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Lord was James Brown a BULLY or what?! I don't know... after reading so much now on the history of James Brown and the Famous Flames, the fact that James Brown seemed to muscle his way into being the leader (though Bobby Byrd, RIP, was the original lead singer and its founder) and the fact that King Records itself didn't really seem to look at the other guys favorably more than they did Brown - but that was probably because of Brown too, it just speaks volumes on how James got inducted in the first class of inductees in the first place. Guys don't take this as a James Brown diss because of course he did his work.
Initially I was like everyone else thinking that James founded the group and I also was under the impression like others that the Famous Flames was his backing band (they weren't, but they were the group James joined) and now their Rock & Roll Hall of Fame induction this year seems to confirm a lot of things I had suspected of James even though I knew of his ego tripping a lot: that basically James bullied his way to being a front man and despite Bobby's words on how he went autopilot for James, he actually did leave him - angrily - over money issues THREE TIMES (!), I think Bobby had to have had harbored some bitterness over how James treated him, including the other members but both Bobby and Bobby Bennett both say that they still respected James (though Bennett made it clear that James "was just one of the Famous Flames").
I don't know... James had a lot of emotional scars and he wanted to be the boss, the alpha male, it's just crazy that most of us were ignoring that band - with the exception of a few (like LBC for instance) but if James was the "hardest-working man in show business" as they say, so was the Famous Flames that stayed with him and Bobby Byrd more than anything because he co-wrote a lot of songs with Brown (most of which were uncredited), he formed production companies to HELP James sell his records, he formed People Records or at least co-formed it, he got Bootsy Collins and practically formed the JB's.
Then when HE left (along with a few other integral band members), James' career seemed to slowly take a nosedive. I don't know, is it just me that notices now HOW much of a bully he was? I mean I knew he was on his ego trip but I didn't know it was to this extent. And also the issue with not paying the Famous Flames or the JB's or any of the singers who sung on hit recordings James is credited with writing (and even that's started to be questioned), causing them to abruptly walk out on him especially since THEY were the ones who had to pay James money for fucking up.
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James Brown was an asshole, pure and simple. That's why I don't care for or listen to his music. His personal life colors how I see him. "Lack of home training crosses all boundaries." | |
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I used to think James was a cool, chill guy as he would pull himself off that way. But i read horror stories of his band... his band was tight & as good as it was cause he was on that ass every sec. I mean from what i hear total Ike turner style on his band putting fear in them if they fuck up.
James was indeed a bully
Not ot bring Richard into this but he inspired Please Please Please as you said so i can see why Little had so much anger towards JB & everyone else for ''stealing'' from him
Either way James was a great musician but a sad mess of a person Pistols sounded like "Fuck off," wheras The Clash sounded like "Fuck Off, but here's why.."- Thedigitialgardener
All music is shit music and no music is real- gunsnhalen Datdonkeydick- Asherfierce Gary Hunts Album Isn't That Good- Soulalive | |
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and it sucks because we all love his music but in real life like many great musicians... he was not the best person.
, I heard that wasn't the only song James got ideas from or nearly copied from Richard but idk how true that is.Was James a bully or was he driven? He was no angel but what would have become of the Famous Flames if he did not take control? Chances are that without his ambition they would never have had any success at all.
There was kind of a similar situation with Chuck Berry when he took over Johnnie Johnson's band. Sure, you could argue that Chuck stole his band but at the same time without Chuck would they have been successful? Probably not.
Like it or not someone needs to be the one making the decisions and having a drive to succeed, James was that guy. | |
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^ If James Brown was so driven, what did that make Bobby Byrd, Johnny Terry, Bobby Bennett and Lloyd Stallworth then? It seem James was jealous of the attention given to those who he was inspired by - Ray Charles, Little Richard, Little Willie John, Jackie Wilson and didn't wanna be just seen as a "member of a group". That's why he was allowed to rename the band as he started to want first dibs which probably goes back to his own childhood.
