Does anyone know them?

Five Star, known as the britsh jackson 5, is a group, consisting of the five siblings, Stedman, Lorraine, Denise, Doris and Delroy Pearson.

I like their well polished choreography and the fresh sounds.

"Let Me Be The One"

They had some fun,catchy tunes in the 80s,but "Let Me Be The One" is my absolute favorite.Great track that still sounds good to this day.

one of the guys looks like Michael Jsckson (Thriller era)

Sukiyaki said:

Does anyone know them?

Five Star, known as the britsh jackson 5, is a group, consisting of the five siblings, Stedman, Lorraine, Denise, Doris and Delroy Pearson.

I like their well polished choreography and the fresh sounds.

I know and love them

has there been an Unsung episode on Five Star?

Love them!! No Five Star thread can be complete without this one:

My favorite Five Star jam "Love Take Over"

SoulAlive said:

Abdul said:

My favorite Five Star jam "Love Take Over"

This is the first song by Five Star i listened to and took to them.

funkaholic1972 said:

Love them!! No Five Star thread can be complete without this one:

I love this song too , but unfortunately, i'm unable to see this in my country.

ReddBlitz said:

Love me some Five Star ... shame they were only around for a short while. Always thought the guitar solo in Slightest Touch was proper kickass, and Rain or Shine is still a brilliant track.

Another my favorite they peformed on The top of The Pops

Can't speak for the UK, but in NYC "All Fall Down" was by far their biggest hit record - it was a huge smash with the urban audience and dominated black radio in NYC in the Summer of 1985. Their other records were minor hits, but not this one.

hardwork said:

lool said:

hardwork said:

Can't speak for the UK, but in NYC "All Fall Down" was by far their biggest hit record - it was a huge smash with the urban audience and dominated black radio in NYC in the Summer of 1985. Their other records were minor hits, but not this one.

Them and their team really dropped the ball in the US. This should've cemented them as an R&B act in the states but they went all pop/rock with their next few albums and gradually lost black radio support. Even with massive black radio play, "All Fall Down" peaked at only #16 (R&B) on Billboard.

Interestingly enough, "All Fall Down" was produced by Nick Martinelli, an Italian DJ from Philadelphia who was responsible for producing the breakthrough hit "Hangin' On a String" for Brit soul pioneers Loose Ends and their later hit plantinum LP "Zagora." In fact, I understand that members of Loose Ends (assume this to mean Carl and Steve as they were the instrumentalists of the group) played on "All Fall Down" meaning it was a Loose Ends record, basically, with Five Star providing the vocals and overall vibe. (LOL Steve the guy from Loose Ends who looks like a model, is in fact a clasically trained trumpet player, and is likely playing in the horn section on "All Fall Down.") In this sense, it seems that Five Star initially was deliberately followoing the path beaten by Martinelli and Loose Ends and it initially was working, at least in the NYC area where Loose Ends was first broken. I understand Five Star became a big pop phenemonon type of thing in the UK a la maybe even the Spice Girls (at least in terms of scope) to the piont where they were ubiquitous in the UK and the average Brit probably knew who they were. Not the case in the U.S. (nor was this true of Loose Ends.) Interesting path Five Star traveled all the way around. They wound up vastly more popular in the UK than the US, whereas it was the other way around for niche R&B group Loose Ends (as it was for bonafide stars Sade, as well.). I would be very happy to learn more how this happened if anyone could offer enlightment.

[Edited 3/17/19 6:37am]

hardwork said:

lool said:

hardwork said:

Interestingly enough, "All Fall Down" was produced by Nick Martinelli, an Italian DJ from Philadelphia who was responsible for producing the breakthrough hit "Hangin' On a String" for Brit soul pioneers Loose Ends and their later hit plantinum LP "Zagora." In fact, I understand that members of Loose Ends (assume this to mean Carl and Steve as they were the instrumentalists of the group) played on "All Fall Down" meaning it was a Loose Ends record, basically, with Five Star providing the vocals and overall vibe. (LOL Steve the guy from Loose Ends who looks like a model, is in fact a clasically trained trumpet player, and is likely playing in the horn section on "All Fall Down.") In this sense, it seems that Five Star initially was deliberately followoing the path beaten by Martinelli and Loose Ends and it initially was working, at least in the NYC area where Loose Ends was first broken. I understand Five Star became a big pop phenemonon type of thing in the UK a la maybe even the Spice Girls (at least in terms of scope) to the piont where they were ubiquitous in the UK and the average Brit probably knew who they were. Not the case in the U.S. (nor was this true of Loose Ends.) Interesting path Five Star traveled all the way around. They wound up vastly more popular in the UK than the US, whereas it was the other way around for niche R&B group Loose Ends (as it was for bonafide stars Sade, as well.). I would be very happy to learn more how this happened if anyone could offer enlightment.

Nick and Loose Ends were also behind their singles "Let Me Be The One" (#2 R&B), and "R.S.V.P." . The group should've employed their services for the second album as well just to have some balance. Instead they brought in the pop songwriters and producers and were heavily marketed to pre-teens. That's when they blew up in the UK and began losing black radio in the US. The second album was massive in the UK but most of the singles were not released in the US. Probably too poppy and RCA were not shelling out pop promotional dollars for Five Star. The songs probably were not going to hit stateside at black radio anyway. But the few US singles from the second album all made the top 20 on Billboard's R&B chart. All that exposure in the UK might've been overkill because the kids and the press turned on them after a few years. They brought in Leon Sylvers III to give the 4th album some soul but he was kind of old news by 1988. And the new leather gear and Denise's humongous blonde hair extensions and spot-on MJ-style vocalizing did them no favors at the time. It was an attention-grabbing look for a photo shoot. But the first two videos from the album had them sporting the same look. The songs were decent enough but they just over-saturated the UK market and people just wanted them to go away. Now if they'd have spent 1/3 of that time, money, energy maintaining the following they'd found with US R&B audiences, they would have rebounded nicely when they started focusing on R&B again. But the momentum was lost and aside from Soul Train appearances and the occasional video played on BET, they pretty much had no noticeable presence in the US after 1987. RCA didn't even release their 1989 greatest hits album here, which contained this new banger that should've at least gotten them some club play.... [Edited 3/17/19 17:54pm]

Thank you! Very interesting.

One wonders even if Five Star could have maintained themselves as an R&B presence in the U.S. into the late 80s what would have happened to them in the face of the advent of New Jack Swing. Consider what they might have done musically had they done some work with Carl McIntosh during the "Look How Long" period, when he had completely revamped the Loose Ends sound - and very successfully at least from a music if not necessarily a sales standpoint - to re-orient the band in a marketplace now being dominated by hip-hop. I don't think Carl really gets the credit for this that he deserved. That could have been really something musically. In any event, I agree it is definitely a shame to have built a sound and a space for yourself in American R&B - successfully, and as Brits - and then to just wantonly go off in another direction and not consolidate your victory, as it were.

[Edited 3/17/19 21:17pm]