When Smokey Sings
   HOME
*





When Smokey Sings
"When Smokey Sings" is a song by English pop band ABC, released as the first single from their fourth studio album, ''Alphabet City'' (1987). The lyrics and title of the song are a tribute to R&B and soul singer Smokey Robinson. In the United States, Robinson himself was on the ''Billboard'' 100 pop chart with his single "One Heartbeat" at the same time as this tribute song; for the week ending 3 October 1987, both songs were in the ''Billboard'' Top 10 simultaneously. Background "When Smokey Sings" and its B-side, "Chicago", also topped the ''Billboard'' Hot Dance Club Play chart. The song reached No. 11 on the UK Singles Chart and proved to be their second American Top 10 hit, peaking at No. 5 on the ''Billboard'' Hot 100. There is a slight difference in the lyrics between the album and single version in the bridge of the song. Pitchfork Media were favourable for the Miami Mix. In the album version, references are made to "Luther," "Sly," "James," and "Marvin" (most likely r ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

ABC (band)
ABC are an English pop band formed in Sheffield in 1980. Their classic line-up consisted of lead singer Martin Fry, guitarist and keyboardist Mark White, saxophonist Stephen Singleton and drummer David Palmer. Developed from an earlier band, Vice Versa, ABC achieved ten UK and five US Top 40 hit singles between 1981 and 1990, and their 1982 debut album, ''The Lexicon of Love'', was a UK number one. Their early-1980s success in the US saw them associated with the Second British Invasion. Now essentially a solo project for Fry, ABC continues to tour and released a ninth studio album, ''The Lexicon of Love II'', in 2016. History Formation ABC has its roots in the band Vice Versa, a Sheffield band formed in 1977 by synthesizer-players Stephen Singleton and Mark White. Their debut gig was as the support to Wire at the Outlook club in Sheffield.Frame, Pete. (1999) Pete Frame's Rockin' Around Britain: Rock'n'roll Landmarks of the UK and Ireland, Omnibus Press They founded their o ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Billboard Hot 100
The ''Billboard'' Hot 100 is the music industry standard record chart in the United States for songs, published weekly by '' Billboard'' magazine. Chart rankings are based on sales (physical and digital), radio play, and online streaming in the United States. The weekly tracking period for sales was initially Monday to Sunday when Nielsen started tracking sales in 1991, but was changed to Friday to Thursday in July 2015. This tracking period also applies to compiling online streaming data. Radio airplay, which, unlike sales figures and streaming, is readily available on a real-time basis, is also tracked on a Friday to Thursday cycle effective with the chart dated July 17, 2021 (previously Monday to Sunday and before July 2015, Wednesday to Tuesday). A new chart is compiled and officially released to the public by ''Billboard'' on Tuesdays but post-dated to the following Saturday. The first number-one song of the ''Billboard'' Hot 100 was " Poor Little Fool" by Ricky Ne ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


Kent Music Report
The Kent Music Report was a weekly record chart of Australian music singles and albums which was compiled by music enthusiast David Kent from May 1974 through to January 1999. The chart was re-branded the Australian Music Report (AMR) in July 1987. From June 1988, the Australian Recording Industry Association, which had been using the top 50 portion of the report under licence since mid-1983, chose to produce their own listing as the ARIA Charts. Before the Kent Report, ''Go-Set'' magazine published weekly Top-40 Singles from 1966, and Album charts from 1970 until the magazine's demise in August 1974. David Kent later published Australian charts from 1940 to 1973 in a retrospective fashion, using state by state chart data obtained from various Australian radio stations. Background Kent had spent a number of years previously working in the music industry at both EMI and Phonogram records and had developed the report initially as a hobby. The Kent Music Report was first release ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Los Angeles Times
The ''Los Angeles Times'' (abbreviated as ''LA Times'') is a daily newspaper that started publishing in Los Angeles in 1881. Based in the LA-adjacent suburb of El Segundo since 2018, it is the sixth-largest newspaper by circulation in the United States. The publication has won more than 40 Pulitzer Prizes. It is owned by Patrick Soon-Shiong and published by the Times Mirror Company. The newspaper’s coverage emphasizes California and especially Southern California stories. In the 19th century, the paper developed a reputation for civic boosterism and opposition to labor unions, the latter of which led to the bombing of its headquarters in 1910. The paper's profile grew substantially in the 1960s under publisher Otis Chandler, who adopted a more national focus. In recent decades the paper's readership has declined, and it has been beset by a series of ownership changes, staff reductions, and other controversies. In January 2018, the paper's staff voted to unionize and final ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


