Listen: Barefootin’ / Robert Parker
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Robert Parker began his recording career playing with Professor Longhair on ‘Mardi Gras In New Orleans’ in ’49. Over the next decade, this guy worked with just about every New Orleans musician, including Fats Domino, Irma Thomas, and Huey ‘Piano’ Smith. You name it. Hitting his stride in ’66, after signing to the small Nola Records, he and the label delivered a Top 10 (#7) BILLBOARD hit with ‘Barefootin’.

Listen: Let’s Go Baby (Where The Action Is) / Robert Parker
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As it turns out, the single was a classic double A side, as ‘Let’s Go Baby (Where The Action Is)’ became a huge Mod club hit in the UK. It’s cemented his popularity in Europe till this day, where he still can make the occasional appearances and get some royal treatment.

Listen: Get Ta Steppin’ / Robert Parker
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Despite lack of national radio and chart success, his musical success never stopped. Released in ’74 ‘Get Ta Steppin’ eventually became known as a southern funk template, determined not only by those in the know but more importantly, via endless sampling.

Listen: Get Right On Down / Robert Parker
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Almost as though lightning struck twice, not unlike the ‘Barefootin’ / ‘Let’s Go Baby (Where The Action Is)’ coupling, ‘Get Ta Steppin’ / ‘Get Right On Down’ proved to be another double side, basically must have in any respectable soul collection, 7″ single.

Listen: Give Me The Country Side Of Life / Robert Parker
RobertParkerCountry.mp3

Despite not issuing albums during the 70′s (his only LP is BAREFOOTIN’ from ’66), Robert Parker just proceeded to make a seemingly essential single each year or so, right up through ’76.

Listen: A Little Bit Of Something (Is Better Than A Whole Lot Of Nothing) / Robert Parker
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As with his 60′s output, career long musical arranger, producer and collaborator Wardell Quezergue was part of ‘A Little Bit Of Something (Is Better Than A Whole Lot of Nothing)’, his final single prior to recording retirement and one I just never see around.

Listen: Some Guys Have All The Luck / The Persuaders PersuadersLuck.mp3

Only in hindsight did I hear The Persuaders version of ‘Some Guys Have All The Luck’. God only knows how that happened. I worked at a one-stop in Fall ’73, delivering records to accounts, and to my apartment….bad karma. I thought there wasn’t a 7″ I had left out of those personal allocations, but obviously I was wrong.

Add to that, how did I miss it on the radio? There was nothing else to listen to while doing those said deliveries and this one went pop, peaking at #39 in Billboard that very November.

Eventually, around the Christmas season, I got moved inside, pulling orders and restocking. At this I was a whizz. Could do it in my sleep – and loved it. I was in the LP department – all organized by label, then chronologically by catalog number within each. Can you imagine sections for King, Okeh, Fontana, Sue, Deram, Philips, Parrot, Stax, Smash…….ok enough torture.

The front half of the warehouse was dedicated to the 45′s. Maude did my version of the job up there, and she had a Kevin pile – one of everything. Well, sometimes 5 or 10, depending on varying factors. Once a one hundred count box was full, off to the tape dispenser, then on to the cart, bound for the delivery truck, it went. Oh to go back in time.

Still, I didn’t end up with a copy of this one for years.

Listen: Some Guys Have All The Luck / Junior Tucker JuniorTuckerSomeGuys.mp3

Fast forward. 1980.

Oldest trick in the book: cover classic soul songs in a reggae style. Pretty much works every time. In this case, beyond great.

I fell in love with Junior Tucker’s ‘Some Guys Have All The Luck’ upon release. I dare say it got played hundreds and hundreds of times in my record room that year, and on my radio shows.

Corinne and I were both reggae lovers, having been weened on the hard corp Lee Perry and Jack Ruby releases Howard was sending our way starting in ’76. An all time favorite series, THIS IS REGGAE MUSIC, especially Volume 3, became our crowd’s anthem anthology. And I dare say all my best friends from that period can be transported back to some of the greatest times of our lives when we spin it nowadays.

Had I known then, that about ten years after Volume 3′s release, I would one afternoon walk into Chris Blackwell’s office, and suggest reviving the series with a Volume 4 and 5 (Volume 5 exclusive to reggae style RnB covers – this was included), and that he would say “Yes”, my heart would have frozen.

Listen: Find My Way Back Home / The Nashville Teens NashvilleTeensFind.mp3

Last night’s season premier of MAD MEN ended with The Nashville Teens’ ‘Tobacco Road’, their one decent sized US hit. It reminded me I should share this story.

Back in the late 80′s when I worked A&R for Elektra, a guy came to play me his demo. Nice kid, worked at Colony Records a few blocks away on Broadway. In the 60′s, it was a haven for every release available, and the whole back wall was a 45 only counter manned by several employees – and open until 2AM. Always a hubbub of activity, the clerks were constantly juggling customers and going into the back, searching for whatever single you desired, and usually returning with it in hand.

Problem was they sold everything at list price – then 99¢. Seemed a fortune at the time, so you had to have unsuccessfully scoured all other shops before taking that plunge. I used to coax my Aunt Carm into the shop every summer when she’d take me on my yearly pilgrimage to the city.

Anyways this fellow and I get to talking, and I ask if they still have all those 7′ singles in the back sorted by label (which is how they did in the 60′s – you needed to know which label and preferably it’s catalog # as well). “Yes, they’re still set up that way”. So I tell him some of my favorite ones: Deram, London, Sue, Fontana.

A few days later, he comes back to Elektra. I get a call from the front desk informing me he’s upfront. What the fuck does he want – the demo wasn’t great and I told him so already. Turns out he thought I was a nice guy, and wanted to encourage me to let him return with new songs – so he just grabbed all the old stock on those labels and brought them over as a present. A heart stopper of a moment.

‘Find My Way Back Home’ (on the short lived blue swirl label with the WHITE instead of BLACK London logo) was one of many, many jems.

True story.