I think history revisionists have made it so that it seems only James Brown needs to be mentioned when he was really just a group member and front man but for some reason made sure that his name was bigger than that of his band.
I don't know if that's drive or ego... I think the same when I read about Hank Ballard and his control of the Midnighters. Or even Ike Turner and the Kings of Rhythm. [Edited 7/7/12 12:06pm] | |
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^^ Were the 4 people you mentioned grown men or teenagers? If they were adults why didn't they "gang up" on him if necessary and let him know how things were gonna go? Did the company back James? If so, why? Did they see him as the truly talented one? . | |
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I think one of em' did
From what I read, had JB by the collar, up against the wall
Not sure whom it was tho' | |
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They were around the same age as James. I heard one of them did beat him up once he found out that James went behind his and the group's back and had the name of their "Please Please Please" record billed as "James Brown and the Famous Flames". The original group consisted of five guys (not James). Bobby Byrd insisted James be brought in however because James, who had been singing gospel with Bobby's sister in another group (while Bobby had his group the Gospel Starlighters), wanted to sing R&B since gospel wasn't cutting him any bread despite the roof Bobby's parents put over his head.
I don't think Bobby got involved with the scuffle (because he was still close with James for a period though he was cut out of royalties for "Please Please Please" since he co-wrote it) but I think Sylvester Keels was the one who got into a fight with him. The general consensus with some members was that James wasn't a good singer (oddly enough James would say the same about the Famous Flames that stayed with him) but only a middling drummer. James wasn't even an original member. The first 5,000 copies of "Please, Please, Please" read as THE FAMOUS FLAMES, not James Brown and The Famous Flames. The new billing in copies - after only three recording sessions - led to the other guys walking out.
Bobby Byrd, Nafloyd Scott and Johnny Terry left him in 1957 over other issues - including failure to write a new hit (nine recordings between 1956 and 1958 failed to chart and the group was in danger of being dropped). The only reason Bobby Byrd and Johnny Terry stayed was because they were friends of James' and it was Bobby's group originally but eventually Bobby did leave and only Johnny Terry from the original group remained. After "Try Me" was released, James insisted the original members join back with him but only Bobby and Nafloyd agreed.
My guess is the reason the company went with Brown is his manager perhaps probably thought only James could bring star quality. I'm sure people around James told him "you don't need those guys"...and he believed them. | |
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I'll try to sort out the confusion with the history of James Brown and the Famous Flames...
It was Bobby Byrd's original group. In the late 1940s, Bobby Byrd and James Brown were on two directly different paths: orphaned James Brown (due to his parents ditching him when he was still barely in his diapers) was heading to a life of crime in Augusta, Georgia while Bobby Byrd was a good son and member of his family's local Baptist church in Toccoa, Georgia. When James was sentenced to a detention center for armed robbery in 1949, Bobby Byrd was the lead singer of his first group, the gospel group the Zioneers.
That group eventually changed their name to the Gospel Starlighters. Sarah Byrd, Bobby's sister, was a member initially. In 1952, Bobby Byrd and his baseball team met up with James' baseball team from James' reform center where they played against each other. Later, Bobby heard James sing with his own gospel group that he formed in prison. While in jail, James had created some instrument and impressed folks that people called him "Music Box".
Anyway, Bobby was so taken by James' voice - and his candor (apparently Bobby felt bad for James after James told him of his rough upbringing, first in Elko, South Carolina (where he was born) and then in Augusta, just 40 miles away. Bobby told his family about James' issue and they agreed to be his sponsor for an early prison release. James' prison guard let Bobby's parents release him from jail on the condition James didn't return to Augusta. James moved in Bobby's parents' home in Toccoa and worked as a dishwasher while also pursuing stints in baseball (cut from a leg injury) and boxing. However, he got the move to become a musician after seeing some other musician perform so well that girls were screaming. He decided this was the key to success and soon around either 1954 or 1955 (I'm going with '55) because Bobby had already formed his group already, James joined Bobby's group but I think Bobby or another guy was lead singer so James settled as a drummer:
[img:$uid]http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_Gbj0mpn5XyA/RaarSlH6dSI/AAAAAAAAAEg/E9L2kdAcKbY/s400/jb.jpg[/img:$uid] (James is seated on the drums)
The original group that became the Flames were Bobby Byrd (pianist), the Scott brothers Roy and Nafloyd (who were bass guitarist and lead guitarist respectively), Sylvester Keels (vocals), Fred Pulliam (vocals) and Derek Oglesby (vocals). James filled in for a drummer (I'm guessing one of the vocalists). James decided to muscle in on vocals with Byrd in competition for the audience. Bobby settled the matter by letting James lead the group, which caused a friction but Byrd had insisted. Around this time Derek Oglesby and Fred Pulliam pulled out and Nash Knox and Johnny Terry (who once shared James' cell in the Toccoa prison) replaced them.
