Soul X 2 - I'm Alright Now (SS7 2612)

I'm Alright Now

Hey folks. How's everything?

I'm not sure if you've ever been to our companion site, soul detective, but I've just made a few changes over there that I'd like to tell you about...

While the whole 'Blogger' format has served me well over the last couple of years, it just wasn't working out over at SD. I mean, if you create a new post every week like we do here on the B Side (which will stay just the way it is - don't worry), Blogger lists like the last five entries on your 'start page' and archives the rest. A brilliant idea. If you were, however, to keep on adding information to the same posts over the course of several months (like we do on soul detective), the format just doesn't make sense. Before long, the site begins to collapse under its own weight, as the start page takes just short of FOREVER to load. This had become the fate of ol' soul detective.

Well, hopefully, all that's changed.

I had registered the URL souldetective.com a while back, and just recently had this brainstorm... what if I were to use it as a 'front page' that provided links to all the individual cases? That way, even though they'd still be hosted by Blogger, the same as they ever were, they would each load individually and not gum up the works trying to do everything all at once... I don't want to bore you with all of this, but it does appear to be working.

I've added some new features as well, like podcasts of the first four investigations, and a new page called Burning Questions that will focus on complex quandaries submitted by folks just like you. So head on over and check it out when you get the chance and, if you're one of those kind souls who've linked to SD in the past (bless your pea-pickin' little heart), please update your links:

www.souldetective.com

Now... I just posted the flip of today's selection over there as part of our ongoing case five investigation of Allen Orange, as it was co-written by Allen with former King Casual, Aaron Varnell... "Obviously conceived as an 'answer song' to Sam & Dave's Wrap It Up, it never made the charts. According to the label, 'Soul X 2' is made up of 'Lee and Calvin'... anybody have any clue who that might be?" I said. Well, I started looking into things a little further... check this out:

A glance at the BMI database revealed that the L. Crume listed as the co-writer of this funky, incredible tune we have here today, is none other than LeRoy Crume, the man hand-picked by Sam Cooke to replace Bob King as the Soul Stirrers' guitarist in 1956. This unbelievable YouTube video shows Crume in action, and offers a glimpse of what an important figure he was in the development of the jumpin' electric guitar. Anyway, I'm guessing LeRoy is the 'Lee' listed on the label.

OK... BMI lists the other songwriter as Calvin April, long-time lead vocalist for Gospel quartet The Pilgrim Wonders... 'Calvin'. Now how about that? The catalogue number of the single places it in the summer of 1968, shortly after Sam & Dave broke into the top five with I Thank You, and while James & Bobby Purify were still cracking the R&B top forty. I have no idea who brought these two together in that same kind of mold, but it sure works for me! What a great record, huh?

Also, if you've been paying attention lately, you might recall that John R was producing Sound Stage 7's 1968 releases almost exclusively at American Studio in Memphis, using the 'house band' - a band that, by then, included not only our man Reggie Young, but yet another product of the Chicago Gospel world, Bobby Womack on the guitars. Wow.

This is the kind of stuff we do over at soul detective. Come join us.