By breathtakingguy (65.238.6.249) on Wednesday, May 07, 2003 - 12:03 pm:

I'd heard of Chris Clark at Motown for years, but have never heard her. Can anyone compare her to someone so I can get a picture of what she might sound like? Whatever happened to her?

By KevGo (64.115.26.80) on Wednesday, May 07, 2003 - 12:43 pm:

breathtakingguy:
If you go to the Forum Archives you'll see a TON of information regarding Chris Clark. Check out the thread regarding producer Deke Richards - he oversaw a solo album by Chris & posted many photos from the album cover.

At last account, Chris Clark was residing in California (maybe Los Angeles) and worked in the film industry.

If you have the HITSVILLE USA boxed set check out her hit "Love's Gone Bad".

Kevin Goins - KevGo

By stephanie (66.54.1.38) on Wednesday, May 07, 2003 - 01:03 pm:

She is the poor mans Dusty Springfield but she doesnt sound that bad she can carry a tune...listen for yourself and you will see what I mean..
Stephanie

By KevGo (64.115.26.80) on Wednesday, May 07, 2003 - 01:08 pm:

I was going to make the Dusty analogy myself but I left my bullet-proof vest at home.
Stephanie pretty much summed it up.
Kevin Goins - KevGo

By Scratcher (65.132.79.30) on Wednesday, May 07, 2003 - 01:12 pm:

I really liked "Love Gone Bad" but didn't hear it much cause Motown never got behind the record. They played it for a couple of weeks then...poof...it was gone.

By stephanie (66.54.1.38) on Wednesday, May 07, 2003 - 01:22 pm:

I have to be honest with you. I dont dislike Loves Gone Bad but the arrangement is a little harried and hurried and I think it had the potential to be a hit record but the ending is strange and it sounds like she is rushing to keep up. Its almost like (please dont get offended if you are white) a white girl who can sing blues trying to sound bluesier than what she is. Someone once played a tape for me of Chris singing acapella and it was very good I was shocked that it was her. Thats how I know she can sing. My only problem with her and maybe its not her fault is that she never found a definitive sound.
I dont know if any of you have ever heard the Motown album that Bobby Darin put out. If you had never heard any of Bobbys output and listened to this album you would have no idea of how talented he was. Same with the Jean Terrell solo album if no one had heard her material with the Supremes and heard this stuff they wouldnt know the great voice she has. I still say the stuff Mary Wells did when she left Motown shows her in a much better light vocally. At Motown she had hits but she sounded like a limited singer.

Mariah Carey who I consider to be an extremely talented singer and songwriter is going down the begotten path unfortunately. The album Martha Reeves did on MCA her first solo album was a gem and no promotion although it didnt do badly overseas.

Chris Clark is one of these artists that if Berry had found a defined sound for her or something in that arena the way he did Diana I think she could have had some hits. She had the looks and somewhat of a voice she just needed some direction..
Stephanie

By Randy Russi (169.139.180.100) on Wednesday, May 07, 2003 - 01:28 pm:

As for Mary Wells, I loved her voice at Motown!
However, she told me she was hoarse on some of
the sessions, example "Two Lovers" -- she said
the words were barely coming out--so they had
a finished product. As for Chris Clark--I don't
like "Love's Gone Bad", but did like "Do Right
Baby, Do Right". Oh well, everyone has their
opinions, but I do think she could sing.

By KevGo (64.115.26.80) on Wednesday, May 07, 2003 - 01:36 pm:

Stephanie:
I heard the Bobby Darin Motown album you're referring to (released in 1972, a year before his passing). As I mentioned on the Blue Eyed Soul thread, it is a fine piece of work that captured Bobby at his best. Sadly, the album is out of print (except for maybe a couple of tracks on his Rhino boxed set). I was lucky enough to hear it at a used record store when I was in high school but the shop owner wanted a then-whopping thirty bucks for the album(this was in 1981).
Kevin Goins - KevGo

By LG Nilsson (213.89.30.85) on Wednesday, May 07, 2003 - 01:52 pm:

Stephanie,

I agree with you about �Love�s Gone Bad�, it is a bit forced. I have two other Chris Clark favorites. One is �From Head To Toe� on Motown. That song is more in her style I think. The other song is �I Want To Go Back There Again� on VIP.



