Philly Soul!

[alex matson]

As I write this I'm digging on some old Spinners. Makes me want to ask what your favorite records are from this genre! Even as a kid I always liked I'll Be Around and Could It Be I'm Falling In Love.
Whoops...Steve Winwood's While You See A Chance just came on. Somebody sell me a Memorymoog!

[Phil Owl]

One of Soul music's finest eras!

Just about ANYTHING by The O'Jays especially "For The Love of Money" which featured the great Anthony Jackson doing that killer bass part.

Harold Melvin & The Bluenotes had some great stuff, things like "Bad Luck", "The Love I Lost" and "Satisfaction Guaranteed (Or Take Your Love Back), kickass rhythm section work with Ronnie Baker on bass (cannot remember who the drummer was though).

In general, so many of those songs and albums had great arranging and playing. Such a shame there's nothing like that going on now.

[alex matson]

I work in a place that has concerts once a week. This summer there was a festival for charity. This teenaged gospel choir came in and just tore the place up, and the organist was great too. Now I know you can't generalize, but there is something about the voices of singers raised in the gospel tradition that moves me. When I get this studio together I'm going to start looking for local gospel singers that might be interested in trying to make a new-old soul record. I'm so pissed I had to work the night Stevie Wonder played - it was even at one of my company's other location. I was scheduled to work it and got pulled away the day before. Word is he's killin' em up there.

[E-money]

I always loved the Stylistics sound, that guy could sing falsetto better than anybody.
Billy Paul "Me and Mrs. Jones" is a great sounding song.
The O'Jays "Use ta be My Girl" and the Intruders "Cowboys to Girls" are a few other of my favorites.

[percussion boy]

"If you don't know me by now" (Harold Melvin & Blue notes)
"How could I let u get away," "I don't want to lose u" (Spinners)
"Sideshow" (Blue Magic)
"You are everything" (Stylistics)
"Backstabbers" (O'Jays)

. . . and yeah, "Me and Mrs. Jones," fer sure.

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btw, Joe Tarsia, who engineered all that stuff, had such a bad grounding problem at Sigma that he had to rig a red warning light over the coke machine so no one would use it during a take -- otherwise, awful buzz in the audio . . .