Mary Wells - post My Guy at motown

[motony]

I agree with reese in the statement that Mary would have been better off going with Atlantic when she first left...Atlantic & 20th were offering the same money but Morty Craft threw it out there VERBALLY to Herman, Robert West & Mary .,that he could get her in movies, that's why they signed with 20th. Then Atlantic got her for a much lower signing fee in late '65.

[WaitingWatchingLookingForAChance]

I agree with reese in the statement that Mary would have been better off going with Atlantic when she first left...Atlantic & 20th were offering the same money but Morty Craft threw it out there VERBALLY to Herman, Robert West & Mary .,that he could get her in movies, that's why they signed with 20th. Then Atlantic got her for a much lower signing fee in late '65.

Just got home and saw you already made the point that was the crucial selling line for Mary- "MOVIES" Morty Craft was making promises, any promise to get Mary to sign with 20th.

From Mary's point of view, and to read her rationale for leaving Motown for 20th, I can see why she would have made the move. I didn't realize that she really did put a lot of thought into her move and used a fairly analytical approach. As Reese said, hindsight is always 20/20 and even Mary realized that. Still, from a purely business point of view she felt justified and I'm not sure how many others would have made any other decision. Everyone keeps forgetting that Motown hadn't yet reached its epic proportions as a label, so who wouldn't go somewhere where the money was promised to be bigger?

[robb_k]

I agree with Reese in the statement that Mary would have been better off going with Atlantic when she first left...Atlantic & 20th were offering the same money but Morty Craft threw it out there VERBALLY to Herman, Robert West & Mary .,that he could get her in movies, that's why they signed with 20th. Then Atlantic got her for a much lower signing fee in late '65.

Mary would probably have done somewhat better going directly to Atlantic, who not only had the infrastructure in place to market R&B/Soul artists' records, but had a large contingent of Detroit producers under their distribution umbrella, from which to choose to handle production of Mary's recordings. Even Robert West, himself, was producing his Falcons for them for released on Atlantic's flagship label [[Atlantic Records). Also, Mary's ex-husband/self-appointed advisor, Herman Griffin was producing for Atlantic distribution of his Hit/Hit Productions labels [[Himself, The Moments, Ruby Yates). And, In addition, Wilbur Golden's Correc-Tone/SonBert Records and their recording studio, and producers, Robert Bateman, Popcorn Wylie, Herman Griffin, and arranger Sonny Sanders were available. Also, Atlantic distributed Ollie McLaughlin's Karen, Carla and Moira labels, as well as issuing McLaughlin's Barbara Lewis and Deon Jackson on Atlantic.

Wexler could have farmed out Mary to any of those Detroit producers. They could have ended up using Robert Bateman and Andre Williams, as they did with 20th Century Fox, or they might have used Robert West, or Ollie McLaughlin, or even gone to Carl Davis, Barrett Strong, and Sonny Sanders in Chicago, as they did when she came to ATCO. Had she gone to Popcorn Wylie at Correc-Tone, her material and recording may have sounded more "Motownish", and had a higher quality. But the distributors wanting to keep a good relationship with Berry Gordy/Motown would still likely have hurt sales of her records, and resulted in a similar situation to what really happened.

[BigAl]

...as well as issuing McLaughlin's Barbara Lewis and Deon Jackson on Atlantic.

Mary's and Barbara's styles were similar. Both had that "flutey" timbre. I could easily envision Mary singing "Baby I'm Yours" or "Make Me Your Baby," although Barbara did them perfectly of course. Too bad McLaughlin didn't get a chance with her. It might have been a good pairing.