I've tried listening to loads of it Andy. The problem with northern soul is; there's no soul comparing it with some of the Atlantic artists such as Otis, Aretha, Sam & Dave, Wilson Pickett, Eddie Floydd etc
Rusty, yes, great artists. However in the Northern Soul heyday ( 1970's ) you could hear their records in most mainstream clubs.
Likewise carrust - Soul was an alien concept to me in the seventies, I was a serious rock fan.
It is to my eternal regret that I had one of the greatest Northern Soul clubs three miles from where I lived, and never went there, and even worse, never went to the Casino.
massive soul and R&B fan, i had thousands of 45's and over 300 albums, many of the 45's were bought for nothing in record sales, but some i bought from a little gem of a record shop in London, imports costing a small fortune. A friend was a DJ, he would play the best sounds around, and i would often buy those i heard from him, good ole days.
andy, did you live near to the Golden Torch ?, I missed out on the Torch, I came of age just as it closed down :-(. So it was Wigan, Wolverhampton and Blackpool for me.
Peter Stringfellow ran a club in Sheffield which had a weekly soul night. The way I dressed I'd have been beaten-up & my long hair chopped off if I'd crossed the doors. :-(
his club in London was a massive deal, i went there only once because a male friend wanted to ogle the women, it's not what he said, but i wasn't born yesterday.. it did attract some high class clientèle, though you couldn't always tell what they were plying.
andy, I think that if I had lived that close to the Torch I wouldn't have been able to stay away. Great album recorded there ' Major Lance Live At The Torch'.
i remember Major Lance, and many others, i had lots of rare recordings some which would have fetched a lot of money had i a mind to sell at the time. I prefer to listen to something more classical, but those were grand days.