JabarR74 said:

LittleBLUECorvette said:

I think you mentioned them first.

I know, but nobody else has mentioned them.

Since I'm from H-Town, I'd like to see them.

LittleBLUECorvette said:

JabarR74 said:

I know, but nobody else has mentioned them.

Since I'm from H-Town, I'd like to see them.

They haven't been the same since Dino passed.

Vesta Williams

Meli'sa Morgan

Shirley Murdock

Jean Carne

Angie Bofill

Miki Howard

Although I don't think they would be able to do any entire hour on him since he only recorded one album, I think Sherrick's story would be a good one.

Richard "Dimples" Fields

Here's another act they should do a future Unsung on:

And you guys can vote on the next Unsung you'd like to see:

http://www.tvoneonline.co...mp;id=3107

JabarR74 said:

Here's another act they should do a future Unsung on:

And you guys can vote on the next Unsung you'd like to see:

http://www.tvoneonline.co...mp;id=3107

Some interesting choices, less Zhane and Tevin Campbell.

Frankie Beverly & Maze
Midnight Star
Angela Bofill
Tevin Campbell
Alexander O’Neal and Cherelle
Eric B. & Rakim
Cameo
Barry White
Isaac Hayes
Zhane
Atlantic Starr
Bobby Womack

minneapolisFunq said:

Mazarati

I have never even an interview with any of these guys.

bboy87 said:

The Sylvers

5 Star

Jesse Johnson

Add to that...

the orignal but ousted chicks from Destiny's Child

the Mary Jane Girls

Jill Jones - she need to come with the truth about how p treated her

Pebbles

that lady that sang "It's Got To Be Real"

Jennifer Holiday

Dru Down

Ghetto Boyz

DesireeNevermind said:

bboy87 said:

The Sylvers

5 Star

Jesse Johnson

Add to that...

the orignal but ousted chicks from Destiny's Child

the Mary Jane Girls

Jill Jones - she need to come with the truth about how p treated her

Pebbles

that lady that sang "It's Got To Be Real"

Jennifer Holiday

Dru Down

Ghetto Boyz

I reall don't think the Slyvers will ever do "Unsung". . .

dancerella said:

The Pointer Sisters

Betty Davis

Andre Cymone

Cheryl Lynn

Pebbles

Angela Bofill

Full Force

The Pointer Sisters are too classy and big for Unsung IMO.

TD3 said:

DesireeNevermind said:

Add to that...

the orignal but ousted chicks from Destiny's Child

the Mary Jane Girls

Jill Jones - she need to come with the truth about how p treated her

Pebbles

that lady that sang "It's Got To Be Real"

Jennifer Holiday

Dru Down

Ghetto Boyz

I reall don't think the Slyvers will ever do "Unsung". . .

Really? Why not?

Has anyone seen a documentary of any sort on Mtume? I swear they are one of the most sampled yet little known artist. People know the music but not much about the group it seems.

The Supremes

More popular sixties groups

Angela Bofill

Prince's proteges

Sade

TD3 said:

DesireeNevermind said:

Add to that...

the orignal but ousted chicks from Destiny's Child

the Mary Jane Girls

Jill Jones - she need to come with the truth about how p treated her

Pebbles

that lady that sang "It's Got To Be Real"

Jennifer Holiday

Dru Down

Ghetto Boyz

I reall don't think the Slyvers will ever do "Unsung". . .

Cheryl Lynn

Jill Jones most definately...her paisely park album is fire!.....She should have been a huge star.

Stephanie Mills! Helloooooo!!!!

The Miracles - the first real success of Motown and they hardly get recognized as much as the Supremes...

DesireeNevermind said:

the orignal but ousted chicks from Destiny's Child

angel345 said:

The Supremes

More popular sixties groups

Angela Bofill

Prince's proteges

Sade

Compared to Martha and the Vandellas, the Marvelettes, Mary Wells, Brenda Holloway, Kim Weston and the Velvelettes, SURELY YOU JEST.

DecaturStone said:

minneapolisFunq said:

Mazarati

I have never even an interview with any of these guys.

There was some done, when they reunited for performing at the Prince Family Reunion, last year at the Cabooze.

http://minneapolis.craigs...90027.html

The return of Mazarati: "Y'all don't think they're funky? You're wrong!"

