With summer winding down, we now start to look to the fall and what’s coming up in that season.  Real Gone has recently announced a couple of 2-CD compilations in the R&B/Soul genre due on October 5^.

The first is The Complete ABC/Dunhill Singles from the Four Tops.  The vocal quartet of Levi Stubbs, Abdul “Duke” Fakir, Renaldo “Obie” Benson and Lawrence Payton needs little introduction as they were the Motown stalwarts who gave us such classics as “I Can’t Help Myself (Sugar Pie Honey Bunch)” and “Reach Out I’ll Be There” in the 1960s.  But, by 1972, the Motown brass had decided to move their operations from Detroit to Los Angeles and several acts, including Four Tops, decided to part ways with the company.  The group signed with ABC/Dunhill, remaining with the label until 1978.  During that time, they released seven studio LPs and one live album.  In addition, they released 33 single sides, all of which are included on Real Gone’s 2-CD set.

When Four Tops arrived at ABC/Dunhill, they were assigned to producer Steve Barri, who had worked with The Grass Roots.  (Eventually during their tenure at the label, the group’s Lawrence Payton would take over producing duties and they would work with Philadelphia’s Norman Harris.)  Their primary songwriting team was that of Dennis Lambert and Brian Potter.  All told, Four Tops racked up a total of 11 Pop chart hits and 15 R&B chart hits at ABC/Dunhill.  Their highest climbing single was 1973’s “Ain’t No Woman (Like The One I’ve Got)” which hit No. 4 on the Pop side and No. 2 on the R&B side.  The group then moved to Casablanca in 1978 before returning to Motown in 1983.

Real Gone’s new compilation follows on from their other Dunhill singles compilations featuring The Mamas and The Papas, Steppenwolf, and The Grass Roots.  Singles from Dunhill have been slow to arrive on CD due to the legend that head of label, Jay Lasker, threw out the tapes when he deemed them worthless.  For this Four Tops set, 27 of the tracks have never been on CD in their correct single versions and 13 of the songs have never appeared on CD at all.  The first seven songs are in mono, the rest are in stereo.

The team behind Real Gone’s previous Dunhill singles collections have put together this new compilation: engineer Aaron Kannowski, Ed Osborne on A&R and liner notes and co-producer Gordon Anderson.  Osborne’s notes feature new quotes from Steve Barri and Dennis Lambert.

Next up from Real Gone is Joe Simon’s Step-By-Step: The Complete Pop Hits.  This 2-CD, 35-track set gathers up all of Simon’s hits on the Billboard Pop chart.  Simon, the R&B singer dubbed the “Mouth of the South” signed to Vee-Jay label in the early 1960s and scored his first hit in 1964 with “My Adorable One,” the lead-off song on Real Gone’s set.  When Vee-Jay folded, he moved to Monument Records subsidiary Sound Stage 7 in 1966.  He continued his hit-making ways with such songs as “Teenager’s Prayer” and “You Keep Me Hangin’ On.”  His biggest hit for the label came with 1969’s “The Chokin’ Kind’ which went to No. 13 Pop/No. 1 R&B and won him a Grammy for Best Male R&B Vocal Performance in 1970.

That same year, Simon moved to Polydor-distributed label Spring Records where he teamed with Kenny Gamble and Leon Huff.  His hits with them included 1971’s “Drowning In a Sea of Love” (No. 11 Pop/#No. 3 R&B) and 1972’s “Power of Love” (No. 11 Pop/No. 1 R&B).  The next year, Simon wrote and performed the title song to the Warner Bros. film Cleopatra Jones, which hit the Top 20 of Pop chart.  His biggest hit on that chart came with 1975’s No. 8 hit “Get Down, Get Down (Get On The Floor),” which he co-wrote with Raeford Gerald.  The last track on the set is 1976’s “Come Get To This,” his final entry on the Pop chart.  Simon continued to have R&B hits into the early 1980s before becoming a preacher and moving into gospel recording.

Real Gone’s compilation has been produced with the full cooperation of Joe Simon.  Grammy-nominated producer Mitchell Cohen has written the liner notes, which include new quotes from the artist.  It has been remastered by Mike Milchner at SonicVision.

If you would like to give either of these double disc compilations due on October 5 a try, we’ve got the preorder links and full tracklistings below.

Four Tops, The Complete ABC/Dunhill Singles (Real Gone Music, 2018) (Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada)

Disc 1

1. Keeper of the Castle
2. Jubilee with Soul
3. Ain’t No Woman (Like The One I’ve Got)
4. The Good Lord Knows
5. Are You Man Enough
6. Peace of Mind
7. Sweet Understanding Love
8. Main Street People
9. I Just Can’t Get You Out of My Mind
10. Am I My Brother’s Keeper
11. One Chain Don’t Make No Prison
12. Turn on the Light of Your Love
13. Midnight Flower
14. All My Love
15. Seven Lonely Nights
16. I Can’t Hold Out Much Longer

Disc 2

1. We All Gotta Stick Together
2. (It Would Almost) Drive Me Out of My Mind
3. Mama You’re All Right with Me
4. I’m Glad You Walked into My Life
5. Catfish
6. Look at My Baby
7. Feel Free
8. I Know You Like It
9. Strung Out for Your Love
10. You Can’t Hold Back on Love
11. The Show Must Go On
12. Runnin’ from Your Love
13. H.E.L.P.
14. Inside a Brokenhearted Man
15. Just in Time
16. This House
17. Guardian De Tu Castillo

Joe Simon, Step By Step: The Complete Pop Hits (Real Gone Music, 2018) (Amazon U.S. / Amazon U.K. / Amazon Canada)

Disc 1

1. My Adorable One
2. Teenager’s Prayer
3. My Special Prayer
4. Put Your Trust in Me (Depend on Me)
5. Nine Pound Steel
6. No Sad Songs
7. You Keep Me Hangin’ On
8. Message from Maria
9. I Worry About You
10. Looking Back
11. The Chokin’ Kind
12. Baby, Don’t Be Looking in My Mind
13. San Francisco Is a Lonely Town
14. It’s Hard to Get Along
15. Moon Walk Part I
16. Farther On Down the Road
17. Yours Love
18. That’s the Way I Want Our Love
19. Misty Blue

Disc 2

1. Your Time to Cry
2. Help Me Make It Through the Night
3. To Lay Down Beside You
4. You’re the One for Me
5. All My Hard Times
6. Drowning in the Sea of Love
7. Pool of Bad Luck
8. Power of Love
9. Trouble in My Home
10. I Found My Dad
11. Step by Step
12. Theme from “Cleopatra Jones”
13. River
14. Get Down, Get Down (Get on the Floor)
15. Music in My Bones
16. Come Get to This