The shrewd move of
bringing in Bob d'Orleans was obviously paying off. He had
become Golden World's Principal Engineer.
Another engineer
would follow, in John Rhys, who was born John Rhys Eddins
in England.
He was mainly
responsible for the Wingate label's second release, which
was Sam Bowie's excellent "Think about the times we had
together". The song was co-written with Popcorn, arranged
by Gil Askey and produced by John himself.
He would also write
and produce Wingate003 "Love is like a baseball game"
for Dick Glass and Wingate007 "The tears came rollin"
for The Pack. The Pack would go on to become Grand Funk
Railroad.
In late '65,
Wingate would launch another label in Volkano. It is
significant that all four releases were written or
co-written by John.
The first was by
Little John and Tony "Beginning of the end". It was
co-written and arranged by Dennis Coffey. Little John was
John himself and Tony was Pete Saputo (aka Anthony Raye).
Other releases on
the label were by the Classmen and Bob Santa Maria.
John would later
move onto Impact Records where he famously laid down Shades
of Blue's "Oh how happy." He would also write the
legendary "Time will pass you by" for Tobi Legend (aka
Tobi Lark).
Ed Wolfrum was only
21 years of age when he joined the engineering stable at
Golden World and immediately proved his worth on the
legendary "Back street" by Edwin Starr.
Ed recalls, "As I
remember, I did the session, Bob did the OVD with Edwin, and
both Bob and I mixed it, as I was a young engineer under
Bob's instruction then. I also remember George McGregor
(drums) on the session and Horns and Rhythm in the studio.
Although I worked at
Motown prior to that I had a lot to learn. I owe a lot to
Bob DeOrleans and Mike at Motown.
I have fond memories
of working on that recording"
Ed later became
Chief Engineer at Golden World and Chief Engineer at
legendary United Sound Systems on Second Avenue. His
recording work has earned numerous awards including two
Emmys and seven Grammys. Yet another great
signing by Wingate and Bratton.
Don Davis's name
first appears on a Golden World (Ric-Tic) 45 in October
1965, when he co-wrote and co-produced J.J. Barnes "Please
let me in".
Bob d'Orleans
recalls "Don and Popcorn were independent producers. They
would go to JoAnne with a record, or JoAnne would give them
a project, that's the way it would work. Don would use
whatever office space was available on the day, although
eventually most of his time was spent in the Control Room.
At first I showed him how things worked, but once he got a
grasp of it, he would spend a lot of time with Ed Wingate
who had also gone through the learning process. Don used to
do a lot of his stuff early in the morning."
Some of that product
would appear under Solid Hitbound, which was his
collaboration with Lebaron and his WJLB colleague, George
White.
It was clear too
from talking to JoAnne that she had a lot of time for Don
the Engineer and Don the Producer. He had already done
a fantastic job with Ge-Ge and Thelma, and Golden World was
another feather in his cap. For more on Don Davis see
Groovesville
Productions.
The talent didn't
stop with these guys however. Russ Terrana was keen to join
the Company after leaving the Sunliners.
Ed Wingate liked the
Terrana brothers a lot and was pleased to offer Russ a job
on the engineering team.
Ralph recalls, "Bob
d'Orleans was quite a guy for the horse races and one day
failed to return in time for an important Edwin Starr date.
Russ was still a bit green and vividly recalls Edwin asking
him if he could handle it. Russ went '(Gulp ) of course no
problem'....and apparently it wasn't."
This was possibly
the "It's my turn now" session.
Berry bought Golden World
soon after and Russ would find himself
an employee of the Motown Record Corporation.
Gordy would be the
real winner, however, as Russ would rack-up eighty-odd
number one hits throughout the rest of his career.
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