BY JAY GABLER, TC DAILY PLANET
May 31, 2009
“Mazarati’s coming back,” shouted Tony Christian with a grin, “and it’s gonna be dangerous!”

Christian was in his Bloomington garage on Sunday evening with the founding members of Mazarati, the Minneapolis band whose 1986 debut album was release number 001 on Prince’s Paisley Park label. The occasion marked the first time in 20 years that the band had been together. They were at Christian’s house to rehearse for their reunion show: they’re playing a set Friday night at the Prince Family Reunion at the Cabooze. Appropriately, the Cabooze was also the venue where the band played their very first show—tickets were $2.

“We have rehearsal space,” said lead singer Sir Casey Terry as he ducked into Christian’s basement, “but we wanted to do it this way because this is where we started—playing in the basement.” Terry grew up with Prince, who was nonetheless surprised when he came upon Terry playing at First Ave. “I had real long hair then,” remembered Terry, “and it was hanging down covering my face. Prince came up and said, ‘Is this your music?’ I pushed my hair back and said, ‘Yeah, this is my music! You know who I am.’”

Prince signed Mazarati to his label, contributing songs and musical cameos. “He’d jam with us when we were still a bar band,” said Terry. “You’d hear this voice on the monitor—Play “Head”—and you’d know he was there. Once we were playing an awards show in L.A., and the room was full of all these great musicians—legends, like Smokey Robinson. They weren’t that into it, and Prince jumped up on stage. ‘Y’all don’t think they’re funky?’ he said. ‘You’re wrong!’”

Mazarati’s 1986 debut was a modest success; they toured nationally, played live on MTV, and had a top 40 hit with the Prince-penned “100 MPH.” “We were playing four to seven nights a week,” remembered keyboardist Aaron Keith. “We went from playing bars to playing for ten or twenty thousand people.”

When Mazarati’s producer Brown Mark parted ways with Prince, the band signed with Motown Records—but the band members weren’t happy with the resulting album, Mazarati 2. “I didn’t sound ethnic enough for Motown,” said Terry. At the label’s urging, the band brought in an assortment of other producers, songwriters, and performers. “The sound was generic,” said Terry. “It was just a byproduct of the original Mazarati.” The band left Motown, and their second—and last—album was released only in Canada.

Today, Mazarati may be best known for the fact that they were the first act to record Prince’s #1 hit “Kiss.” Prince gave the band a brief demo of the song, which he originally envisioned as a countryish swing number. Mazarati gave the song its funk arrangement; Prince was so pleased with the result that he re-edited the recording—adding his own lead vocal and guitar solo—and released it on his 1986 album Parade.

“People sometimes say Prince liked us because we were the band he could never be,” said keyboardist Marvin Gunn (a.k.a. Marr Starr). “We were hard black funk rockers with”—Gunn gestured at Keith and drummer Pancho Lopez—“two white guys who were also funky.”

Since the band broke up, all the members have remained active in music. Keith restored the Varsity Theater, and Christian and Gunn performed as the Wild Pair—best known for their duet with Paula Abdul as the animated MC Skat Kat on the #1 single “Opposites Attract.”

On Sunday the band declined to be photographed or to be heard in rehearsal, preferring to reemerge in style at the Cabooze. “We hit too soon,” said Christian. “We were young and dumb. Now we’re fluent and we know how to do it! You can quote me on that.”

Jay Gabler (jay@tcdailyplanet.net) is the Daily Planet’s arts editor.

http://www.tcdailyplanet....wrong.html




Two notable Minnesota acts get back together this weekend.

Last update: June 4, 2009 - 4:25 PM

SOUNDS OF BLACKNESS
When: 8 p.m. Sat. • Where: Janet Wallace Fine Arts Center, Macalester College, 1600 Grand Av., St. Paul. • Tickets: Sold out.

No wonder Sounds of Blackness' 40th anniversary reunion concert Saturday sold out so fast: They needed to save room for the roughly 100 current and past members of the venerable gospel/funk/R&B choir who plan to make it for the show, including some from as far away as Japan and Italy.

"It makes me want to quote one of the old spirituals: 'My soul looks back and wonders,'" leader Gary Hines quipped about the turnout.

