Various - Eccentric Soul: A Red Green Black Production

  by Andrew Carver

published: 28 / 4 / 2012

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The folks at Numero Records have been tireless in tracking unknown and overlooked artists, and have found more than a few diamonds in the rough. The focus of 'Eccentric Soul: A Red Black and Green Production' is Robert Hosea Williams. A go-to producer in the Washington DC area, he was also inspired to start his own label by the Afro-centric ideology of Father’s Children, whose ‘I Really Really Love You’(1973) kicks off the set. Despite the nineteen tracks on the album keep to the traditional soul themes of love, loss and struggling to get by - these were, after all, songs he was trying to place with the larger labels he was doing engineering work with. Accompanied by some adulatory liner notes and the usual classy Numero packaging job, the songs should hit the sweet spot of most soul fans - there’s the crying violins of Summits’ ‘Sleepwalking’, the keening vocals of Mark Greene on the Exceptions’ ‘We’re In Love’ and ‘It Must be Love’, and 'Day By Day’, the streetwise groove and alternately gutsy and breathy singing of Skip Mahoaney and the Casuals. The superb Dyson’s Faces put up a couple of dynamite tracks. Clifton Dyson has a voice that was born to plead on ‘Don’t Worry About the Joneses’ and ‘We’re Two Fools in Love’, and the exceptional backing both vocally and musically. On the other hand, Williams’ failure to break any of his bands big is echoed in Promise’s ‘I’m Not Ready For Love’. The five-girl combo was originally called the Gerldets. A photo accompanying their write up shows they were billed as purveyors as ‘the sexiest rock and soul’. Unfortunately the lyrics of their one tune on the compilation, ‘I’m Not Ready For Love’ take exactly the opposite tack, and must have seemed ridiculously naive for 1975, when George Clinton and Co. were producing efforts like ‘Chocolate City’. While the music brings the funky goods (the band wisely declined to tour without the company of their regular backing band), the lyrics are strictly for lovers of good-girl pop. By comparison, Father’s Children ‘Phoney People’ is much more of its time - it’s no wonder they were hauled away to the majors in L.A. The other band on the comp, East Coast Connection comes across like a fantastic party band with some fast-paced groovers like ‘Summer In The Park’ propelled along by pumping brass. Unfortunately musical capability, fame and fortune rarely walk hand in hand, and both the bands and Williams found regular employment and family life more appealing than slogging it out on the road. Fortunately engineer and musicians lasted long enough to cross paths and leave soul lovers with another time capsule, lovingly curated by the soul diehards at Numero.

Track Listing:-

1 I Really Really Love You
2 Sleepwalking
3 We're In Love
4 Town Called Nowhere
5 It Takes Two
6 It Must Be Love
7 Dont Worry About The Joneses
8 We Share Love
9 Generation
10 Im Not Ready For Love
11 Phoney People
12 Summer In The Park Pt. 1
13 Were Two Fools In Love
14 Lets Do It Over
15 Day By Day
16 I Need Your Love
17 I'll Never Say No
18 Seems Like
19 Linda Movement

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