The Masqueraders

An interview with The Masqueraders from 2004

From Soul Express 1/2004

THE MASQUERADERS INTERVIEW (2004)

  Of the 29 songs the Masqueraders recorded  between 1965 and 1972, Unmasked (Grapevine; ‘04; 26 tracks; 73 min.) offers us 23 plus three previously unreleased ones.  The set was compiled by Garry J. Cape and John Anderson and the liners were written by Martin Goggin.  We ran the full feature on the group in our # 2/2001 issue, and some of the comments in this review are from that story, some are fresh.

  The history of the group goes back as far as to the year of 1957, when Robert “Tex” Wrightsil, Charlie Moore, Johnny Davis, Lawrence Davis and Little Charlie Gibson formed the Stairs and did a couple of recordings for Alvin Howard’s Sound Town label out of Dallas.  In the more or less stable line-up of Lee Jones as the lead, ”Tex”, Charlie Moore, Harold Thomas and David Sanders they toured as the New Drifters in the early sixties, although on the road Harold was replaced by Orberdean Deloney.

  Their very first single as the Masqueraders, Man’s Temptation / Dancing Doll, was released in early ‘64 on the MK label, but you can’t find it on this comp.  Harold Thomas: ”We didn’t have that one.  Nobody could come up with it.”  However, their second effort on Alvin Howard’s Soultown label in ‘65 is included.  Talk About A Woman and That’s The Same Thing are two early stompers with some rough and loud background singing.  Harold: ”That was Little Charlie.  As a matter of fact, we recorded it on a two-track machine.  The music was on one track, and the vocals was on the other track.  I think the engineer, once he took the tape, just left it like it was.  Even when we went to the radio station, the jock didn’t tell us whether it was good or bad.  He just said we needed to go either to Stax or Motown.  When we went to Motown, we didn’t even take the record.”

  Of their seven Detroit songs, which came out on LaBeat in ‘66 and ‘67, four are presented on this set.  Mainly produced by Lou Beatty and the three Brothers Of Soul members, with the exception of a mid-paced pleader called One More Chance they are either poppy beaters (Together That’s The Only Way, How Can I Go On), or driving scorchers (I Got The Power).  Among the ones that are missing are the gospel-infused Family and a nice ballad called Be Happy For Me, and I guess this is due to the fact that when compiling these records mainly for the British market the company has to take into consideration the northern scene, although in other parts of the world it may not be so enthusiastically recognized.  Harold: ”When we were booked to come to Britain, the songs that they wanted us to perform were all uptempo stuff, and we didn’t understand why.”

  Their next nine singles, which came out on Wand, Amy, Bell and AGP between ‘68 and ‘70, were all cut under the supervision of Chips Moman at his American Studios in Memphis.  A great deepie called Let’s Face Facts has the same backing track as James Carr’s I’ve Gotta Go.  Harold: ”That’s our song.  We did it first.  We did it for Otis Redding, but that year he had the tragedy, so we didn’t get a chance to get it to him, but Chips Moman knew we had written a song for Otis Redding.  James Carr was currently cutting at American, too.  They just probably pulled the track out and let him sing on that track.”  On the flip they had a Motown soundalike, a driving dancer titled I Don’t Want Nobody To Lead Me On.

  Also the next single – a strong soul ballad called Sweet Lovin’ Woman, which could have been out of Arthur Conley’s repertoire, backed with a beater titled Do You Love Me Baby – was released on Wand, because at the time Florence Greenberg happened to be at American with Ronnie Milsap and Chips persuaded her to put the Masqueraders out on her label.

  Two fine soul slowies, This Heart Is Haunted and the country-tinged On The Other Side, came out on Amy as Lee Jones & The Sounds Of Soul.  Harold: ”Between the transition of our staying with Wand and Larry Uttal, who had Bell Records, we had come up with some more tracks.  Chips was really excited.  We were already hooked up with Wand as the Masqueraders, but Chips figuring himself to be a smart business guy wanted to release more material on us.  He did it by releasing it under the name of Lee Jones and the Sounds Of Soul.  It was little odd, but it was just a one-record deal.”

