THE FASCINATIONS

The Fascinations were, among other things, the perfect vehicle for Curtis Mayfield's pop songwriting. While his songs with the Impressions were getting funkier and more socially conscious, the Fascinations' sides show just how good Mayfield was at crafting straight, buoyant pop. Originally from Detroit, the Fascinations sound less like classic Mayfield soft soul and more like a synthesis of Motown-style ebullience with the nuance of Chicago soul. One gets the sense that he saw them as viable competitors with the Motown Sound™. And while Curtis' role with the Opals and the other OKeh artists was as songwriter or in collaboration with Carl Davis, Mayfield was much more involved with the Fascinations, writing, producing, and performing on their recordings. At times they can sound almost like the Impressionettes.


Hold On

But all the credit shouldn't just go to Mayfield. Lead singer Bernadine Boswell Smith's voice is totally amazing-- girlish and raw and so, so good. Sounding like she's constantly singing in the red, she transforms snappy little teen pop into awesome declarations of love and heartbreak.

Take, for instance, the first song Mayfield cut with them on ABC-Paramount:


The Fascinations - Mama Didn't Lie

Jan Bradley had already scored a hit with the song a year or two earlier (Although the liner notes to the Curtom Story seem to suggest Mayfield originally wrote the song for the Fascinations):


Jan Bradley - Mama Didn't Lie

Where Bradley's voice sounds clear and innocent, Boswell Smith sings with gospel-style force. The Fascinations' version is a more spirited recording, but in an era during which Motown was still coaching the blackness out of singers' voices, it wasn't really "hit material." I will say the Bradley version is beautifully produced-- great bottom end.

For the hell of it, here's a Joe Meek produced version by Flip & the Dateliners:


Flip & the Dateliners - Mama Didn't Lie

Sounds like 70s Cambodian pop. When I hear Joe Meek I think, Timbaland who? If only Meek would've stuck around long enough to record with Beyonce. They would give a whole new meaning to great bottom end. Alas, the world can only sustain so many "king's of men" at once.

Anyway, the Fascinations next single was "Tears in my Eyes." It failed to do much and ABC dropped them soon after.


Tears in my Eyes

When, in 1966, Mayfield formed his own label (Mayfield) he focused on pushing the Fascinations. The first release was the song "Say It Isn't So." It was a hit in Chicago but failed nationally.


Say It Isn't So

You can really hear the Motown influence on the flip-side:


I'm So Lucky (He Loves Me)

Their next single, "Girls Are Out to Get You," was their one bona fide hit, reaching #13 on the R&B charts, and scraping the pop charts. In the early seventies the song was a hit in the UK, inspiring a brief Fascinations reunion for an overseas tour.


Girls Are Out to Get You


b/w You'll Be Sorry

The b-side is one of my favorite Fascinations tunes. I've been listening to it on repeat for the last few days. When I played it for the ol' GF, she looked totally bored and said "I always forget you like this kind of music." So I guess it's not for everyone.

If you like what you hear, an out-of-print compilation is posted over at the blog Soulful Divas ---> HERE

THE OPALS

The Opals: (from left) Myra Tillotson, Juanita Tucker and Rosie Addison

The Opals were one of the great Chicago girl groups. And while only three singles were released under the Opals moniker they can be heard on songs by Major Lance, Otis Leavill, Betty Everett and Walter Jackson. Next to The Fascinations (who I'll post about soon) the Opals are one of my favorite of the many Curtis Mayfield related groups.

Hailing from East Chicago, IN, they were discovered in 1962 by The Dells while performing in Gary. The seasoned group (together since the early fifties), by Mickey McGill's account, "took them as little kids and showed them how to sing and everything." Most importantly, The Dells brought the girls to Vee-Jay where they sang back-up on several hits -- most notably Betty Everett's smash "The Shoop Shoop Song." Eventually they were presented to Chicago A&R man Carl Davis, who would produce their recordings for OKeh.

Their first single was a Billy Butler authored tune called "Does it Matter."


Does It Matter


b/w Tender Lover

But the next release, in the summer of 1964, "You Can't Hurt Me No More," was their first sizable local hit and a perfect showcase for the mid-sixties OKeh sound-- produced by Carl Davis, authored by Curtis Mayfield and arranged by Johnny Pate. It's a beauty.


You Can't Hurt Me No More


b/w You're Gonna Be Sorry

Their final single was an old R&B number written and recorded by the Dells in the fifties called "Restless Days," backed with a Mayfield song called "I'm So Afraid." "Afraid" managed to chart, but The Opals broke up soon after.


Restless Days


I'm So Afraid

A few years ago, around the release of the film Dream Girls, Dave Hoekstra of the Sun-Times, traveled with Rosie Addison to Carl Davis' home to talk about the OKeh days. Despite some clunky comparisons to Jennifer Hudson ("Like Hudson, the Opals grew up in church"), the piece is pretty charming. Read it here.

THE PARA-MONTS

UPDATE: There's a streamable interview with Walter Coleman, who wrote both of the songs below, over at the website of the Sitting in the Park radio show.Here.



The Para-Monts - I Don't Wanna Lose You



The Para-Monts - Come Go With Me

The slower number, "I Don't Wanna Lose You" slays me. I've been walking around singing "the dial from my ray dee ohh" softly to myself. But the flip, "Come Go With Me" was the moderate chicago hit in '67, and the more desired cut by the Northern soul DJs. Chances are, maybe at this very moment, there's an English postman, or cabby, or policeman spinning around in circles to the song, or I like to think so anyway.

LITTLE THINGS MEAN AN AWFUL LOT

Denise LaSalle - One Little Thing



I've been loving this song, the b-side to Denise LaSalle's first single, "A Love Reputation", on Billy "the Kid" Emerson's Tarpon label.

Denise LaSalle - A Love Reputation



Emerson recycled an existing backing track from an earlier (and totally inferior) recording by Carol Vega, replacing the double tracked vocal with LaSalle's effortless delivery.

Carol Vega - One Little Thing



Where Vega's coquettish phrasing makes the organ and woozy guitar sound kind of annoying and cute, LaSalle's voice fills the whole arrangement, giving space & drama and against the odds lines like "one little kiss from you started an avalanche" come off feeling real and palpable. There's something about a voice like LaSalle's-- big & capable of the awesome-- singing small, sort of foolish songs that just slays me. Limitations of form or something? Best not to think.

Another recent favorite is Archie & Al Perkins' "You Can Belong to Someone," an answer to the Impressions' "I Need to Belong to Someone." The original is a bit of a poor man's "People Get Ready" (a monster by any non-Curtis standard) but the Perkins' traded verses take the song into realms of the infinite. Moment: "Stop CRYIIING like a motherless child"

Archie & Al Perkins - You Can Belong to Someone



The Impressions - I Need to Belong to Someone



While Perkins was a radio personality of some renown, his musical talents were apparently up for debate. In Chicago Soul by Richard Pruter, none other than Denise LaSalle recounts:

"Al Perkins, a famous disc jockey that was killed in [Detroit in 1983], was a good friend of mine. He couldn't sing that well, couldn't keep time with the music. Al went down to Willie Mitchell's studio and cut a smash hit. So I said, 'If this man can make Al sound that good that's where I'm going."