In 1962/3,
Dagenham guitarists Vince Nichols and Kevin Sheehan, sharing a passion for
American R'n'B, formed rock band The Boys. Local singer
Sean Buckley joined them a year later, closely followed by drummer Dave
Simmonds, also a Dagenhamite, and
bass-player Colin 'Doc' Banyard from Elm Park. With this line-up the
Breadcrumbs were formed.
Turning
professional in 1965, and managed by Kenny Johnson, in whose Stratford E.15.
pub "The Two Puddings" they held a
long-term residency, the band worked London pubs and clubs and toured
extensively in concert, supporting The Kinks, The Who, The Animals, The
Pretty Things, Manfred Mann, Jerry Lee Lewis, Them, P.J.Proby and many
others.
After
auditioning for Shel Talmy, their first record 'It Hurts Me When I Cry/
Everybody Knows', engineered by Glyn Johns and featuring Jimmy Page, was
released on Stateside.
From 1966,
with a name-change to The Sean Buckley Set, they travelled further afield,
Spending long periods in Frankfurt, Copenhagen,Lyons, Avignon and Munich,
where an album of covers,'Hithouse Hits', was cut for Polydor.
The band split
in 1967, the Breadcrumbs scattering to find bread in other arenas, though
mostly still involved in music.
In 1970/1?
Sean and Vince re-united, using percussion and acoustic guitar to form the
duo Buckley, who were taken on by the Tremelos management company, Gale
Music.
Their record
'Billy Boy/ The Higher the Fewer' came out on Bell Records.
Personnel: Colin Banyard (bass) Sean Buckley (vocals) Vince Nichols (guitar, vocals) Kevin Sheehan (guitar, vocals) Dave Simmonds (drums) + unknown brass section
Tracklist: 01.19th Nervous Breakdown (Jagger/Richards) 3.50 02. Shapes Of Things (McCarty/Relf/Samwell-Smith) 2.21 03. Sounds Of Silence (Simon) 3.13 04. I Fought The Law (Curtis) 2.18 05. Listen People (Gouldman) 3.13 06. Keep On Running (Edwards) 2.52 07. Soulsville U.S.A. (Floyd/Cropper) 3.13 08. These Boots Are Made For Walking (Hazelwood) 2.40 09. Get Out Off My Life Woman (Toussaint) 3.04 10. I Got You (I Feel Good) (Brown) 2.47 11. Uptight (Wonder) 3.27 12. Michelle (Lennon/McCartney) 2.30 13. Jenny Take A Ride (Crewe/Johnson/Penniman) 3.55 14. To Whom It Concerns (Andrews) 2.42
Q: She's 16 and British, what can she possibly know about singing
vintage American soul music? A: Enough to make you squirm, get off your
ass, and dance close with anybody who'll have you. Joss Stone
is a young woman who, if you believe the story, was about to record her
wannabe pop smash debut and then be well on her way to becoming the
next Britney/Christina. Then she heard some vintage American Miami soul made by the likes of Latimore, Little Beaver, Betty Wright, Timmy Thomas, and the like, and genuine inspiration took hold. The result of all this career changing (or diva postponement) is The Soul Sessions, a collection of ten badass soul classics recorded with all of the above folks -- soul princess Betty Wright and S-Curve's Steve Greenberg produced almost all of it in Miami, though a pair of tracks were recorded in New York with R&B wunderkind Mike Mangini and a souled-out cover of the White Stripes "Fell in Love With a Boy," guided by the Roots'
?uestlove (Ahmir Thompson) on the modern tip, was cut in Philly. These
jams drip honey sweet and hard with tough, sexy soul, and Stone's voice is larger than life. It's true she's been tutored and mentored by Wright and her musical collaborators in the science of groove, but she keeps it raw enough to be real. Her reading of Harlan Howard's "The Chokin' Kind" reveals that it should have been an R&B tune all along -- check out Little Beaver's (Willie Hale) guitar solo. Her reading of Bobby Miller's "Dirty Man," a track associated with Wright, is gutsy and completely believable, and the interplay between Latimore's piano and Beaver's funky, shimmering guitaristry brings Stone's vocal down to street level.
For a woman as young as Stone to tackle Carla Thomas' "I've Fallen in Love With You" and Aretha Franklin's "All the King's Horses," not to mention John Ellison's nugget "Some Kind of Wonderful," takes guts, chops, or a genuine delusional personality to pull off. Stone
has the former two. She has unique phrasing and a huge voice that
accents, dips, and slips, never overworking a song or trying to bring
attention to itself via hollow acrobatics. The strings and funky
backbeat provided by Thompson on "I've Fallen in Love With You" are
chilling in the way they prod Stone
to just spill a need out of her heart that one would believe would be
beyond her years. And speaking of Thompson, his production of the Stripes tune is more than remarkable; it conveys Jack White's intent but in an entirely new language. The set closes with Stone's radical reread of the Isleys' "For the Love of You," a daunting and audacious task. The way she tackles this song, prodded only by Angelo Morris'
keyboard whispering alongside her, is far from reverential, but it is
true, accurate, moving, and stunningly -- even heartbreakingly --
beautiful. This is a debut that, along with those fine practitioners in
the nu-soul underground such as Peven Everett, Julie Dexter, Yas-rah, Fertile Ground,
and a few others, is solid proof that soul is alive and well. And
perhaps, given her youth and stunning looks, the perverse star-making
machinery will use this unusual entry into the marketplace to
reinvestigate the wonders of timeless depth and vision inherent in soul
and R&B that are far from exhausted, as this record so convincingly
proves.