Eventually this lineup would sign with Federal Records in 1956 (not King Records at first) and record "Please Please Please" as a GROUP, not JAMES BROWN and his backing group. In fact, by the time "Please Please Please" and "Try Me" were hits James wasn't even a solo artist. He was just the front man of the Flames.
In 1956, after three sessions, it was Nafloyd Scott and Roy Scott who left the group first. The remaining group recorded several more recordings but failed to get another hit. By this time they began arguing over songwriting credit as Bobby Byrd and some of the members noticed their names not listed on the credits as this song kept the group performing at the chitlin' circuit. Due to this and Ralph Bass' backing of Brown (and whoever was his manager, I think it was Ralph Bass), Bobby Byrd walked out as did Johnny Terry and Sylvester Keels leading James to hire members of J. C. Davis' band and its own backing vocalists to be "interim Famous Flames" as James struggled to find another hit, finally scoring in 1959 with "Try Me", which is not a James Brown hit but a Famous Flames hit, the group's first number-one hit and their first top 50 hit. On that lineup, much prominently was Bobby Bennett, who had joined the group in 1958 replacing another member who was getting married.
After "Try Me" came out, James decided to fire most of the interim Famous Flames (with the exception of Bennett) and asked for the "originals" including Sylvester Keels, Nash Knox, Johnny Terry, the Scott brothers and Bobby Byrd to rejoin him. Sylvester, Nash and Roy declined but Bobby Byrd, Johnny Terry and Nafloyd Scott returned. Nafloyd settled as a backing guitarist for James' band (don't know how long his stay was) while Bobby Byrd and Johnny Terry returned to sing with James. They were joined in 1959 by 17-year-old "Baby" Lloyd Stallworth. Johnny Terry would come in and out of the group and these guys: Byrd, Stallworth and Bennett, remained with Brown until 1968:
[img:$uid]http://images.onset.freedom.com/burlington/gallery/m2fx24-m2fx07theflames.jpg[/img:$uid]
These guys would be with him when the Apollo album was released (they were all over that album and introduced), would be with him when he performed on "Ed Sullivan", "American Bandstand", The T.A.M.I. Show, "Ski Party", when the records started hitting overseas (particularly James' solo recordings) and they would be mobbed by fans, according to Bobby Bennett.
James' actual solo career didn't start until "Night Train" in 1962 and "Prisoner of Love" in 1963 but the Famous Flames still attracted the audiences. In the meantime, Bobby Byrd continued to help his friend try to get far, even going so far to create a production deal with James titled Fair Deal to get James to a crossover audience. Who knows what he may have contributed in helping songs like "Papa's Got a Brand New Bag", "I Got You (or I Feel Good)", "It's a Man's World" and songs like that getting released due to issues with King Records.
