(Pictured: Kenny Gamble and Leon Huff)


February 24, 2010




Waterlogged gold records - Teddy Pendergrass' Heaven Only Knows, Lou Rawls' Unmistakably Lou - lay amid rubble in the offices of Philadelphia International Records yesterday while McFadden and Whitehead's "Ain't No Stoppin' Us Now" played on a boom box.

Fire officials ruled yesterday that the Sunday morning blaze, which started in a stockroom, had been set but declined to release any other information. The fire severely damaged the brick building on South Broad Street where the Sound of Philadelphia was born.

"We feel violated that someone would go into such a sacred place and create such havoc," said Kenny Gamble, who owns the building at 309 S. Broad St. along with his partner, Leon Huff, and songwriter and producer Thom Bell.

Gamble said yesterday that detectives from the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives had shown him and Huff pictures of a person taken from the scene by authorities. "We kind of know who did it," he said, adding that it was not someone he or Huff recognized. "The bottom-line question is: Why?"

No one has been charged in connection with the fire.

The main casualties of the fire were memorabilia and merchandise to be sold in the PIR retail store on the ground floor of the building where Chubby Checker recorded "The Twist," when it housed the Cameo Parkway record label. That was before Gamble, Huff, and Bell bought the building in 1970.

The building suffered structural and water damage, and about 40 gold records were harmed, as were irreplaceable photos, said Gamble's nephew Chuck Gamble, PIR's executive vice president, who estimated the damage "in the millions."

The recording studio where Candy & the Kisses cut "The 81" - Gamble and Huff's first songwriting collaboration, in 1964 - and where Gamble's ex-wife Dee Dee Sharp recorded "Mashed Potato Time" in 1962 went unharmed. No damage was done to any master tapes, Chuck Gamble said. Those are housed in an underground vault outside the city.

"The Almighty wrapped his arms around the studio," said Huff, of the storied third-floor recording facility where he has been working on his first solo album in three decades on a Yamaha grand piano that was unscathed by the blaze.

"It hurts," Kenny Gamble said. "There's so much water damage and smoke and fire damage that the whole place will be have to gutted. But we'll be back. Stronger than ever.

"Maybe we'll write a song about it. 'The Day They Burnt Philly International Down.' "


http://www.philly.com/inq...s_set.html
[Edited 2/24/10 9:23am]

this is sad

Wow....

Thank God the masters weren't damage

DAMN!!!!!

go to google maps to see the building before the fire.

309 S Broad St
Philadelphia, PA 19107

This is sad.

That's messed up.
..jus' pure evil.

News clip from the day of the fire.

Suspect Charged in Music Company Fire
February 25, 2010


A man rescued from a fire at a renowned R&B record company had been using a lighter to see inside the building, which he entered while possibly intoxicated, police said Wednesday in charging him with arson.

Police said Christopher Cimini, 27, apparently believed he was someplace else and was seen trying a set of keys before kicking in the door of Philadelphia International Records, the home of musicians including Teddy Pendergrass, Patti LaBelle, Lou Rawls and the O'Jays.

Fire, smoke and water damage from last weekend's blaze ruined 40 percent of the company's memorabilia, though the recording studio was largely spared, label co-founder Kenneth Gamble said Wednesday.

"When I walked through it the other day, it was like an old friend had died," Gamble said. "I'm looking for the resurrection. Bottom line is we'll be back."

Cimini is charged with arson, risking or causing a catastrophe, burglary, criminal trespass and other crimes in the Sunday morning blaze. Cimini, who turned himself in accompanied by his attorney, remained in custody, and a listed telephone number for him could not be found Wednesday night.

Police spokesman Lt. Frank Vanore said Cimini "appeared to be extremely intoxicated or under the influence of something" on surveillance video.

Cimini began walking through the building using a lighter to see and ended up in a closet storing memorabilia, where the blaze started, Vanore said.

"He actually was calling for help out of there, and that's when they rescued him," he said.

The fire damaged gold and platinum records and the company's personal inventory of CDs by Michael Jackson and the Jacksons, Pendergrass, Rawls and LaBelle, Gamble said.

Gamble's partner, Leon Huff, said, "We'll bounce back. We wrote the song — 'Only the Strong Survive.'"

Gamble, 66, Huff, 67, and fellow Philadelphia producer Thom Bell are credited with creating the lush acoustics of 1960s and '70s soul music that came to be known as the Sound of Philadelphia. Gamble and Huff's songs include the O'Jays' "Love Train," Billy Paul's "Me and Mrs. Jones" and McFadden & Whitehead's "Ain't No Stoppin' Us Now."

Many of their biggest hits continue to resonate in popular culture through remakes and commercial licensing.

The duo won a Grammy for Best R&B Song in 1989 for Simply Red's version of "If You Don't Know Me By Now," which was originally performed by Harold Melvin & The Blue Notes. The O'Jays' "For the Love of Money" is the theme song for Donald Trump's TV show "The Apprentice."

Before Gamble and Huff bought the three-story brick building in 1970, it was home to Cameo Parkway Records, where Chubby Checker recorded "The Twist" and Dee Dee Sharp, Gamble's first wife, recorded "Mashed Potato Time."

Today, the building primarily serves as the licensing arm of Philadelphia International Records, which hosts tour groups and offers a small gift shop. An art store also occupies space on the ground floor.

LaBelle, who recorded the gold album "I'm In Love Again" for the label in 1983, said in an interview Wednesday that she is still close to Gamble and Huff. Hearing about the fire was devastating, she said.

"It was like a big piece of them was taken away," LaBelle said. "I just felt awful for them."

Gamble and Huff were inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2008.


http://news.yahoo.com/s/a...lphia_fire