The Tears Of A Clown
"The Tears of a Clown" is a song written by Hank Cosby, Smokey Robinson, and Stevie Wonder and originally recorded by Smokey Robinson & the Miracles for the Tamla Records label subsidiary of Motown, first appearing on the 1967 album '' Make It Happen''. It was re-released in the United Kingdom as a single in July 1970, and it became a #1 hit on the UK Singles Chart for the week ending 12 September 1970. Subsequently, Motown released "The Tears of a Clown" as a single in the United States as well, where it quickly became a #1 hit on both the ''Billboard'' Hot 100 and R&B Singles charts. This song is an international multi-million seller and a 2002 Grammy Hall of Fame inductee. Its success led Miracles lead singer, songwriter, and producer Smokey Robinson, who had announced plans to leave the act, to stay until 1972. In 2021, it was listed at No. 313 on Rolling Stone's "Top 500 Greatest Songs of All Time". History Origins Stevie Wonder (who was discovered by Miracles member Ronn ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Bassline
Bassline (also known as a bass line or bass part) is the term used in many styles of music, such as blues, jazz, funk, Dub music, dub and electronic music, electronic, traditional music, traditional, or classical music for the low-pitched Part (music), instrumental part or line played (in jazz and some forms of popular music) by a rhythm section instrument such as the bass guitar, electric bass, double bass, cello, tuba or keyboard (piano, Hammond organ, electric organ, or synthesizer). In unaccompanied solo performance, basslines may simply be played in the lower register (music), register of any instrument while melody and/or further accompaniment is provided in the middle or upper register. In solo music for piano and pipe organ, these instruments have an excellent lower register that can be used to play a deep bassline. On organs, the bass line is typically played using the pedal keyboard and massive 16' and 32' bass pipes. Riffs and grooves Basslines in Pop music, popular m ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Marvin Gaye
Marvin Pentz Gay Jr., who also spelled his surname as Gaye (April 2, 1939 – April 1, 1984), was an American singer and songwriter. He helped to shape the sound of Motown in the 1960s, first as an in-house session player and later as a solo artist with a string of successes, earning him the nicknames "Prince of Motown" and "Prince of Soul". Gaye's Motown songs include "Ain't That Peculiar", "How Sweet It Is (To Be Loved By You)", and "I Heard It Through the Grapevine". Gaye also recorded duets with Mary Wells, Kim Weston, Tammi Terrell, and Diana Ross. During the 1970s, Gaye recorded the albums '' What's Going On'' and ''Let's Get It On'' and became one of the first artists in Motown to break away from the reins of a production company. His later recordings influenced several contemporary R&B subgenres, such as quiet storm and neo soul. "Sexual Healing", released in 1982 on the album ''Midnight Love'', won him his first two Grammy Awards. Gaye's last televised appearances we ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