I think this was the best song she recorded at Motown. It�s a sad, moody feel here. Did any other artist record this song?

Kev, I'm listening to the Darin album on Motown right now!

Lars

By Carl Dixon London (62.31.40.155) on Wednesday, May 07, 2003 - 01:56 pm:

B J Arnau did a version on UK Mojo records in 1971.

By Randy Russi (169.139.180.100) on Wednesday, May 07, 2003 - 02:09 pm:

I haven't heard I Want To Go Back There Again,
at least I don't think I have, but Berry Gordy
said in his book it was one of his favorite
songs. From Head to Toe was done by the Miracles
on their LP Going To A Go-Go.

By Davie Gordon (193.122.21.42) on Wednesday, May 07, 2003 - 02:21 pm:

Lars,

There were at least three UK versions of "I Wanna
Go Back There Again" in '68 none of them particularly interesting. I'm sure there's at
least one US version but can't think of it at this
minute. Wasn't there a Supremes' version that was shelved ?

Davie

By Mike Sku (64.9.11.62) on Wednesday, May 07, 2003 - 02:35 pm:

Diana Ross did a version of "I Want to Go Back There Again" on the Tribute to Berry Gordy CD. I also like Thelma Houston's version. By far, Chris Clark has the definitive version. I liked a lot of her stuff; I particularly enjoyed her "Whisper You Love Me Boy" just because it was so different. There's a Marginal comp floating around out there that has her VIP and Weed stuff on it. Not every song is a standout, but it's a great collector's piece.

By MotownForever (205.188.209.109) on Wednesday, May 07, 2003 - 02:35 pm:

Thelma Houston also recorded "I Want To Go Back There Again." Motown released it as a single on their Mowest label in 1971.

By LG Nilsson (213.89.30.85) on Wednesday, May 07, 2003 - 03:10 pm:

Thanks for the info about �I Want To Go Back There Again�. I found the Thelma Houston MoWest single and the �Tribute to Berry Gordy� CD just by turning around!� but it is not Diana Ross singing the song, it is Shanice. Diana Ross is singing Brenda Holloway�s �You�ve Made Me So Very Happy� on the tribute CD. I still vote for the CC version!

Lars

By KevGo (64.115.26.80) on Wednesday, May 07, 2003 - 04:13 pm:

Lars:
Enjoy!
Kevin Goins - KevGo

By stephanie (66.54.1.38) on Wednesday, May 07, 2003 - 05:00 pm:

YES Do Right Baby is more the Chris Clark that stands out in my opinion GOOD CALL!!!! I have not heard more of her material I need to do that....thanks for the info
Stephanie

By Greg C. (207.103.134.9) on Wednesday, May 07, 2003 - 10:12 pm:

Chris Clark had two albums with Motown. The first was "Soul Sounds" (1967) which was excellent. If you want to hear this lady "sang" check out "From Head To Toe" and "Do Right Baby-Do Right". The second release from Chris was called "CC Rides Again" and it was the only release on the Motown subsidiary label called Weed. It was a weak release and an album that consisted of mostly remakes of the day (1969).

Chris Clark is hardly a "Poor Man's Dusty Springfield". I saw her in concert twice, at the Fox Theatre at a Motortown Revue and at the old 20 Grand on W. Warren and 14th, and this woman brought the house down at each venue.

I don't want to get political here but it was the Chris Clark/Berry Gordy/Diana Ross triangle that kept Ms. Clark's career on the backburner and kept her from reaching her full potential.

