Sweet! it was great to see Billy and Miriam get this recognition, and also Fortune Records.
--MB
-----Original Message-----
From: Association for Recorded Sound Discussion List <[log in to unmask]> On Behalf Of Alex McGehee
Sent: Monday, March 29, 2021 6:39 PM
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: [ARSCLIST] Miriam Linna and Billy Miller
That’s really interesting, Matthew. My family has been in the Detroit area since 1971! Thanks for the YouTube links. I know my sister will appreciate them and so will my brother who used to do pretty spot on impressions of the Miracles, and yeah he knew all the dance steps and everything.
–Alex
> On Mar 29, 2021, at 5:11 PM, Barton, Matthew <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
>
> Funny, my copy arrived today! The title comes from this track by Nolan Strong and the Diablos: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RGko6th_7ko
>
> When Smokey Robinson visited the Library of Congress a few years ago, he was amazed to see that we had albums by them, and declared that they were his favorite group in those days. They were very big locally, and "The Wind" was another local hit, and a favorite of vocal group collectors: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bIVKaayaNaY.
>
> Most Fortune artists were only known around Detroit and its environs, though a few well known artists like John Lee Hooker cut some sides for them. They did r&b, blues, rock and roll, jazz, country, gospel, etc. Anything they thought could sell. The best blues record Fortune ever released is probably this version of "Cat Squirrel" by Dr. Ross: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QX5GYmGhnRk
>
> The owners were nothing if not eccentric, and even though they kept some albums in print sporadically into the 80s and even the 90s, it was hard for stores to get them in any quantity, and collectors would snap them up quickly.
>
>
> --Matthew Barton
>
>
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Association for Recorded Sound Discussion List <[log in to unmask]> On Behalf Of Alex McGehee
> Sent: Monday, March 29, 2021 3:59 PM
> To: [log in to unmask]
> Subject: [ARSCLIST] Miriam Linna and Billy Miller
>
> Greetings all,
>
> I’m a little late in posting this so apologies if someone else beat me to the punch. The March 29th issue of the New Yorker’s Talk of the Town has a short but excellent piece on the work of Miriam Linna and Billy Miller. At the time of his death, Miller had spent more than a decade working on a history of the somewhat obscure Detroit label called Fortune Records (the story’s author, Nick Paumgarten, calls it, “a kind of Gnostic gospel of Rock and Roll…”
>
> “Mind Over Matter: The Myths and Mysteries of Detroit’s Fortune Records” was published last fall thanks to Miriam Linna and Miller’s co-author, Michael Hurtt. I don’t follow discographical research in their area of expertise, so the story was new to me and such a great one that I thought others might be interested. I think the New Yorker allows two or three free articles before the paywall goes up. Here’s the link: <https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2021/03/29/chronicling-rock-and-rolls-neglected-stories <https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2021/03/29/chronicling-rock-and-rolls-neglected-stories>> The header is: Show and Tell, Chronicling Rock and Roll’s Neglected Stories.
>
> If you want the book Nortonrecords.com <http://nortonrecords.com/> will sell it to you for $100. It’s also five pounds, so not sure what those shipping charges would be.
>
> Cheers,
> Alex McGehee
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