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Tuesday, June 9, 2009

SINCE I MET YOU - LENNY WILLIAMS


Here's an ultra smooth jam that was dropped off to me from the soul king out of San Fernando otherwise known as JR. It's the great LENNY WILLIAMS comin' thru with a cut off of the MOTOWN LABEL circulated in 1975. Lenny otherwise known as Leonard Charles Williams was born on 02-06-1945 in Little Rock, Arkansas.
Lenny Williams moved to Oakland with his family when he was a year old.
He grew up in a strict gospel environment.
Lenny's uncle was Bishop Charles Henderson Mason, founder of the Church of God in Christ (America's leading black Pentecostal church).
At school he studied trumpet, sang in gospel groups and planned on being a minister.
He later developed a taste for secular music and entered numerous talent contests, eventually landing a record deal with Fantasy in 1968.
Here his early singles were 'Lisa's Gone' and 'Feelin' Blue' before he left Fantasy to write songs with Larry Graham.
In 1972 Jerry Wexler signed him to Atlantic Records and one single, 'People Make The World Go Around', was recorded.
Unfortunately just before it was released another version by The Stylistics came out and was an instant hit.
Lenny was soon dropped by the label.
Returning to Oakland he was invited to replace Rick Stevens as lead singer with Tower Of Power.
He recorded three albums with the group and scored with 'So Very Hard To Go', 'What Is Hip' and 'Don't Change Horses (in The Middle Of The Stream)' on Warner Brothers Records between 1972 and 1974.
Desiring a solo career again he left the group and recorded two albums for Warner Brothers and one for Motown before major success came his way in 1977 with 'Choosing You', including 'Shoo Doo Fu Fu Ohh', for ABC Records.
Both this and the gold-selling follow-up 'Spark Of Love' (1978), including 'You Got Me Running', were produced by Frank Wilson.
After ABC became integrated into MCA, Lenny's albums included 'Love Current' (1979), including 'If You're In Need', and 'Let's Do It Today', before he released 'Changing' for the Rockshire label (1984) and 'New Episode' (1986), including 'Ten Ways Of Loving You', for the Knobhill label (via Fantasy) in 1986.
In the early 90's he recorded for the Krush Groove label where 'Layin' In Wait' (1990) included 'Gotta Lotta Luv'.
In 2000, Lenny released 'Love Therapy' on Volt Records and followed that in 2004 with the album 'My Way' for the Thump Records imprint.
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