  Tommy Cogbill produced their biggest hit, a slow and impressive soul ballad called I Ain’t Got To Love Nobody Else (# 7-r&b in late ‘68), backed with an ordinary stomper named I Got It.  Robert Wrightsil: ”Tommy was a studio musician, a bass guitar player, plus he would produce us some things.  Actually he’s the one that got us a hit.  We’d give Chips our best song and he’d say he didn’t like it.  We’d give Tommy our best song, and he’d record us.”  David Sanders: ”Most of the songs we cut were done as demos.  That’s why we never had an album during that time, because when we were recording it was meant for someone else to record.  I Ain’t Got To Love Nobody Else was for us, but at the time when we did that song, Chips really didn’t like it.  Tommy Cogbill did the production on that.  A DJ came by to listen to some of the stuff in the studio, liked our record and thought it was a hit, so they put it out and it took off.”

  A deepish soul ballad called I’m Just An Average Guy (# 24-r&b), backed with a mover titled I Ain’t Gonna Stop, was released next on Chips’ own AGP imprint.  Robert: ”Chips thought he could make more money by us being on his label, but he didn’t know how to promote.”  Harold: ”I believe that Chips jumped the gun and told Larry he wanted to put us on the AGP label and I think it kinda frustrated Larry.”

  A big-orchestrated, pleading slowie, with David Sanders on lead, called Say It flopped (the b-side, a mover named The Grass Was Green, isn’t included on the comp), and so did the follow-up, Love, Peace And Understanding, a driving dancer, backed with a poppy swayer called Tell Me You Love Me, something the Association might have cut.

  A mid-paced pop song titled How Big Is Big and its flip, a heavy deepie called Please Take Me Back, were released on Bell (874).  Harold: ”We didn’t have a distributor.  Larry Uttal was just frustrated.  After that Chips – to make amends with Larry – agreed to put us back on Bell Records, but it was over.  Larry was already heartbroken.”  The final Bell single, James Taylor’s rock & blues song called Steamroller and a vibrant mid-pacer titled Brotherhood, are omitted.

  On the set there are three previously unreleased tracks, a mid-paced poppy ditty named Poor Boy’s Dream (with Robert on lead), an average beater titled I’ll Be Ready (Lee is leading as normally) and a ballad called Accept Me As I Am (Harold’s turn to lead).  Harold: ”Darryl Carter was the person, who did the demos.  If Chips had liked them, he could have told Tommy Cogbill to finish them.  We put them down as demos, and those were the songs that Chips wasn’t really impressed with.”

  Next the boys returned to Dallas, without Lee Jones, and found regular jobs.  Harold: ”Everybody was kinda working around and keep families going on.”  In the early 70s for their own Stairway label they cut a sweet and sophisticated ballad called Let Me Show The World I Love You, with Harold on the falsetto lead, and a semi-psychedelic – á la the Temptations – mid-paced mover titled The Truth Is Free, with Sam Hutchins on lead this time.  David: ”It was just local stuff.  It was good stuff, but we just didn’t have money to follow it up.”  Harold: ”They did real good locally.  We didn’t know a lot about the industry.  We had met a distributor, who had several shops in the area.  We called him and told that we had cut a record, and he gave us the money to press it up.  We only got five thousand records pressed up, but we sold most of them.”

  The Masqueraders released two good singles on Hi Records in ‘73 and ‘74 before hooking up with Isaac Hayes for two albums and three singles on HBS/ABC (‘75-’77).  In 1979 Harold released one gospel single on his Gospel City Records label, and the whole group cut many sides in the hope of striking a deal with Pathfinder in the late 70s.  Harold: ”We recorded those songs in Paul Zelesky’s studio.  The songs were between us and Paul.  We didn’t have any money, but he agreed to let us put our demos down and come up with a good record deal out of it.  All of that was leading up to the time, when we got with Bang.  There were some good songs, we just have to redo them.  Paul has them, but we didn’t give him the right to own them.”

  On Bang they had one album and two singles in 1980, and finally, besides some background work, they released two singles in the early 90s on their own TNT label.  Harold: ”We’re deciding now, which way we’re gonna go with our music – it’s like either TNT, Stairway or Soultown.  Soultown was created by Alvin Howard, who has passed away, but anything he had we can use.  Right now Memphis is working on becoming the independent music capital of the world, so we’re trying to line up, so we can get some material to go.”  The group was supposed to visit the U.K. a while ago, but due to some problems with passports it didn’t come about, but now they’re ready to try again.