of the Memphis musicians cause they got to have a band name—the MGs, the Bar-Kays, and what have you—and the Funk Brothers had no publicity, no press pictures, no photos. The only people who knew they were called the Funk Brothers were folks around Motown. Different companies, different dynamics—you know?
“First everyone went over to the Hotel Pontchartrain and hung at the bar there. Some other Detroit people came over. Marvin Gaye, who drummed some, really wanted to meet Al Jackson, the drummer of the MGs. And it was Marvin’s idea that everyone go over to Hitsville on West Grand and jam. Some of the Funk Brothers thought Berry Gordy and the management wouldn’t like that. Besides, that night they were supposed to be cutting tracks for Little Stevie Wonder. But Marvin knew Berry and the other higher-ups were in Hollywood negotiating a deal for a TV special, so the henhouse was unguarded.
“Once Marvin rolled off to Hitsville with Al Jackson and fine-ass Tammi Terrell, a convoy of cars followed them over. Harvey Fuqua was running the session and Stevie, who shouldn’t even have been up, was laying down harmonica when Marvin and Al barged in followed by the MGs and the Funk Brothers.
“Guitars got pulled from cases. A second trap drum was set up. Bourbon and Black Label got poured into paper cups. A local businessman provided reefer. Stevie’s session got hijacked. My British friend says it was Al Jackson and Benny Benjamin on drums, Jamerson on bass, Steve Cropper and a bunch of guys on guitars, Earl Van Dyke on piano, Booker T. on organ, Little Stevie on harp, Marvin, Tammi, and Otis wailing on vocals.”
“Whoa, that’s a damn soul all-star team,” D said.
“Hell yeah, but it gets better. The Supremes had just got in that night from a gig in Philly. Diana Ross had her driver stop by the studio to pick up lyric sheets for a session the next day. So La Ross sees Carla Thomas sipping a can of Coke on the Hitsville steps and chatting with Gladys Knight, so she knew something was up.
“She goes down into the studio and sees this incredible Motown-meets-Memphis scene, and at the center of it she sees Otis, a big, husky country boy. Not necessarily her type, but the man had sex appeal. Between Harvey, Marvin, and Otis, the idea for something like ‘Tramp’ is concocted and, after playing coy for a while, Ross agrees to participate. The combined band bashes it out a couple of times with Otis laughing his way through it and Diana enjoying it too.
“Now, Motown being Motown, somebody calls Berry Gordy out on the coast and drops a dime. Berry doesn’t make them stop the session, but orders the engineer to embargo the tapes. So after the fun is over, the Stax musicians head back to their hotel. They have a show at the Regal in Chicago the next night and need some sleep before hitting the road. But Otis and Cropper, who are savvy about songwriting and publishing, hang around cause they want a copy of the tapes.
“Harvey Fuqua is now in a tough spot. The engineer has told them Berry’s edict and he wants to follow orders. But he feels they should have a copy. So he calls Berry and Berry tells Harvey to put Otis on the phone.”
“Shit,” D said, “that must have been one interesting phone call.”
“Hell yeah. No one really knows what was said. Harvey told people later that Otis laughed a lot and wrote something on a piece of paper. After Otis hung up he pulled Cropper aside, whispered something, and they left.”
“I assume the tapes never surfaced?”
“Somehow ten copies got pressed up on the Soul label—Berry had been smart enough to actually copyright the word soul—so the copies were on that label,” Edge explained. “It was where Berry put out records like Shorty Long’s ‘Function at the Junction’ and shit that didn’t fit the Motown formula. Somebody with a sense of humor up in Detroit put the words Country Boy & City Girl on the label. So there was some conversation about putting the record out, but I guess the lawyers between the two labels couldn’t reach an agreement. Besides, end of the day, I’m sure the Motown people didn’t think it was the right fit for the Queen of Pop.”
“This was 1966? She hadn’t left the Supremes yet, huh?” D said.
“She broke out in 1970.”
“They had big plans for her.”
“Yup. And Otis didn’t have his pop hit until ‘Dock of the Bay’ after he died in a plane crash. So, inside Motown and the world of R&B, that record became a collector’s item, then a footnote, and then a rumor.”
“So you’re looking for a copy?” D asked.
“And now so are you.” Edge reached into his pinstriped suit and pulled out a stack of euros that he handed to D. “That’s the equivalent of $5,000 American dollars.”
“Why me?”
“Cause you know a lot of people and you were close to Dwayne Robinson, who knew the history. He actually mentions the record in his footnotes in The Relentless Beat.”
“Dwayne is dead,” D said softly, “and wrote that book a long time ago.”
“I’m told there’s another 10K in it for you.”
“Who is this guy?”
“Made money in the ’90s doing something with computers. R&B is his passion. He wants to complete his collection. I also think there’s some kind of competition involved, but I’m hazy on the details.”
“Okay. As you can see, I need the money. This millionaire British soul fan give you any clues? Also, does he have a name?”
“No name. Cool?”
“Cool.”
“Some people say there might be a copy buried under the Apollo Theater.”
“Shit,” D said, “that would be a hell of a place to dig.”
INNER CITY BLUES
D was riding the C train across Brooklyn, an experience that brought him back to his childhood in Brownsville and reminded him how many of his friends had gone wrong. For them it hadn’t been about food, shelter, and clothing, it had been about diamonds, brands, and ghetto-fab. They wanted to be envied. They wanted to be sweated and jocked and talked about. Green-tinted paper was the ticket. So D resented money because it had played him and everyone else he knew for a fool. But how else did Americans keep score?
When D was a kid he thought a lot about this on the subway whenever it got crowded. He’d look at all the people around him, crushed against each other, breathing into each other’s faces, trying not to look into each other’s eyes. What the fuck was this all about? Money, of course. And judging by all the Bibles, Watchtowers, and Korans D saw people hunched over and moving their mouths to read, religion was a damn good business.
It was about fucking too. There were babies everywhere, usually pushed by young girls who seemed either too ill-tempered or casual in their caregiving duties.
D had been one of those crying subway babies. His mother had one of those too-loud, high-pitched black girl voices that cut through the rumble of steel wheels. He had been the fourth of four boys. The murders of his three older brothers had beaten his mother down. His father? Long gone. She’d remade her life and was living down South with her devout new husband, seeking spiritual salvation in the rituals of domesticity she’d been denied as a younger woman.
A
