Have just noticed that some videos of 14 Karat Soul have been uploaded to youtube recently. I have written at length about the group here and elsewhere: seeing them in the mid-eighties at a week-long residency at Glasgow's Mitchell Theatre remains one of the most thrilling concert experiences I have ever had and I curse myself for not making a surreptitious recording during one of the several nights I attended. Whether there exists a high quality recording of their live act I know not; but there are odd bits and pieces on youtube: a BBC radio session here, a Channel 4 appearance there, and so on.
And now there are a few videos of their early days. Here is Carry Me Back from the show Sister Suzie Cinema - this live recording must be from 1980 as it was made the week before the premiere of the show in New York. Glenny T (I presume; it's hard to be certain) introduces Bobby Wilson, who delivers a stunning lead. Despite the low quality of sound and vision this is a treat. Reginald "Briz" Brisbon comes through loud and clear, driving the group along.
The lineup of that time is given on the Mabou Mines website as David S. Thurmond, Glen (Glenny T) Wright, Russell Fox 2d, Bobby S. Wilson and Reginold (Briz) Brisbon, so this must have been before Brian "Lamont" Simpson was recruited. The image at the top of this post also comes from that site.
I can't now remember whether he was in the production of Sister Suzie Cinema and The Gospel at Colonus which I saw in Edinburgh a year or two afterwards but he was definitely in the group at the time of the Mitchell Theatre, putting his everything into Annie Had a Baby and other songs.
I will return to this post over the next few days to add more videos. It's not quite my dream of coming across a high quality tape of their complete live repertoire of the time but it reminds me of that excitement which is almost forty years old now.
Related posts:
14 Karat Soul
14 Karat Soul live on Channel 4
14 Karat Soul as they should be heard
The first and last picture show: Sister Suzie Cinema on Soundcloud
Try Them One More Time
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