On the whole, I like my soul music down-'n'-dirty - Otis Redding, Wilson Pickett, James Brown, and the like. But, showmanship and melodrama has always had a place in rhythm & blues. James Brown himself appreciated the value of the grand gesture, and many great soul singers were as comfortable in Las Vegas as they were in Harlem - Jackie Wilson, Sam Cooke, and Ray Charles, to name a few. New Orleans native Johnny Adams is another less celebrated singer who had a firm grasp on the dramatic possibilities of soul music. Early on, he earned the evocative sobriquet of "The Tan Canary" due to his powerful delivery, multi-octave range, swooping vocal mannerisms, and what one wag described as "his death-defying falsetto." Johnny Adams once said, "They got a whole lot of New Orleans music. I try to make mine different." Consequently, Adams' smooth style and vaudevillian stage demeanor contrasted sharply with the casual cacophony de rigeur on New Orleans sessions of the day.

Johnny Adams' career is marked by three distinct commercial peaks - his recordings for Ric Records (1959-1963), SSS International (1968-1971), and Rounder Records (1984-1998). The first phase springs from Adams' deep roots in the fertile Crescent City. Born in New Orleans in 1932, he got his start there in the mid-1950's singing gospel music, first with the Soul Revivers and later with Bessie Griffin & The Consolators (who recorded briefly for Specialty). Legend has it that Adams was persuaded to convert to secular music when his upstairs neighbor, Dorothy Labostrie (who had previously written "Tutti Frutti" for Little Richard), heard him singing "Precious Lord" in the bathtub. After signing to the New Orleans indie label Ric in the 1959, he recorded Labostrie's "Oh Why," (later retitled "I Won't Cry") with an 18-year-old Mac Rebennack (soon to be known as Dr. John) producing.

"I Won't Cry" was a local hit, and over the next five years Johnny Adams recorded 10 more singles for Ric (and associated label Ron) produced by Rebennack, Ric owner Joe Ruffino, and noted New Orleans musician Eddie Bo, with backing by another Big Easy stalwart, Edgar Blanchard and his Gondoliers. The Ric singles included such gems as "Come On" (1959), "Someone For Me" (1960), "Life Is A Struggle" (1961), and "A Losing Battle" (1962), which became Adams' first national hit (#27 R&B). (See Rounder Records' I Won't Cry, 1991).

By 1962, Johnny Adams' renown had spread far enough that Berry Gordy sought to lure him to fledgling Motown Records; only the threat of legal action by Joe Ruffino halted him. Soon, however, Ruffino died, and Adams left Ric in 1963. His success quickly waned, and he began hopping from label to label - a practice he would continue for 20 years. In the span of five years, Adams worked for Eddie Bo's Gone Records as well as Pacemaker Records, run by legendary Texas impresario Huey P. Meaux, and even cut some singles for famed Los Angeles R&B label Modern Records. Perhaps most importantly, he recorded for Watch Records, a New Orleans label run by producer/arranger Wardell Quezerque. Adams waxed his histrionic interpretation of Ray Price's 1954 country nugget, "Release Me" (revived in 1962 by R&B thrush Esther Phillips), for Watch in 1968.

Later that year the second significant phase of Johnny Adams' career began when he signed with Shelby Singleton's Nashville-based SSS International label. SSS reissued "Release Me," and it jump-started Johnny's career (#34 R&B, #82 Pop). The 1969 follow-up, "Reconsider Me," proved to be a real barn burner, taking him into the R&B Top 10 (#8) and Pop Top 30 (#28) in 1969. Like "Release Me," "Reconsider Me" was originally written as a country song, and it sounded suspiciously similar to its precursor as well as Willie Nelson's "Funny How Time Slips Away." Adams sang the hell out of it, though, and "Reconsider Me" became the song for which he is best remembered.

Adams quickly scored another hit for SSS in 1969 with "I Can't Be All Bad" (#45 R&B, #89 Pop), and the label released his first-ever LP, Heart & Soul, the same year. That album included new versions of several Ric sides, including "A Losing Battle" and "I Won't Cry," which charted as a single in 1970 (#41 R&B). But, his productive tenure at SSS International ended in 1971 after Singleton bought the rich Sun Records catalog and shifted his attention towards that profitable venture. (For a generous sampling of Adams' SSS catalog, see Collectable Records' Reconsider Me, 1996).

During the remainder of the decade, Adams recorded with little success for numerous companies. These included major label Atlantic (releasing four singles between late 1971 and early 1973); Mississippi-based indie Ace (A Christmas With Johnny Adams, 1975, later reissued as Christmas In New Orleans); and local New Orleans imprint Chelsea (Stand By Me, 1976). In 1978, he signed to now-defunct Ariola Records America, where he recorded an album called After All The Good Is Gone produced by New Orleans entrepreneur Senator Jones and arranged by Wardell Quezerque. While he dented the charts one last time with the title track (a remake of Conway Twitty's 1976 country hit), and the album earned four stars from Rolling Stone magazine, Johnny Adams continued to toil in relative obscurity. By the late 70's, he was recording for small New Orleans labels like JB, Paid, and Hep' Me (working mainly with Senator Jones), and playing weekends at Dorothy Labostrie's Medallion Lounge with guitarist Walter "Wolfman" Washington.

[close]