Jr. Walker - URGENT!!!

[marv2]

Y'all remember this one? One of my favorites of Junior's from the 80's......"URGENT"!



http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qjt1AQli-P0

[marv2]

Junior can also be heard blowin' down the house on Foreigner's original from '81:


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JA6id4--BDg

[thomas96]

Does anyone know of footage of him performing this with Foreigner? I heard that he played a few shows with them after it was released but maybe there's no video of it.

[marv2]

Does anyone know of footage of him performing this with Foreigner? I heard that he played a few shows with them after it was released but maybe there's no video of it.

I also heard he toured with them a bit back in the 80's. I'll keep an eye out for any footage.

[Methuselah2]

Jr.'s version with the All Stars is clearly the one! Relentlessly pulsating--truly sensational. It snaps, it slaps, it snarls, it seethes, it smashes anything that gets it its way. Jr. & the All Stars could do no wrong. Thanks, Marv, for posting this terrific example from the mid-80s that highlights their brilliance in as full-force as it only ever was.

[marv2]

Jr.'s version with the All Stars is clearly the one! Relentlessly pulsating--truly sensational. It snaps, it slaps, it snarls, it seethes, it smashes anything that gets it its way. Jr. & the All Stars could do no wrong. Thanks, Marv, for posting this terrific example from the mid-80s that highlights their brilliance in as full-force as it only ever was.

You welcome and you are right! Jr's version is smokin'! Do you know if Jr Walker & the Allstars were represented in the Motown Musical at all?

[Methuselah2]

This cast listing shows Jr. being played by Wilkie Ferguson III as well as Maurice Murphy:

http://www.playbillvault.com/Show/Detail/Cast/13983/Motown-The-Musical-at-Lunt-Fontanne-Theatre

[soulster]

A little bit of info you may not know:

When Foreigner was recording "Urgent" in 1981, band leader, writer, and producer Mick Jones wanted Jr. Walker to play that sax solo on the record. So, he got him to come down to the studio to cut it. But, it was at the end of the disco era and Jr. Walker had been used to playing disco-style music. So, Jones had Walker do numerous takes of a solo, whatever Walker wanted to play, but still couldn't get the sound Jones wanted, the sound that Walker used to play back in the Motown days. So, when they mixed the song, he comped the many takes into the solo you hear on the song today. Yup, Jr. Walker never played that solo! It was all a bunch of punch-ins, and if you go back and listen to "Urgent" you will suddenly hear all those punches. In fact, before Jr. Walker could play the song live, he had to actually learn the part from listening to the record.

"Urgent" hit #4 on Billboard's Hot 100 in the fall of 1981, and stayed on the chart for 23 weeks. No doubt Jr. Walker made that record!

[thomas96]

I have some more information on this as well to add to what soulster gave us. It's on paper at my house in Boston, so once I get back there, I will type it up here. It's quite interesting.

[marv2]

This is all interesting. I just know that I liked the original song when I first heard it. I had no idea that it would be played almost constantly for months afterwards. I didn't know it was Junior on the record until a few weeks after hearing it on the radio. When he reprised it in 84-85,.I loved it all over again. It was even danceable the second time around.

[stephanie]

I had never heard the Jr Walker version I like it better than Foreigner [[and I LOVE that group) Jr has a good singing voice he is the man.

[marv2]

I had never heard the Jr Walker version I like it better than Foreigner [[and I LOVE that group) Jr has a good singing voice he is the man.

Stephanie, I agree. It is a shame that Junior Walker was never given credit for his vocals, his "gut bucket" voice sold a lot of records.

[thomas96]

Stephanie, I agree. It is a shame that Junior Walker was never given credit for his vocals, his "gut bucket" voice sold a lot of records.

Very forgotten as a vocalist. His sax is clearly the main appeal, but the man really can sing! DAMN! Junior has got to be one of my favorite acts, with pretty much every song he lended his sax and voice to being fantastic.

[marv2]

Very forgotten as a vocalist. His sax is clearly the main appeal, but the man really can sing! DAMN! Junior has got to be one of my favorite acts, with pretty much every song he lended his sax and voice to being fantastic.

I can't even begin to name all of my favorites by Junior Walker [[& the Allstars) so I will mention one that got played a lot at our house when I was a kid:


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b35kP8MvV4U

[thomas96]

I can't even begin to name all of my favorites by Junior Walker [[& the Allstars) so I will mention one that got played a lot at our house when I was a kid:


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b35kP8MvV4U

Love it. The amazing thing is he remained relevant from about '65 to '73 with literally all that material being great material.
Some of my favorites that weren't big hits:
Pieces of a Man
Teach Them to Pray
Gotta Hold On To This Feeling
Walk In The Night
Cleo's Mood
Pucker Up Buttercup
Way Back Home
These Things Will Keep Me Loving You
I Ain't Going Nowhere

And of course Shotgun, Money, How Sweet It Is, What Does It Take, etc.