By STUBASS (152.163.188.68) on Wednesday, May 07, 2003 - 10:21 pm:

STUBASS... CHRIS CLARK TAKE!!!...I FIRST SAW CHRIS CLARK ACCOMPANYING BERRY GORDY JR. AND HIS TWO SONS AT THE TEMPTATIONS SHOW AT THE ROOSTERTAIL IN THE MID 60'S!!!...SHE WAS BERRY'S "SQUEEZE" AT THE TIME...LIVING AT HIS HOUSE ON MONICA AND W. OUTER DRIVE!!!...IT WAS AROUND THE BERRY GORDY-DIANA ROSS TIME...SO HOW OLD BG WAS HANDLING *THESE* TWO "ANGELS" IS ANYBODY'S GUESS...BUT I WOULD REALLY LIKE TO KNOW WHAT CHRIS AND DIANA HAVE TO SAY ABOUT EACH OTHER!!!...I THINK THAT WHILE CHRIS HAD SOME STRONG EARLY ROUNDS...DIANA GOT THE WIN BY T.K.O.!!!...STUBASS

By Knockout (198.81.26.231) on Wednesday, May 07, 2003 - 10:47 pm:

Didn't they both work together on Lady Sings The Blues??

Girlfriend need to know dat

By STUBASS (205.188.209.109) on Wednesday, May 07, 2003 - 10:50 pm:

DON'T KNOW K.O....BUT AS YOU CAN SEE...DIANA GOT THE BILLIE HOLIDAY PART!!!...STUBASS

By Knockout (198.81.26.231) on Wednesday, May 07, 2003 - 10:57 pm:

Chris Clark was one of the writers of Lady Sings The Blues....

By STUBASS (205.188.209.109) on Wednesday, May 07, 2003 - 11:15 pm:

K.O....YOU GOT MY CURIOUSITY GOING...SO I DID SOME QUICK RESEARCH!!!...CHRIS CLARK WAS A RECIPTIONIST AT MOTOWN RECORDS...WHO IN 1967...WAS GIVEN A RECORDING CONTRACT...AND DID SOME RECORDING THERE WITH MINOR SUCCESS!!!...BERRY GORDY REWARDED HER WITH A VICE PRESIDENCY OF THE MOTOWN FILM DIVISION...WHICH LED TO HER PARTICIPATION AS A WRITER (OSCAR NOMINATED) FOR "LADY SINGS THE BLUES"!!!...IN THE EARLY 70'S...SHE MADE WHAT HAS BEEN DESCRIBED...AS AN ILL FATED ATTEMPT TO REVIVE HER SINGING CAREER!!!...STUBASS

By Knockout (198.81.26.231) on Wednesday, May 07, 2003 - 11:24 pm:

I love to get your curiosity going...
makes for some good reading for the rest of us...

tee, hee

By STUBASS (152.163.188.68) on Wednesday, May 07, 2003 - 11:29 pm:

STUBASS KNOW'S THAT (tee,hee) FROM *SOMEWHERE*???...

By Ron Murphy (68.42.89.162) on Thursday, May 08, 2003 - 05:54 pm:

Greg C's last statement from above was right on target. As far as the jobs she held at Motown let's just say that B.G. does take care of the women that have his children.

By : (198.81.26.231) on Thursday, May 08, 2003 - 06:03 pm:

Does Chris have any children with him?

By Ron Murphy (68.42.89.162) on Thursday, May 08, 2003 - 06:06 pm:

My statement above includes Chris Clark.

By KevGo (64.115.26.80) on Thursday, May 08, 2003 - 06:23 pm:

Ron:
Forgive the questioning but from what I gathered from Berry's autobiography as well as Raynoma Singleton's book there was no mention of Chris Clark having any children by Berry Gordy (and Gordy was quite revealing about the women he had relationships with). If anything, Chris Clark pretty much gave up on being Berry's girlfriend because he was in love with Diana Ross (even after Diana married Robert Silberstein).
Kevin Goins - KevGo

By Ron Murphy (68.42.89.162) on Thursday, May 08, 2003 - 08:13 pm:

The fact that Diana Ross' child didn't know who her real father was for 19 years did not change the fact that some people at Motown knew about it. I decided to make that comment and anyone can choose to believe it or not. There are a lot of things not in Raynomas book and many of the things that were got her in a lot of trouble. I can't say how I know certain thing's because I would have to bring up other names and so on. I can tell you that I was active in the record business in Detroit in the 60's just as I still am.