Among the better-known alumni and associates from the Grammy-winning ensemble, Ann Nesby is unavailable to come, Jimmy Jam, Terry Lewis and Alexander O'Neal are all maybes, and Cynthia ("Funkytown") Johnson will for sure make the show, which coincides with Macalester's own alumni weekend. Of course, rehearsing with that many people will be no easy chore, but Hines said it's actually gotten a lot easier than it was 40 years ago.

"We've been sending out MP3s via e-mail to people of the repertoire, so we're going to be almost ready even before everyone gets to town," he said.

Since Saturday's concert is sold out, Hines left open the possibility of another big reunion show down the line. For sure, though, look for a new Sounds album to land in August, titled "The Third Gift: Story, Song & Spirit."

CHRIS RIEMENSCHNEIDER

MAZARATI
When: 9:30 p.m. today. • Where: Cabooze, 917 Cedar Av. S., Mpls. 612-338-6425. • Tickets:$25.

There are probably seven different versions of the truth if you talk to the members of Mazarati, an underrated funk-rock band from Prince's secretive purple reign. What they all agree on is that they're excited to reunite tonight after 20 years, even if it's just for three songs.

Fittingly, their comeback will be at the Cabooze as part of the third annual Prince Family Reunion (in honor of his 51st birthday on Sunday).

"We played our first show at the Cabooze" in 1984, said guitarist Tony Christian.

Mazarati, which gigged on the Upper Midwest club circuit, scored their only hit -- "100 MPH," co-written by Prince (they also recorded "Kiss" before he decided to keep it for himself) -- on a self-titled album produced by Prince bassist Brown Mark on Paisley Park Records in 1986. A revamped version of the group recorded "Mazarati 2" on Motown. "Fourteen thousand copies were released in Canada," sighed lead singer Terry Casey, who has a Mazarati logo on his left bicep.

Since then, Casey, now with salt-and-pepper curls, has toiled as a machinist. Christian and keyboardist Marvin Gunn (aka Marr Starr) worked on Paula Abdul's hit debut; now Gunn is an actor and musician in Phoenix while Christian has been producing with Prince sideman Dr. Fink. Bassist Jerome Cox (aka Romeo) worked with Death Row Records in L.A. before dropping out of the music biz. Guitarist Craig (Screamer) Powell has continued to gig, mostly with Westside. Keyboardist Aaron Keith played in a piano bar for 10 years, reopened the Varsity Theater and has served as a union stagehand for everyone from Eminem to Barack Obama.

New to Mazarati is well-traveled Twin Cities drummer Pancho Lopez, who did stints with Stevie Wonder and Kool and the Gang.

The band sounded as tight and funky as ever at a recent rehearsal. "We're going to do an album" -- and some gigs -- Christian promised.

Also appearing tonight are such familiar Purple faces as Dez Dickerson, Bobby Z, Dr. Fink, Michael Bland, Margie Cox, Tyka Nelson, Mike Scott and the Family, the Paul Peterson/Susannah Melvoin group that recorded the original version of "Nothing Compares 2 U" and is working on a new album.

JON BREAM

http://www.startribune.co...page=1&c=y

UPDATE!! 3rd Annual "Prin...! UPDATE!!

DesireeNevermind said:

TD3 said:

I reall don't think the Slyvers will ever do "Unsung". . .

Really? Why not?

Some of the Sylvers fans have asked some the family members would they consider doing Unsung. One or two have questioned the merits any type publicity for publicity sake, as a postive. I'm not sure if that opinion is shared by all of them.

I wouldn't be surprised if some artist have shied away from doing the series. I know many Orgers like the show but TV1 could've done something special here and instead decided to embrace the lowest common denominator. (IMHO) To each their own.

This lady right here is the definition of unsung.

Midnight Star

Vernon Burch

Chante` Moore

Dynasty

Glenn Jones

Rachelle Ferrell

Billy Preston

Vee Jay Records

Mazarti did my absolute fab version of Nothing Compares 2 U...I can never find it, so I def want them

[Edited 11/18/10 19:57pm]

keep up with the suggestions. I am learning about people just from your suggestions. Quite a few I have never heard of before.

Thank God for Youtube.