunter with Frank Bryant on bass guitar and  Drifters backing band member Abdul Ali as a second guitar.

The session was to take place at United Sound Studio, and would focus on a song called “Honey” for which Terry had assigned a local, since forgotten, vocalist. The backing accompaniment was completed, along with an instrumental track intended as the ‘B’ side, but the vocalist couldn’t perform the song to Terry’s satisfaction.

It was at this point that Frank suggested that himself and his brother Jimmy, now back from the army, could easily sing the song, and convinced Johnny Terry to give them a chance. ”We knew we could sing it and we could harmonize well together. Once Johnny heard us he took to cutting us singing a lot. He loved our voices.”

music: "Honey" - Just Brothers

Continued