By KevGo (64.115.26.80) on Thursday, May 08, 2003 - 08:25 pm:

Ron:
I'm sure there were many open yet unspoken secrets at Motown just like many other companies. What labels did you work for and in what capacity? I work for a record label here in Manhattan.
Kevin Goins - KevGo

By Scratcher (65.132.76.242) on Thursday, May 08, 2003 - 08:57 pm:

Ron, I bet you know an older guy in Detroit that I know who knew the Gordy family long before Motown existed. He eventually did odd work at Motown, like road manager for Edwin Starr and some others before becoming the first African-American in Detroit to establish a certain media entity in the city. I've never seen his name in any Motown book by anybody but he has accounts about the company galore. Big Clue: he was married to somebody who many think was only married twice. In fact, he was her first husband, a fact that I've never seen printed anywhere.

By Julian (152.163.252.68) on Thursday, May 08, 2003 - 10:44 pm:

I wanna be a recording executive so I can have two glamor chicks like that!

By Ron Murphy (68.42.89.162) on Friday, May 09, 2003 - 12:39 am:

I kind of broke my own rule by making that statement but this time I just could not help it. I started thinking about my friend and first Motown star Marv Johnson who told me many times that his efforts(and others)gave B.G. and his family and their childred jobs/ A lot of others were made promises that were never kept. Joe Hunter used some titles of Motown hit records to make his point, one of them was "it was Berry's DREAM COME TRUE-NOT OURS".What other artist was given a job like that, a one time they Marv a job-drilling holes in the returns,he was a smart man and could have been used better,but looking back at things he was lucky to get that. I don't mean to say that Berry did something wrong,I just wanted to comment on some of the discussion on Chris Clark and support other comments and some good things that Berry has done. I started working as a recording engineer in 1965 at various studios in Detroit and still do mastering work .

By John Lester (213.123.124.151) on Friday, May 09, 2003 - 02:36 am:

Julian

If you were a recording STAR, then I am sure you can all the glamour chicks you wanted. But hey, what about your "sugar pie honey bunch" - do you think she might be pleased with that!

By KevGo (64.115.26.80) on Friday, May 09, 2003 - 10:56 am:

Ron:
Your name looked very familiar. I may have some Detroit-based records that bear your work.

Welcome to Soulful Detroit. I'm sure you have many anecdotes to share.

Regards,
Kevin Goins - KevGo

By Julio (152.163.252.68) on Friday, May 09, 2003 - 11:49 am:

Xtown.

Awwww, what'd you have to go and bring HER up for???????
You bursted my bubble!

By TonyRussi (68.210.2.246) on Friday, May 09, 2003 - 12:27 pm:

I thought Chris Clark was a good singer..."I Want To Go Back There Again" is on my "Soul Sounds"LP but I really never got into it. I liked "Do Right Baby, Do Right" the best of the 45's released here.

By Joe Moorehouse (64.12.97.7) on Friday, May 09, 2003 - 08:26 pm:

I've always assumed that Chris Clark was brought to Motown by Frank Wilson--hadn't he written My Sugar Baby for her before they joined the company? Maybe I have my history wrong here, but I figured that was how it happened.

Love's Gone Bad was released in late summer of '66, and was pretty good, although the Underdogs did it better a couple months later. But the stuff she did after that--some of which has been mentioned here already--was terrific. (And her version of Do I Love You is right there with Frank's, IMO.) Yes, she sounded a lot like Dusty Springfield, and Dusty was a Goddess--I think Dusty in Memphis is one of the dozen best LPs ever released in any genre, and her Philips singles are awesome. But Chris Clark was a major talent and deserves serious props for her small but excellent output. I don't care who her boyfriend was or any of that People Magazine rubbish, it's what's in the grooves that counts--and what's in the grooves is fine.

