Dave Godin’s Deep Soul Treasures Volume 4Kent CDKEND485★★★★★
The late Dave Godin was a towering figure in the appreciation of American soul music in the UK. As a soul fan he set up the first Tamla Motown fan club, as a writer he coined the terms “Northern soul” and “deep soul” and as a shop and record company owner he released some great records on the Soul City and Deep Soul labels.
With the Ace Records subsidiary Kent in the 1990s he began a series of deep soul compilations, Dave Godin’s Deep Soul Treasures, which included some of the greatest and most intense soul tracks ever released in the UK. He’d reached volume four before his untimely death in 2004.
Now Ady Croasdell has taken on the mantle and compiled a fifth volume that includes tracks Godin had wanted to include in earlier sets – such as the lilting “Somebody New” by the Emotions, the impassioned “Where is the Party” by Helena Ferguson and the strange but compelling “Dead!” by Carolyn Sullivan.
While most of the names here won’t be known outside soul circles there’s a smattering of better-known artists including Gladys Night with the early non-Motown cut “Lovers Always Forgive”, Esther Phillips with the deeply felt “Home is Where the Hatred Is”, Muscle Shoals songwriter George Jackson with the Southern Soul ballad “My Desires are Getting the Best of Me”and Dionne Warwick’s sister Dee Dee with “Foolish Fool”.
Bu then it’s perhaps the lesser-known names who impress the most, from the haunting “All I Want is You” by Zilla Mayes to the pleading “Who Knows” by Soul City and the equally poignant “I Will” by Lattimore Brown.
Soul music doesn’t get any better than this.
