AccuRadio Song Of The Day-The Originals

Artist:The Originals
Song:Baby, I'm For Real
Album:The Very Best Of The Originals





The Originals were hanging around Motown without much success until Marvin Gaye wrote and produced the 1969 top twenty hits Baby. I'm For Real and The Bells. But Originals group leader Freddie Gorman had a long history going back to the early days of Motown. In 1957, he and pal Brian Holland led The Fideletones. They recorded a single for Aladdin and split up in 1959. Gorman went back to his job as a mailman. He met Berry Gordy and reunited with Holland to write the Marvelettes hit Please Mr. Postman. Unfortunately Gorman was squeezed out when Holland brought in his brother Eddie Holland and Lamont Dozier. In 1964, Gorman wrote The Reflections hit (Just Like) Romeo and Juliet for Golden World Records. But Gorman returned to Motown when Gordy bought Golden World in 1965. He joined The Originals which was supposed to be led by former Contours lead singer Joe Stubbs. He was the brother of Four Tops lead singer Levi Stubbs. He left The Originals to go solo. The rest of The Originals C.P. Spencer, Hank Dixon and Walter Gaines were members of The Voice Masters and had been backup singers since the early days of Motown. So The Originals recorded and continued to sing backup but couldn't get a hit until Marvin Gaye took an interest in them. He was trying to prove to Gordy that he could produce his own music so he wrote Baby, I'm For Real with his wife Anna (Berry Gordy's sister) and it topped the R & B Singles chart and reached #14 on the Billboard Hot 100. The Bells was a top twenty pop hit as well. C'P. Spencer left and was replaced by Ty Hunter when The Originals moved to Los Angeles with Motown in 1972. They didn't have any success after that. Even working with Lamont Dozier didn't help. The Originals left Motown in 1978 and split up in 1981 when Ty Hunter died. You can get all their hits on this budget comp. C.P. Spencer died in 2004 and Freddie Gorman died in 2006. But Hank Dixon tours the oldies circuit with a version of The Originals with his daughter Terrie Dixon, Freddie Gorman's son Dillon Gorman and Gene Chandler's son DeFrantz Forrest. Here are The Originals performing Baby' I'm For Real on the TV show Upbeat! 1969.