• TalkBass has been independent since 1998. Add your voice.
    Create a free account to reply to discussions, view embedded media, and browse with fewer display ads.
    Join free Log in
    Want zero display ads or expanded classifieds tools? Compare plans.

Carol Kaye Controversey Solved?

Status
Not open for further replies.
#81
There was some question in the past about Earl Palmer book "Back Beat, The Earl Palmer Story" substanciating Carols Claims.

On p.119 Carols name is listed along with a whole lot of other musicians that Earl Worked with... No Motown there...

P.121 Mentions how Tedesco (Known in the studios as "Cheech") gave Carol a hard time and supposedly said something to the effect of "Sit down in the back and be quiet"...

p.136 Speaks about doing songs for motown artists with the Lewis Sisters (apparently Earl had a thing for one of them) doing tunes for Motown on Romaine St., which was the Motown West Studios here in L.A., apparently in those days the singers had to be in the studio (probably doing scratch vocals so the musicians would have an idea of where the phrasing was).

No titles. In retrospect no one said Carol never worked for Motown but we have never gotten the straight story on what she may have worked on...

While the referrences given do not refute her claims they certainly don't substanciate them...
 
#83
Originally posted by BassLand
...No titles. In retrospect no one said Carol never worked for Motown but we have never gotten the straight story on what she may have worked on...

While the referrences given do not refute her claims they certainly don't substanciate them...
Click to expand...

BassLand = satie = Bob Lee??? Just trying to keep things straight here. :D


Here's a quote from this [Invalid or Expired Link Removed] that you provided in another Carol thread:

Motown opened an office in LA in the somewhere in the early to mid-sixties. There was a great deal of Motown recording activity out there and Carol Kaye was right in the middle of it. But the type of recording being done out there and the type of tracks Carol played on needs to be defined. The material is as follows: a)Motown had a lot of artists signed to their label that were exclusively recorded on the West Coast. They included names like Bobby Darren, Tony Martin, Paul Peterson (of the Donna Reed Show), Soupy Sales, the Lewis Sisters, etc. Carol worked on many of these sessions. b)Brenda Holloway hits like "Every Little Bit Hurts" and "You've Made Me So Very Happy," and "When I'm Gone" were exclusively cut by Carol and the West Coast musicians. Brenda never recorded in Detroit. c)A lot of the glitzier more show-biz style albums like The Four Tops On Broadway, The Temptations In A Mellow Mood, The Supremes at Disneyland, and in particular, the Soundtrack from the TV Special TCB (Takin' Care of Business) with the Temptations and the Supremes which were all cut by Carol and the West Coast crew. TCB is of particular importance to the dispute because that may be the root of many of Carol's claims and the resultant confusion over bass credits. TCB featured a lot of medley's of famous Motown hits performed by the Temps and Supremes including "Stop In The Name of Love," "You Keep Me Hangin' On," "Baby Love," "I Hear A Symphony," "Come See About Me," "Get Ready," and others. Maurice King, Motown's music supervisor for live shows, was involved with that soundtrack and told me Carol was definitely on that soundtrack. So Carol did play those tracks’ BUT THEY WERE REMAKES OF THE ORIGINAL HITS FOR A SYNDICATED TV SHOW. THEY WERE NOT THE ORIGINAL SINGLES AND THEY WERE ALL PLAYED DIFFERENTLY AND ARRANGED DIFFERENTLY FROM THE ORIGINAL SINGLES.
Click to expand...

How do you reconcile this with your statement above? Did you overlook or forget about this piece of information from a link that you provided?
 
#85
You know what's interesting to me? Some people have made the argument that Carol simply really believes that she played on them, even if she's wrong, so it's not like she's doing anything malicious.

To that I would have to say that she sounds like she's looney. If I'm as accomplished and recorded as CK1, then I know what I sound like. If you give me Darling Dear, let me play it, Brad Johnson, Lump, XavierG, JimK, and Bruce play it, all on the same bass, same backing track, same tone, same everything, I would know who wasn't me. Even let 10 years go by, and there's a pretty good chance I would know who isn't me.

How can CK1 not know her own sound. Then you compound that with the fact that she played with a pick, and I'm blown away that there's controversy.

Sure, Babbitt doesn't get credit for all his lines, and Jamerson may be given credit for some stuff that's not his, but when you listen to his signature work, those 20 - 30 pieces that were platinum hits, were Jamerson does what no other bass player could do, well, it just doesn't seem that difficult to me.
 
#87
Originally posted by Phil Smith


BassLand = satie = Bob Lee??? Just trying to keep things straight here. :D


Here's a quote from this [Invalid or Expired Link Removed] that you provided in another Carol thread:



How do you reconcile this with your statement above? Did you overlook or forget about this piece of information from a link that you provided?
Click to expand...