[marv2]

Love it. The amazing thing is he remained relevant from about '65 to '73 with literally all that material being great material.
Some of my favorites that weren't big hits:
Pieces of a Man
Teach Them to Pray
Gotta Hold On To This Feeling
Walk In The Night
Cleo's Mood
Pucker Up Buttercup
Way Back Home
These Things Will Keep Me Loving You
I Ain't Going Nowhere

And of course Shotgun, Money, How Sweet It Is, What Does It Take, etc.

Thomas it really depends on where you lived when these songs were new because I would consider many on your list to have been hits in that they received a lot radio airplay [[in the Detroit area) back during their original release namely:

Gotta Hold On To This Feeling
Walk In The Night
Cleo's Mood
Way Back Home

These songs were played regularly enough that I can remember things that were going on in life around me at that time.

[marv2]

Here's one I absolutely love........love this video too filmed somewhere in the U.K.. "A Walk in the Night"! Have mercy LOL!!!


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uea5C9ASBeg

[thomas96]

Here's one I absolutely love........love this video too filmed somewhere in the U.K.. "A Walk in the Night"! Have mercy LOL!!!


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Uea5C9ASBeg

Absolutely beautiful.

And yeah I see what you mean about location/hits.

[Methuselah2]

Taped in 1969--

WHAT DOES IT TAKE [[TO WIN YOUR LOVE)

Interesting footage of Jr. & All Stars performing:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ub72eylahJg

[thomas96]

Here's what I've got:

Mick Jones was another englishman who had grown up revering Jr. Walker from afar. "Junior was very highly respected in music circles. A lot of guitar players would steal his sax riffs. You can ask Eric Clapton, Jeff Beck, any of those people. They'd happily admit to being inspired by Junior's sax playing."

By 1981, Jones' British-American band Foreigner was a multi-platinum monster. During sessions in New York for their fourth album, they had recorded a track they agreed might benefit by a saxophone part "like Jr. Walker might play it." Flipping through the pages of the Village Voices, Jones was shocked to discover that Walker was in town to play the Lone Star Cafe that very evening.

"It was just a wild hunch," Jones says now. "I went down and sat through three sets, something I would have done with great pleasure in any event. Then I went backstage--downstairs, actually--to meet him.

"Junior walks in and says, 'I hear somebody wants to cut a record.' And I kind of lost it. The real fan in me comes out, and I start stutterin 'ah ah ah...you don't know how much your music has meant to me....' I just completely lost it. His son is standing behind me making signs like, 'Dad! This guy's in a big group,' because Junior had no idea who we were. That first meeting was very comical.

"He came down to the studio to listen to the track, and said, 'Where's the band?' At first, he felt a bit strange about overdubbing. I guess in his heyday, he'd almost always cut live.

"He was sitting down out there in the studio all by himself, looking quite forlorn. We ran the track down several times, and he was playing in a very mellow style. But in my head, I'm hearing the high, screaming, blasting notes. He said, 'Man, I don't do that any more. I'm in a new bag now.' Finally at the end, he stood up and ripped through a couple of incredible takes will all the old stuff in there.

"We knew we had a great performance in there somewhere. It took producer Matt Lange and I about two days of constant editing and splicing little things together to make the classic, spectacular Jr. Walker solo that we wanted to hear. It's all him playing, but it's from multiple performances."

The classic Jr. Walker solo they grafted onto "Urgent" made the song a runaway hit, and helped Foreigner achieve their first #1 album.

"The funny thing is that when he played a few dates with us--Chicago, Madison Square Garden in New York--he walked out on stage and played the solo note for note. Like he'd heard it on the record or the radio and learned it from there. He played our edits note for note! We were floored.

"He's a wonderful guy, and we had a lot of fun. I hope we'll be able to reunite somewhere along the line."

[jsmith]

Been playing a various artists 'lesser known tracks' Motown CD in the car over recent weeks.
The CD features one Jnr Walker track amongst all the other Motown gems.
Jnr's track is a 'breath of fresh air' and is the 'stand out cut 'as it sounds so different to all the 'artist + Funk Bros' tracks on the CD.
I don't think Motown made the best of him in the 70's.