Personnel: Cindy Blackmann (drums) Jack Daley (bass) Willie "Little Beaver" Hale (guitar) Benny Latimore (piano) Angelo Morris (keyboards, guitar) Joss Stone (vocals) + Adam Blackstone (bass on 03. + 10.) Deanna Carroll (background vocals on 07.) Mark Ciprit (guitar on 07.) Kirk Douglas (guitar on 03. + 10.) Karen Dreyfuss (viola on 07.) Taneka Duggan (background vocals on 07.) Jimmy Farkus (guitar on 05.) Sam Furnace (saxophone on 07.) Steve Greenwell (bass on 07.) Dawn Hannay (viola on 07.) Kamal (keyboards on 03.) Lisa Kim (violin on 07.) Myung Hi Kim (violin on 07.) Sarah Kim (violin on 07.) Soo Hyun Kwon (violin on 07.) Leanne LeBlanc (cello on 07.) Liz Lim (violin on 07.) Mike Mangini (tambourine on 02.) Namphuyo Aisha McCray (background vocals on 01., 02., 04., 06. + 09.) Ignacio Nunez (percussion on 02.) Sandra Park (violin on 07.) Danny Pierre (keyboards on 07.) James Poyser (keyboards on 03. + 10.) Robert Rinehart (viola on 07.) Tom Rosenfeld (viola on 07.) Laura Seaton (violin on 07.) Sarah Seiver (cello on 07.) Rob Shaw (violin on 07.) Fiona Simon (violin on 07.) Alan Stepansky (cello on 07.) Angie Stone (background vocals on 03. + 10.) Jenny Strenger (violin on 07.) Timmy Thomas (organ on 01., 02., 04. + 08.) Ahmir Thompson (drums on 03., 07. + 10.) Jeremy Turner (cello on 07.) Betty Wright (background vocals on 01. - 03., 04., 06., 09. - 10.) Jeanette Wright (background vocals on 01., 02., 04., 06., 09.) Sharon Yamada (violin 07.) Jung Sun Yoo (violin on 07.)
Tracklist: 01. The Chokin´ Kind (Howard) 3.35 02. Super Duper Love (Are You Diggin´ On Me ?) Pt. 1 (Garner) 4.20 03. Fell In Love With A Boy (White) 3.38 04. Victim Of A Foolish Heart (Buckins/Jackson) 5.31 05. Dirty Man (Miller) 2.59 06. Some Kind Of Wonderful (Ellison) 3.56 07. I´ve Fallen In Love With You (Thomas) 4.29 08. I Had A Dream (Sebastian) 3.01 09. All The King´s Horses (Franklin) 3.03 10. For The Love Of You Pt. 1 & 2 (E.Isley/M.Isley/K.Isley/R.Isley/R.Isley/Jasper) 7.33
In 1962/3,
Dagenham guitarists Vince Nichols and Kevin Sheehan, sharing a passion for
American R'n'B, formed rock band The Boys.
Q: She's 16 and British, what can she possibly know about singing
vintage American soul music? A: Enough to make you squirm, get off your
ass, and dance close with anybody who'll have you. Joss Stone
is a young woman who, if you believe the story, was about to record her
wannabe pop smash debut and then be well on her way to becoming the
next Britney/Christina. Then she heard some vintage American Miami soul made by the likes of Latimore, Little Beaver, Betty Wright, Timmy Thomas, and the like, and genuine inspiration took hold. The result of all this career changing (or diva postponement) is The Soul Sessions, a collection of ten badass soul classics recorded with all of the above folks -- soul princess Betty Wright and S-Curve's Steve Greenberg produced almost all of it in Miami, though a pair of tracks were recorded in New York with R&B wunderkind Mike Mangini and a souled-out cover of the White Stripes "Fell in Love With a Boy," guided by the Roots'
?uestlove (Ahmir Thompson) on the modern tip, was cut in Philly. These
jams drip honey sweet and hard with tough, sexy soul, and Stone's voice is larger than life. It's true she's been tutored and mentored by Wright and her musical collaborators in the science of groove, but she keeps it raw enough to be real. Her reading of Harlan Howard's "The Chokin' Kind" reveals that it should have been an R&B tune all along -- check out Little Beaver's (Willie Hale) guitar solo. Her reading of Bobby Miller's "Dirty Man," a track associated with Wright, is gutsy and completely believable, and the interplay between Latimore's piano and Beaver's funky, shimmering guitaristry brings Stone's vocal down to street level.