Johnny Terry, Bobby Byrd, Bobby Bennett and Lloyd Stallworth each practiced their choreography while Brown would work with his instrumental band and made up their own harmonies and came up with lyrics (they were sometimes credited and sometimes not credited by King staff and sometimes foolishly by Brown). Bobby Bennett was the one seen draping the cape on James when he walked out from "fake exhaustion" at the T.A.M.I. Show to "Please Please Please" and was actually the comedian of the JB Revue. Bobby Byrd would open the show with his own solo recordings and sometimes he and Bobby Bennett would introduce James before Danny Ray started doing it in 1966 or 1967. Despite their efforts, James didn't treat them fairly at all: he didn't pay them, fined them if they messed up (which Bobby Bennett says they rarely ever did but when they did it was costly), and when he got a Learjet (probably as a result of his groundbreaking solo success in the mid-1960s post-Apollo album), the other guys either rode by bus or car. In the early days, they each took turns (Brown included) riding a custom station wagon.
Eventually money and James' increasing ego trip and addiction to controlling every aspect of anyone working with him led to the Famous Flames walking out before another sold out tour in 1968, in which by this point James Brown's impact had made the Famous Flames close to a passing memory. Still, however, King confused people by billing some records as "James Brown and the Famous Flames" recordings when they weren't.
The Famous Flames (simply a vocal group after 1959)
The James Brown Band (later the James Brown Orchestra, formed in 1959)
---- The Famous Flames left him in 1968. The James Brown Orchestra followed two years later. Thankfully for James, his old friend Bobby Byrd had returned to the group and hired Bootsy Collins' and Catfish Collins' band to back Brown up on tour and on recording "Sex Machine" immediately afterwards. Bobby Byrd also played a part in shaping the career of Lyn Collins there, signing her to People/Polydor in 1972. Bobby had been recording solo numbers since the Famous Flames days and continued after 1970. Bobby Bennett and Lloyd Stallworth also had solo recordings with Brown producing (I think; LBC posted a thread about it. When I find the thread, I'll post the link).
---- As much as we love to talk about how Diana Ross "muscled" her way to be lead singer of the Supremes (technically she already was), James Brown's way in how he handled the Famous Flames and the reason why some of them waited until THIS YEAR to get inducted has to be a crime almost. Him and Hank Ballard. Not sure about Smokey since he was pissed the Miracles weren't included or even the late Gene Vincent, the late Bill Haley or the late Buddy Holly in why the Blue Caps, Comets and Crickets weren't inducted with their front men. But the Famous Flames being dismissed as some backing group of James Brown, who did have star quality (don't get me wrong, I'm just stating), is real sad to me. Thankfully Bobby Bennett is alive to see that being corrected:
[img:$uid]http://www.washingtonpost.com/rf/image_296w/2010-2019/WashingtonPost/2012/04/17/Style/Images/142910700--228x311.jpg?uuid=F8OfaogoEeGrtIOZYQRVAA[/img:$uid]
[Edited 7/7/12 15:06pm] | |
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He was nice to me. Just Music-No Categories-Enjoy It! |
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I guess I meant "bully" in a sense that whatever he wanted, he got and didn't care about what happened in the future because it was all about now... much like Ike Turner, he ruled with an iron fist. James was probably bipolar, but that still don't excuse him for how he treated his own group! | |
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In his book, Bobby Womack mention that JB use to whipped their butts when touring with him | |
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I read that. | |
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I think he fired them for looking sloppy or threatened to or at least fined them. I think he did fine them a few times. Jesus, James.
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lol better be good or James will have your ASS. Cociane is a helluva drug Is all I'Z gonna say. Just Music-No Categories-Enjoy It! |
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Not to mention PCP...
Female reporter: James, how did all this trouble begin? James Brown: [singing]Living in Amerrrr-iiiica... hehe something wrong? Female reporter: Nothing wrong at all... you're not in any danger but you're out on bond. James Brown: No I'm not. Female reporter: James Brown: ...I'm out on love. Female reporter: James Brown: Out on love! [singing]I've longed from night to night ya find me...
----
[Edited 7/7/12 16:20pm] | |
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Well have the charges been dropped?
ahh hell, put up the real deal
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"Asacatamolumentomuche... no... Danke Schoen! I'm not concerned 'cause there's nothin' wrong... | |
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"I don't know if he was a "bully" he just didn't take no shit from anyone. It has to do with his upbring I belive. He had to make it his own way, he didn't live by the rules this went with his music and his life.
