Tommie Young: Do You Still Feel The Same Way - 1973
Tommie Young was a soul singer from Texas who recorded most of her music in Shreveport, Louisiana in the early seventies. Her voice was strong, soulful but gospel-influenced, like Betty Wright, Shirley Brown, Freda Payne and Candi Staton. She has been relatively forgotten, which is a shame cause she laid down some seriously quality seventies soul.
This is an excellent album. The sound quality is superb. The horn backing is dominant throughout the material as are the churchy backing vocals. I think you can get the picture - powerful vocals, emotive songs, big brass backing - all the usual ingredients from the era.
That's How Strong My Love Is is very different-sounding to the version that is more commonly heard - by Otis Redding and The Rolling Stones for example. Young's version is slowed down to walking pace and it becomes a late night soul ballad, although some horns are still there on the backing, they are not as "hooky" as on the more popular version. It is, however, a bit of a cult hit among soul music fans, apparently.
Everybody's Got A Little Devil In Their Soul is a marvellously catchy, upbeat piece of gospelly soul with lots of call-and-response vocals and fast, funky guitars. It is a rousing track. A gem is the delicious slow burning groove of You Brought It On Yourself. Its lyrics are familiar ones of male fecklessness and infidelity. You Came Just In Time is Heaven-sent, wonderful soul too, as is the nicely-titled She Don't Have To See You (To See Through You).
That is all forgotten about in That's All A Part Of Loving Him as Tommie forgives her man anything on an attractive funky, grinding and bassy number. It has a bit of a Northern Soul feel to it, although the beat is probably just a bit slower. It also features some nice flute enhancements. It is the type of track that Paul Weller might have covered during his Studio 150 phase. Ok he didn't but he just may have...I'm sure he would have liked the track. This is a very impressive and uplifting album of seventies soul. The fact so much of this material slipped under the radar is a pity.
Unfortunately, unlike sound-alike contemporary Laura Lee, this would appear to have been the only album released by Young during this, her most productive period.
