Following the lead from JAY FROM THE BIG BAD BAY AREA it's time to post only the second single on TOMORROW'S VELVET DREAMZ. In 1966, "Southside Chicago" from Ole Records got good play on WVON, one of Chicago's premier radio outlets in the city during the heyday of soul music. With its gentle lope, the young Otis Brown sings his verses bragging that he is from the South Side of Chicago over a persistent chorus chanting throughout the record, "South Side Chicago." What he was hearing on the South Side was the city in song, and Brown and his ad hoc group the Delights are so delighted about coming from there they sing "South Side Chicago" some 38 times through the record. While the South Side was in decline at this point, there were still a lot of entertainment venues that kept the community vital in 1966. The legendary Regak Theatre, at 47th and South Parkway (now King Drive) was still putting on monthly soul shows (where you could see six to nine acts singing all the latest soul hits for a buck-fifty), and such nightclubs as the Sutherland on 47th, Algiers on 69th and the Bonanza around 77th and Halsted were also active. In these showcases, soul music fans could see many of the same acts they heard on WVON, such as Otis Brown.
Olé Records was owned by King Bevill and operated out of his home at 9734 Princeton on the South Side, one of the innumerable small mom-and-pop record labels that helped put Chicago on the map as a soul music center. Bevill and Brown, who experienced the South Side during the latter stages of its glory years, created a fitting paean to the section of the city they so loved.
Olé Records was owned by King Bevill and operated out of his home at 9734 Princeton on the South Side, one of the innumerable small mom-and-pop record labels that helped put Chicago on the map as a soul music center. Bevill and Brown, who experienced the South Side during the latter stages of its glory years, created a fitting paean to the section of the city they so loved.
POSTED BY G MAN
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