By stephanie (66.54.1.38) on Friday, May 09, 2003 - 09:11 pm:

Chris Clark is OK in my book I have heard that she was better live than on record..
Steph

By Mike Sku (64.9.11.62) on Monday, May 12, 2003 - 07:26 am:

I apologize for that big blunder. Sometimes all my Motown facts get muddled together. It was indeed Shanice doing Chris Clark's song.

By Vandelron (24.44.20.172) on Monday, May 12, 2003 - 08:23 am:

Why wouldnt Motown get behind Loves Gone Bad if Berry was so wild about Chris????Doesnt make sense;;;;;;;;I admired Raynomas candor in her book. Posner in his Motown book reports how Berrys denial of Raynomas role in the beginning of Motown is BS. Her name IS on the papers.

By Ron Murphy (68.42.89.162) on Monday, May 12, 2003 - 10:32 am:

Marv Johnson and I did two TV interviews with Raynoma when her book came out.Just before that I got a copy and we read it,now Marv was there almost from the time that Berry and Raynoma met,and his comment was that there was not anything in the book that was not true. now Raynoma could have put more in it and there was some funny things going on when the book came out that she told us about but I won't put them up on this forum.

By Scratcher (63.188.33.131) on Monday, May 12, 2003 - 11:29 am:

I heard "Love Gone Bad" on the radio when it was released and thought it was going be another Motown smash. It was that HDH sound that was hot and I thought it would zoom up the charts. I didn't know or care whether Chris Clark was white or black at the time. Never heard of her before the record. Perspectives are different when you first hear the record for the first time 20 and 30 years after the fact as part of a various artists compilation album or CD. I didn't have time to analyze whether she was keeping up with the beat or not, cause I only heard it a few times before they stopped playing it; all I know is that it sounded hot as hell on the radio, at the time.

By soulboy (80.0.251.212) on Monday, May 12, 2003 - 12:25 pm:

Scratcher
I reckon that record still sounds hot today,and i say this: She certainly DOES have soul!

By Vandelron (24.44.20.172) on Thursday, May 22, 2003 - 09:39 pm:

I listened to Loves Gone Bad the other day---Chris doesnt exactly sing on most of it--she sort of talks/sings. It is unique and has somewhat of a harder edge HDH sound---I think it was too different to b a huge it and she didnt really sing on it. I need to listen to her other stuff to really judge her voice.

By Southern Man (172.152.73.57) on Friday, May 23, 2003 - 01:25 am:

Hey Vandelron since you can analyze records and tell why they didn't hit explain why "Function at the Junction," "Needle in a Haystack," "He was Really Sayin' Something," "The Wind" by the Diablos, "You Made Me So Very Happy" Brenda Holloway, etc. didn't become million sellers and "Tip Toe Through the Tulips," "Rubber Ball" (Bobby Vee), "Dee Dee Dinah," "Louie, Louie" and "My Ding-a-Ling" did?

I'll wait...

Give up?

The Answer: Promotion & Distribution--Period.

By HW (68.37.216.164) on Friday, May 23, 2003 - 01:36 am:

Chris Clark was (is?) also a photographer and there are many photos in the archives with her credit.

And now, this little tidbit: Motown had a female recording engineer named Jane Clark in L.A. in the 70s. Found her name on some of the early cuts by Leon Ware that ended up for Marvin Gaye, like "After The Dance." Just got hipped to the fact that she's Chris's sister.

By Vandelron (24.44.20.172) on Friday, May 23, 2003 - 11:12 pm:

Southern Man--not sure where u r coming from. I was just giving MY opinion on her record(not analyzing the business end). Since Motown/HDH was doing phenomenal business at the time my analysis was based on how it SOUNDED to me.(we really try not to criticize each other here-just give OUR thoughts without "going after's"another.