[marv2]

Here's what I've got:

Mick Jones was another englishman who had grown up revering Jr. Walker from afar. "Junior was very highly respected in music circles. A lot of guitar players would steal his sax riffs. You can ask Eric Clapton, Jeff Beck, any of those people. They'd happily admit to being inspired by Junior's sax playing."

By 1981, Jones' British-American band Foreigner was a multi-platinum monster. During sessions in New York for their fourth album, they had recorded a track they agreed might benefit by a saxophone part "like Jr. Walker might play it." Flipping through the pages of the Village Voices, Jones was shocked to discover that Walker was in town to play the Lone Star Cafe that very evening.

"It was just a wild hunch," Jones says now. "I went down and sat through three sets, something I would have done with great pleasure in any event. Then I went backstage--downstairs, actually--to meet him.

"Junior walks in and says, 'I hear somebody wants to cut a record.' And I kind of lost it. The real fan in me comes out, and I start stutterin 'ah ah ah...you don't know how much your music has meant to me....' I just completely lost it. His son is standing behind me making signs like, 'Dad! This guy's in a big group,' because Junior had no idea who we were. That first meeting was very comical.

"He came down to the studio to listen to the track, and said, 'Where's the band?' At first, he felt a bit strange about overdubbing. I guess in his heyday, he'd almost always cut live.

"He was sitting down out there in the studio all by himself, looking quite forlorn. We ran the track down several times, and he was playing in a very mellow style. But in my head, I'm hearing the high, screaming, blasting notes. He said, 'Man, I don't do that any more. I'm in a new bag now.' Finally at the end, he stood up and ripped through a couple of incredible takes will all the old stuff in there.

"We knew we had a great performance in there somewhere. It took producer Matt Lange and I about two days of constant editing and splicing little things together to make the classic, spectacular Jr. Walker solo that we wanted to hear. It's all him playing, but it's from multiple performances."

The classic Jr. Walker solo they grafted onto "Urgent" made the song a runaway hit, and helped Foreigner achieve their first #1 album.

"The funny thing is that when he played a few dates with us--Chicago, Madison Square Garden in New York--he walked out on stage and played the solo note for note. Like he'd heard it on the record or the radio and learned it from there. He played our edits note for note! We were floored.

"He's a wonderful guy, and we had a lot of fun. I hope we'll be able to reunite somewhere along the line."

Excellent story. Love it!

[thomas96]

Been playing a various artists 'lesser known tracks' Motown CD in the car over recent weeks.
The CD features one Jnr Walker track amongst all the other Motown gems.
Jnr's track is a 'breath of fresh air' and is the 'stand out cut 'as it sounds so different to all the 'artist + Funk Bros' tracks on the CD.
I don't think Motown made the best of him in the 70's.

I agree, though his early 70's material is fantastic. Everything after about mid '73 started to get worse. But it's trying to incorporate a gutbucket saxophone soloist with a southern soulful voice into an era of funk and disco. I think it would've been really interesting if they revived their Workshop Jazz label and had him play some sweet jazz. [[Of course having other jazz musicians on the label, and they would also be able to keep Jamerson and all the Funk Bros)

[marv2]

I agree, though his early 70's material is fantastic. Everything after about mid '73 started to get worse. But it's trying to incorporate a gutbucket saxophone soloist with a southern soulful voice into an era of funk and disco. I think it would've been really interesting if they revived their Workshop Jazz label and had him play some sweet jazz. [[Of course having other jazz musicians on the label, and they would also be able to keep Jamerson and all the Funk Bros)
Junior was never "slick". Even his work produced by Johnny Bristol with the strings, session singers etc, Junior's raw talent always cut through. His tremendous talents did not fit the disco era at all.

[thomas96]

Junior was never "slick". Even his work produced by Johnny Bristol with the strings, session singers etc, Junior's raw talent always cut through. His tremendous talents did not fit the disco era at all.

Very true, though I still think he would've appealed to the jazz market in the 70's if Motown would've continued Workshop Jazz. And if you or anyone else here knows of any jazz recordings by Junior, I would absolutely love to hear them.

[marv2]

Very true, though I still think he would've appealed to the jazz market in the 70's if Motown would've continued Workshop Jazz. And if you or anyone else here knows of any jazz recordings by Junior, I would absolutely love to hear them.

I agree. For example Grover Washington Jr. was scoring big time in the 70's. He recorded for KUDU records which Motown bought or licensed at one point.

[soulster]

Thanks thomas96! I tried to find that article and couldn't recall where I read it. That's where I got my info. I thought it was in Mix Magazine's "Classic Tracks" section but it wasn't there.