Northern Soul

Thank you!

 

The original version of Tainted Love (not the Soft Cell) cover would be an example.

 

Shag is a sexual term in the UK! The dance of the beast with two backs.

 

as I say, a bit of a cliche...

you're clearly spoiling for a fight, so I'm outta here maaan!

 

The customers may be geographically concentrated in a small area but in these days of Ebay and Discogs no marketplace is insulated. Just because a specialist customer base is not global or US-focused does not render it unworthy.

I'm not a Northern Soul expert or fan but I understand that many of the records are indeed very valuable. This means that demand significantly exceeds supply. Same as for many other sub-genres and artists including plenty beloved on this thread. See also rare stamps, coins...

Whether they are luscious sonic rarities is in the ears of the beholder, but that is probably true of everything else discussed on this thread.

 

We're talking about the Ruth Swann version, right?



(Gloria Jones did the original, but the Ruth Swann is "CLEARLY" the version Marc and Dave based their cover version on. You're welcome.)

 

Gloria Jones.

 

Obscure, yes, but once again young Brits were taking a music that was ignored in America, and turning it into a movement, as Joni said `You don`t know what you`ve got till it`s gone". (but you can keep the Rap in America, we don`t want it!).
Brits were `Crate Digging` in the States for obscure releases that had that certain beat, not quite `STAX`, not quite `MOTOWN`, and coming back to the UK with boxes of obscure treasures, that would change hands for a princely sum.
Why this track was not a major international hit single is a total mystery to me, you Yanks should be ashamed of yourselves for ignoring it.



P.S. The Northern Soul movement was a vital part of social change in the UK, providing a place where Boys and Girls, Black and White, could mix without any pre-judgement or prejudice...if you had the moves....you were in!

 

I'm a record collector whose interests overlap the "northern soul" phenomenon. I go to a lot of soul nights that are essentially American variants of the British equivalents. We even get some of the old Wigan folk who come. In America, we're luckily insulated from a lot of the worst of it. We get the music and the enjoyment of being together, without the intense baggage the old guard puts onto the whole deal. If you weren't at Wigan or the Twisted Wheel, you might as well be a poseur.

Personally, as someone who comes from the same places where these records were originally made, I don't get it to the point of detesting the idea of being associated with them. I've found the British record folk to be condescending, elitist, and ignorant, particularly in regards to the people who produced the music they claim to adore. Yes, the Northern Soul scene gave a lot of these artists second (lucrative) careers, but I've heard too many stories, and seen some examples myself, of these people being rude or disdainful in their pursuit of records, even being borderline (even outright) racist in their conceptions of who the artists were as people and what their lives were like. A lot of these same artists got completely ripped off by record collectors, felt used or under-appreciated anew, had their records and personal possessions rifled through when random Europeans knocked on their door looking for stuff... The whole scene was kind of gross when these people descended on places like Detroit, Chicago, Cleveland, etc. in the 70s-90s.

And consider the continued obsession over "cover-ups," as if it's a crime to figure out the title and artist of a great record. "I found it, you didn't" territoriality over a 45 you didn't even write or record, which you only dug out of god knows where by doing god knows what, and you're going to lord it over everyone else?

If you look at the work of folks like, say, Bob Abrahamian in Chicago, who went out of his way to treat artists with respect, obtained lost recordings for them, became parts of their lives, and helped get their music new exposure, you see how twisted the Northern Soul scene can be in comparison. To quote the Detroit record producer and artist Ben Blackwell, "Diggers go and sell our soul to England." Indeed.

/rantover

 

I think the term was coined by the owner of a London record store who used to get loads of kids with 'funny accents obviously from somewhere in the Northern wastelands' asking to buy obscure US soul 45s with a four on the floor beat.

 

That’s a great album, The Verve at their peak.

 

At the time getting the obscure record was driven by the club DJs and was 100% competitive. It then trickled down to the kids. A lot of the 45s were rare in the first place, so you can see how that would effect the market even today.
Music was only part of the whole scene, the unique dance styles were just as important, if not more so. Then there was the all-nighter culture, plus the finger up to the London based record industry.

 

I'd also push back against the "obscure means not good" thing. The economics of the record industry back in the day meant that a lot of the independent labels who produced this stuff couldn't afford to promote their records, never pressed very many to begin with, or in other cases got a regional hit and bankrupted themselves trying to press more to meet demand. The net result being a lot of really great recordings never got any kind of exposure or follow-up.

Now, there's also instances of Northern Soul folk lionizing not-great records simply because there's only like two known copies and a big DJ got one of them, but that's another conversation altogether.

 

No, i'm not. You should all know by now that I don't troll. What I write is my real opinion.

 

Well, you came in with a misinformed hot take about an entire genre of music, but, that's just, like, your opinion, man.

 

I'm aware of all that. Why is it that people mistake a contrary opinion as not being knowledgeable?

To be fair. cultural differences have a lot to do with how music is percieved. The U.S. and the U.K. don't always like the same music. Compare the music charts in both countries through history. It will tell the tale.

The clip you posted doesn't even sound like soul music. It is easily forgettable, too.

 

You mean Beach Music?

 

The very same

 

I love hearing a total unknown R&B scorcher from a label I sort of think I know from an artist I don't know by a producer who I have hear of that just kicks the doors down it's so white hot! It's like flipping over the 45 of Rescue Me and finding out it's even better than the A-side. Or findiut out Archie Bell and the Drells have more than two good songs, and the 3rd one does not sound exactly like the first two. Or that Luther Ingram has another 45 classic, and you never heard it before. I LOVE NORTHERN SOUL

 

Post received. Most soul labels were small-time operations, and many records only got as far as the local scene. But, i'll counter that often, a larger label will hear a record and pick it up, and they wouldn't pick one up unless they believed it had national potential. (too bad a lot of labels, producers, owners got ripped off by these distribution deals).

 

You showed your taste and interest in R&B a long while back. I think it was discussing the Rhino DIBYM or/and Have a Nice Day Series of one and two hit wonders. You had your favorites all post 1974 towards the disco/funk era. Nothing wrong with that except the real point of the one-hit wonders of the series imo is 1970 - 1974. The post 1974 also missed the best of the so-called Northern Soul club favorites. It's just not your favorite era. You were too young at that time maybe.

 

No, i'm informed. I already told you I am aware of the history of the movement. Doesn't mean I have to like the music...man.

Looks like this thread is going the same way that other thread did. Discussing musical genres brings out the worst in people.

 

Beach music and Northern Soul aren’t exactly the same but there is a great deal of overlap. There are tons of singles sitting in the homes of Beach Music aficionados here in NC that the Northern Soul collectors would love to have. I’m hoping to tap into some of those collections when I retire and have more time. And here in the Southeastern US, Shag is dance you do (with your clothes on) to Beach Music.

 

I don't have much to say about it because I wasn't there and I'm an American.

That said I do have a few Northern Soul CD compilations that I put on occasionally and enjoy. Whether they are the best representations of the "scene" in its heyday I can't say but they contain many good tracks I'd probably never hear otherwise, since I don't collect obscure soul 45s.

 

Still pretty popular with the SOS crowd in SC.