Saturday, January 13, 2018

Summer Gold: Marcia Hines 'Dance You Fool, Dance'


Probably one of her best records, and that is saying something.

It's a track from Hines' fourth album, the execrably titled Ooh Child, one which - according to Karen Dewey's Diva: the Life of Marcia Hines - brought to a head the terrible tussle between Hines and her producer/ record label owner, Robie Porter. Dewey says Porter 'found two black backing singers in the US called Terry and Monalisa, the latter of which was capable of sounding exactly like Marcia.' Dewey quotes Tony Hogarth, the managing director of the label Wizard, as saying that Porter's extensive use of these backing singers (of whom more later in this series! Thrills) was to 'increase his power and lower Marcia's by saying, "I can re-create your sound without you"'. Dewey notes that the back cover of Ooh Child features a picture of 'Monalisa and Terry in the foreground and Marcia in the background.' (pp. 151-2).

Following the Ooh Child debacle Hines and her manager Peter Rix entered litigation with Porter and Wizard and Dewey doesn't really go into detail so who knows. The main thing for us to console ourselves with is that 'Dance You Fool, Dance' is immense.

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way to drops!

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