I consider myself to be quite knowledgeable when it comes to R & B, soul, reggae, blues, and African music. But as much as I love the various musical styles under these categories , I have never been a fanatical collector. So there are various obscure gems that I don't have or haven't heard. Still, in this day when everything worth digging up seems to have been re-issued on CD, it is surprising when I come upon a really outstanding artist whose body of work is largely unknown to me. For that matter, it is surprising anytime you find something worthwhile that has not been previously issued on CD. It is actually kind of thrilling to know that that there are still great pieces of music to be discovered, even in these well-mind genres. One such artist is Barbara & The Browns, an R & B vocal group from the Sixties and the early Seventies. I had heard their name--encountering it first on the first volume of the Stax Complete Singles box set. There's a couple cuts on there but neither made a big impression on me. The minor hit "Big Party" just isn't a particularly great song. But browsing around YouTube these days--the ultimate treasure house of great obscurities--I chanced upon a Barbara & The Browns cut entitled "I Don't Have To Wait", posted by some beneficent music lover. I clicked on it and was rewarded by a warm, earthy slice of Southern soul balladry--really nice! Shortly after, I saw a rave review of a Barbara And The Browns compilation CD CAN'T FIND HAPPINESS--possibly in Mojo or In The Basement magazines--that gather together Barbara & The Browns' most notable releases over an eight year period from various labels, a collection curated by the good folks at Kent Records in the UK (God bless the UK soul fanatics, even as we forgive them their Northern soul deification of too many medicre obscurities!). A few mouse clicks on Amazon and the CD was on its way to my mailbox. The internet does have many blessings for the music lover.
CAN'T FIND HAPPINESS brings together the best tracks from Barbara & The Browns' decade-long career which ended in 1972. THe CD includes five previously unreleased gems unearthed by Dean Rudland, one of those aforementioned UK soul fanatics, when he made a pilgrimage to Ardent Studios in Memphis, where most of these recordings were made. Amazingly only one of the five recordings on CAN'T FIND HAPPINESS managed to hit the charts, barely scraping onto the Hot 100 in Billboard. As good as Barbara & The Browns were--and they were very good--they never had a hit or anything close to a hit.
Like so many great artists of the soul era, Barbara & The Browns started as a gospel group. The Brown family had ten children; Barbara and three of her sisters made up Barbara & The Browns. When they approached soon-to-be legendary producer Chips Moman, who had also a musician/engineer in the earliest days of Stax Records, about doing a gospel recording, he convinced them to record an R & B tune he'd written called "Big Party" and leased the master to Stax., where it became the groups only chart recording. Stax then put them together with Steve Cropper for a couple of songs but they did not hit. The group then when back to Chipos Moman, who was involved with the small ne label XL Sounds with its Sounds Of Memphis affiliate. It was a much a production company as a label becuase they frequently leased their productions to bigger labels such as Atco, Chess' Cadet subsidiary, Tower Records, MGM and others.
Barbara had earthy voice that could soar but often had a raw edge. Shewas equally compelling on both ballads and uptempo material. The recordings on CAN'T FIND HAPPINESS embody classic Memphis soul sounds. The musicians on many of the tracks are the same great Memphis session players who played on on countless hit records for other labels--folks like Tommy Cogbill, Reggie Young and Gene Chrisman. Many of the recordings were done at Sam Phillips' legendary studio in Memphis. For me, the greatest moments on the CD are ballads, straight-to-the-heart, elemental tales of undeniable love and lust as well as the pain of love lost with titles such as "If I Can't Run To You I'll Crawl", "Things Have Gone To Pieces", and "It Hurts Me So Much(To Be Able To Look And TO Know I Can't Touch"). This is stick-to-your-ribs music for heart and soul. So I'm enjoying the heck out of Barbara & The Browns CAN'T FIND HAPPINESS. If you like classic southern soul music you will too!