Doesn't seem to me any reconciliation is needed. There's no inconsistency. "Claims" refers to the disputed Jamerson tracks claimed by Kaye, not to any and all Motown tracks. The disputed tracks being the "original singles," which the excerpt you quoted specifically says were different from any versions Kaye was involved with.
 
#89
"and in particular, the Soundtrack from the TV Special TCB (Takin' Care of Business) with the Temptations and the Supremes which were all cut by Carol and the West Coast crew. TCB is of particular importance to the dispute because that may be the root of many of Carol's claims and the resultant confusion over bass credits. TCB featured a lot of medley's of famous Motown hits performed by the Temps and Supremes including "Stop In The Name of Love," "You Keep Me Hangin' On," "Baby Love," "I Hear A Symphony," "Come See About Me," "Get Ready," and others. Maurice King, Motown's music supervisor for live shows, was involved with that soundtrack and told me Carol was definitely on that soundtrack. So Carol did play those tracks’ BUT THEY WERE REMAKES OF THE ORIGINAL HITS FOR A SYNDICATED TV SHOW. THEY WERE NOT THE ORIGINAL SINGLES AND THEY WERE ALL PLAYED DIFFERENTLY AND ARRANGED DIFFERENTLY FROM THE ORIGINAL SINGLES."

This is the first time I've seen this. This could explain Carol's confusion...that is assuming she didn't know that the tracks were being used for the TV show.

But it still doesn't explain how anyone could listen to "Bernadette" and not know that's Jamerson.
 
#90
when it comes to the titles that have been released as the original recordings (rather than remakes for TV shows and the like) I don't see any conflict. Heck I have recorded IWMTLH but you would not catch me trying to pawn that recording off as the original released Motown Record company product. I have all along been led to believe that the original recordings are what were being claimed regarding this thread.
 
#92
Originally posted by cassanova
I cant help but shake one issue I have in my mind about the whole thing. Why didnt she make these claims when James Jamerson was still alive.
Click to expand...

As Bassland Bob already said-
...she's been making these claims for awhile.

I did some diggin' today-
I still have my Sept. '76 Guitar Player issue with a Chuck Rainey interview(any bass-related stuff was hard-to-come-by back then. Trust me).
Anyway, at the very tail end of the interview, Rainey mentions how JJ was his favourite player back in the '60s.
Quote-
"Jamerson played on all the Motown stuff from 1964-'72. Carol Kaye will say she did all the Motown things, but she didn't. They used Ron Brown & James Jamerson. And she'll put Jamerson's lines in her books!
(EDITOR'S NOTE: Jamerson concurs that some of his basslines have appeared, uncredited, in Kaye's manuals. Carol, however, states "All of the lines in all of my books were patterns that I played on records. 90% of the runs were made up on the spot by me; the other 10% were things that were written out but that I deviated from...Kaye adds that while Jamerson played on the bulk of the Motown material from late 1964 through 1967, she played bass on Motown sessions cut on the West Coast as 'demo tapes' at $25.00 per two sides-& later sent to Detroit to be used as records. Hal davis, who was A&R man on those West Coast sessions for Motown, says Carol Kaye was used on bass).

I dug out some of my Kaye bass books(bought in the '70s @$3.00 each)...
Electric Bass Lines No. 4 has "IWMTLH"(pp 22-24). Underneath the title, it sez-
"Original bass line as recorded with Stevie Wonder at Steiner's Studio(approx. 1967)"



...more below-
 
#94
Originally posted by BassLand
when it comes to the titles that have been released as the original recordings (rahter than remakes for TV shows and the like) I don't see any conflict. Heck I have recorded IWMTLH but you would not catch me trying to pawn that recording off as the original released Motown Record company product. I have all along been led to believe that the original recordings are what were being claimed regarding this thread.
Click to expand...

Sure you may have played on IWMTLH and a wide variety of covers, but did the original singers do the vocals? Were you hired by Motown people to do it?
 
#97
Jauqo-
...you snuck in there & busted up my groove!


A page back(& in a now-closed thread)-
Brad makes a great point. Where are the other lines of "Jamerson prowess" in her later recordings? "Hicky-Burr", although very cool, ain't no Jamerson funk...

Too, maybe it's me-
...IF these demos that were soon-to-be the hits we all know & love were actually done in Cali & not Detroit-
Doesn't that mean no Jamerson, no Benjamin, no Robert White, no Joe Messina, no Earl Van Dyke, no Jack Ashford, no "Bongo" Brown, etc?
Or did all the Funk Brothers cop their parts from their West Coast counterparts?

I mean, c'mon!
 
Status
Not open for further replies.

Latest posts

Top Bottom
Back