Chicago's Cadet Records was going great guns in 1970. Groups like
the Dells,
Rotary Connection, and the
Ramsey Lewis Trio were all hitting the regional and national charts. Into this hotbed of talent entered a new group made up of early twenty-something males from the Altgeld Gardens projects (the same locale that had given birth to numerous Chicago soul acts such as the Norfleet Brothers, Patti & the Lovelites, and The Debonaires to name just three). Billy Davis, A&R man from Cadet's parent company Chess, signed the
Shades of Brown after their initial deal with ABC fell through. Producer
Bobby Miller, who'd been working with the label's premier vocal group
the Dells, was brought in and he brought his house arrangers
Charles Stepney, and
Richard Evans, and numerous instrumentalists (including
Phil Upchurch,
Gene Barge, and
Morris Jennings) to help fill out the group's sound -- the four vocalists were backed by a smoking instrumental trio on guitar, bass, and drums. The end result is
S.O.B., one of the great forgotten slabs in Cadet's history. These ten cuts are drenched in the trademark sound of crooning, harmony vocal Chicago soul just as it met the harder driving psychedelic rave-up soul and funk that Motown was beginning to engage with
the Temptations and
the Four Tops and the highly conceptual vocal group sound of Philly soul. An example of the former is in the glorious "Little Girl," where the elegant vocal harmonies are drenched in strings and dramatic tom-toms. Check the furious tempo on "He Didn't Leave Me a Name," with its socially conscious lyrics. The big end horn section on "Man's Worst Enemy," countered with a huge, clear rolling bassline, is high-class uptown soul at its best. The swirling B-3 and low-end strings on "Girl I'm Coming Home" get close to
the Dells and
Temptations in terms of tightly arranged emotion and sung harmonies. "Falling in Love Too Hard" has one of the most ingenious uses of conga drums ever employed on a soul record west of Harlem. That said, any group tracks on this set could be interchanged with them -- meaning, of course, that this is a stone classic. Chicago's combination label and record store Dusty Groove has, with their usual killer instinct, made this title available on compact disc for the first time.
Joe Segal's original liner notes are here, as is a new historical essay by Numero Group's Rob Sevier. This one cannot be praised nearly enough. ~ Thom Jurek