Showing posts with label VIP. Show all posts
Showing posts with label VIP. Show all posts

Sunday, January 20, 2019

The Underdogs - S/T


After three singles on Hideout Records in 1965 and 1966 that went nowhere, Detroit garage rockers The Underdogs probably thought they were finally going to break out in 1967 following the group's signing to Motown's V.I.P. imprint.

In January 1967, V.I.P. released their single "Love's Gone Bad" (b/w "Mojo Hanna"). The band recorded more tracks as well for what I assume was to be their debut album. However, according to the Both Sides Now website, V.I.P. Records only scheduled eight albums during its short life (and two of those were never released), and there's no mention of an Underdogs LP.

The band's newest single didn't sell any better than their previous ones, V.I.P. lost interest and the band faded away.

Then in 2016 and 2017 the collections Motown Unreleased 1966 and Motown Unreleased 1967 came out respectively and included a combined 12 Underdogs tracks. There's also one other track that can be found on the album Motown Sings Motown Treasures. Add the failed single and we've a nice 15-song album:

SIDE A
1. You Hit Me Where It Hurt Me
2. Come on Up
3. If You Don't Want My Love
4. Come See About Me
5. The Way You Do the Things You Do
6. One of These Days
7. Love's Gone Bad [extended version]

SIDE B
1. It's My Time
2. Mojo Hannah
3. I Want A Love I Can See
4. I Got A Feeling Baby
5. Bring It on Home To Me
6. Last Train to Clarksville
7. Need Your Lovin' (Want You Back)
8. Turn on Your Lovelight

This is an interesting collection, and it can be entertaining listening to a garage rock band perform Motown soul hits. A cover of the Supremes' "Come See About Me" doesn't stray far from the original. But "The Way You Do the Things You Do" is almost unrecognizable at the beginning, and the odd "na na na na" from "Land of a Thousand Dances" added in the middle is unexpected. I found an extended version of "Love's Gone Bad" online and included it here as a longer album version of the single.

I opened the second side with "It's My Time" as it seems like the obvious next single. It had actually been originally assigned to The Mynah Birds, but when Rick James was incarcerated and his band broke up, I guess the track was up for grabs.

The oddest choice is a cover of The Monkees' "Last Train to Clarksville." Other than some fuzz guitar, it's basically the same song. Even more odd, according to notes on Motown Unreleased 1967, the song was originally assigned to the Isley Brothers.

I closed out the album with "Turn on Your Lovelight" as it gets the full Motown horn backup and it gives the album a grand conclusion. While most of these songs are enjoyable, there's nothing here that suggests to me that The Underdogs were anything other than standard '60s garage rock.

For a cover, I took one of the two or three band photos I could find, tinted it, and added the group name and VIP Records logo.

Sunday, September 9, 2018

The Mynah Birds -- EP



SIDE A
1. It's My Time
2. Go On and Cry

SIDE B
1. I Got You (In My Soul)
2. I'll Wait Forever

There may or may not be a whole Mynah Birds album locked up in the Motown vaults. According to the Motown discography, there was an album scheduled for release in 1969. But by this time, only one member from the original group that signed with the record label in 1966 was still there.

The group that initially signed with Motown's subsidiary label VIP included Rick James, Neil Young, Bruce Palmer, Rick Mason and John Taylor. However, reportedly, after only recording four songs and right when the band's first single was to be released, word got out that James was a U.S. Army deserter and arrested. 

Motown pulled the single, and the other four members went their separate ways -- Young and Palmer traveled to L.A. and became members of Buffalo Springfield.

Eventually, after serving his jail time, James made it back to Motown and continued to record as the Mynah Birds with other musicians, but those tracks have yet to surface. 

However, the original four songs have been released on Motown compilation albums in recent years. What I've done here is simply make a self-titled EP of those tracks. UMe Records issued "It's My Time" and "Go On and Cry" as a 7-inch single in 2012 for Record Store Day (only 46 years after Motown pulled it). I took the record sleeve artwork for that and made some adjustments (removing excess verbiage and adding the VIP logo and song titles) to create the EP cover.

 "It's My Time" and "Go On and Cry" can be found on The Complete Motown Singles, Vol. 6: 1966; and "I Got You (In My Soul)" and "I'll Wait Forever" can be found on Motown Unreleased: 1966.

It would be great if someone would collect all the Mynah Birds tracks and issue them in one set.