James Brown
James Joseph Brown (May 3, 1933 – December 25, 2006) was an American singer, dancer, musician, record producer and bandleader. The central progenitor of funk music and a major figure of 20th century music, he is often referred to by the honorific nicknames "the Hardest Working Man in Show Business", "Godfather of Soul", "Mr. Dynamite", and "Soul Brother No. 1". In a career that lasted more than 50 years, he influenced the development of several music genres. Brown was one of the first 10 inductees into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame at its inaugural induction in New York on January 23, 1986. Brown began his career as a gospel singer in Toccoa, Georgia. He first came to national public attention in the mid-1950s as the lead singer of the Famous Flames, a rhythm and blues vocal group founded by Bobby Byrd. With the hit ballads "Please, Please, Please" and " Try Me", Brown built a reputation as a dynamic live performer with the Famous Flames and his backing band, sometimes know ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Sly Stone
Sylvester Stewart (born March 15, 1943), better known by his stage name Sly Stone, is an American musician, songwriter, and record producer who is most famous for his role as frontman for Sly and the Family Stone, playing a critical role in the development of funk with his pioneering fusion of soul, rock, psychedelia and gospel in the 1960s and 1970s. AllMusic stated that "James Brown may have invented funk, but Sly Stone perfected it," and credited him with "creating a series of euphoric yet politically charged records that proved a massive influence on artists of all musical and cultural backgrounds." ''Crawdaddy!'' has called him "the founder of progressive soul". Born in Texas and raised in the Bay Area of Northern California, Stone mastered several instruments at an early age and performed gospel music as a child with his siblings (and future bandmates) Freddie and Rose. In the mid-1960s, he worked as both a record producer for Autumn Records and a disc jockey for San Fran ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Luther Vandross
Luther Ronzoni Vandross Jr. (April 20, 1951 – July 1, 2005) was an American singer, songwriter, and record producer. Known for his sweet and soulful vocals, Vandross has sold over 40 million records worldwide. He achieved eleven consecutive Platinum albums and eight Grammy Awards, including Best Male R&B Vocal Performance four different times. In 2004, Vandross won a total of four Grammy Awards, including the Grammy Award for Song of the Year for a song recorded not long before his death, " Dance with My Father". Vandross worked as a backing vocalist in the 1970s, and appeared on albums by artists such as Roberta Flack, Donny Hathaway, Todd Rundgren, Judy Collins, Chaka Khan, Bette Midler, Diana Ross, David Bowie, Ben E. King, Stevie Wonder, and Donna Summer. He later became a lead singer of the group Change, which released its Gold-certified debut album, ''The Glow of Love'', in 1980 on Warner/RFC Records. After Vandross left the group, he was signed to Epic Records as a ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Pitchfork Media
''Pitchfork'' (formerly ''Pitchfork Media'') is an American online music publication (currently owned by Condé Nast) that was launched in 1995 by writer Ryan Schreiber as an independent music blog. Schreiber started Pitchfork while working at a record store in suburban Minneapolis, and the website earned a reputation for its extensive coverage of indie rock music. It has since expanded and covers all kinds of music, including pop. Pitchfork was sold to Condé Nast in 2015, although Schreiber remained its editor-in-chief until he left the website in 2019. Initially based in Minneapolis, Pitchfork later moved to Chicago, and then Greenpoint, Brooklyn. Its offices are currently located in One World Trade Center alongside other Condé Nast publications. The site is best known for its daily output of music reviews but also regularly reviews reissues and box sets. Since 2016, it has published retrospective reviews of classics, and other albums that it had not previously reviewed ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

UK Singles Chart
The UK Singles Chart (currently titled Official Singles Chart, with the upper section more commonly known as the Official UK Top 40) is compiled by the Official Charts Company (OCC), on behalf of the British record industry, listing the top-selling Single (music), singles in the United Kingdom, based upon physical sales, paid-for downloads and music streaming, streaming. The Official Chart, broadcast on BBC Radio 1 and MTV (Official UK Top 40), is the UK music industry's recognised official measure of singles and albums popularity because it is the most comprehensive research panel of its kind, today surveying over 15,000 retailers and digital services daily, capturing 99.9% of all singles consumed in Britain across the week, and over 98% of albums. To be eligible for the chart, a Single (music), single is currently defined by the Official Charts Company (OCC) as either a 'single bundle' having no more than four tracks and not lasting longer than 25 minutes or one digital audio ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]