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.
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