Bobby Byrd was the creator of the Flames, but he and everyone knew JB was who they came to see. I like Bobby Byrd, I have a CD if his, but he just didn't have that "it" factor to be the man. I know it may not be James' band/group or whatever, but sometime you gotta do what's best for everyone.
After they met up sometime in the early 50s, he was in Byrds Gospel band. They didn't have no money fo a backing band, so the mebers would switch off on the different instruments of vocals, drums and piano. I guess JB had the biggest response when he would do the vocals.
After the finally got recorded in late 55/early 56 with "Please" the Flames actually left when they seen the cover of the 45 "James Brown and his Famous Flames." Similar to the scene in Why Do Fools Fall In Love I bet.
This is the period when he finally got a band behind him (left overs from his friend Little Richard's Upsetters who had suprising just retired.) As Try Me was moving up the charts in late 58 (hadn't had a chartting his since their first "Please" in spring of 56 though had a few reginal hits like "Good Good Lovin') he needed the original Flames back so Byrd got some of the fellas together because Brown was making his first appearance at the Apollo in January of 1959.
With the songwriting credits and so forth, I don't think it was James not crediting them (in the early days at least.) We know how the business was in the 50s. JB is enough, those labels not giving credit to all the Flames on every record. That's how I look at it. And plus with Syd and Bass at King backing him and being behind him, he could have his way ...
And even when the guys at King would let him do what he wanted, he went out and did it his way. JB wanted to record some instrumental cuts in 1959. King said hell no. So he couldn't do it, so he recorded it and put it out as James Davis and his sax was named JC Davis. James couldn't do it, but JC could. But JB told Nathan to use his real names "James" James wasn't his real name.
The record didn't sell and prevented (at the time) from JB getting his name on any instrumentals. So he went down to Florida and recorded more intrumentals on DADE Records at Nat Kendrick & the Swans. Nat was his drummer and (Do The) Mashed Potatoes was a smash released in late 1959. He even went to another label that I can't recall and used his guitar player, Little Bobby Roach and his Combo for the single "Mush." By 1960, he could release his instrumental singles as he was promoted to King Records after being under it's sub Federal.
HE did somewht the same thing throughout the 60's with Smash records and recorded many of his protegee's and artist (like his Flames Baby Lloyd and Bobby Bennett) on various other labels. PRINCE: Always and Forever
MICHAEL JACKSON: Always and Forever ----- Live Your Life How U Wanna Live It | |
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I just think it's bizarre how things were. I can see things were similar in other bands but damn it took until 2012 for the Famous Flames to be seriously considered for importance. | |
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Is this the same Bobby Byrd that did "I know you got soul" "Lack of home training crosses all boundaries." | |
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Yeah. | |
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yup
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I feel good and I smell good. Just Music-No Categories-Enjoy It! |
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James calm down as he got older but They say The GodFather of Soul was something else back-in-the-day...
Patti laBelle told Oprah that in the early 60's her group would be performing sometimes before James went on and when James saw that Patti was throwing-down he said "Drop the cutrains on them Bitches!!"...
Patti said the curtain did indeed come down and they had to exit the stage in the middle of a performance...
To James's credit he did tell her decades ago that she was a sanging woman and to keep doing what she was doing and she did...His actions was another story though...LOL...
Patti saw James for the last time months before his Passing @ the British Rock N Roll Hall of Fame ceremony...Prince was inducted that night and was there to accept the honor...Accoring to Miss Patti before the show The GodFather summoned her to his sute and told her how much he Loved her and how Proud he was of her success....
James got the Big head Fever like most Stars that become Super-Duper-Stars...I don't think that his not-so-nice ways early on his career DEFINES his entire career and the Man himself... | |
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It might've not defined his career - I didn't say it did by the way | |
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Bobby needs an unsung "Lack of home training crosses all boundaries." | |
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He has one | |
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I think she meant Byrd... [Edited 7/7/12 19:47pm] | |
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oh, then i agree | |
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