Betty Wright - My First Time Around

Betty Wright - My First Time Around - Atco SD 33-260 - 1969

Girls Can't Do What The Guys Do; Funny How Love Grows Cold; I'm Gonna Hate Myself In The Morning; Circle Of Heartbreak; Sweet Lovin' Daddy; Cry Like A Baby; Watch Out Love; He's bad bad Bad; I Can't Stop My Heart; I'm Thankful; The Best Girl's Don't Always Win; Just You


Produced by: Clarence Reid

Girls Can't Do What The Guy's Do

Clarence Reid and Willie Clark launch The Miami queen of soul Betty Wright with he first album at the tender age of 16 in 1969 (Just Like Joss Stone's Launch). Girls Can do What The Guys Do is a nice little early 2Step production that came out before Reid's own album of the same year.

Clarance Reid plays the piano and organ on the album and as the sleeve note says Henry Stone signs the checks. (cheques UK readers) The album was up against people like Aretha Franklin at the time and really didn't stand a chance, I'm thankful was quite good and although the Reid Sisters gave her a nice earthy sound her version of Cry Like A Baby sounds better now than then.

Wright to co-penned a couple of the songs as well, a good start for a 14-year-old and showed their may be more to come.

Betty Wright had won a singing competition on a local radio station and won a prize record and while in the record store collecting it had been discovered singing along to a tune in store by Willie Clark . So she went with them to a studio and recorded Mr. Lucky that Willie had wrote and Good lovin' were singles on Deep City Records and Lucky was a hit in Southern Miami.



Circle Of Heartbreak  (short edit)
It was three years after I did this Blog that I heard 'Circle Of Heartbreak' played-out at a Soul nite. So I added this paragraph. I had not noticed before what a great Latin feel this song has. It's hard to tell it's Betty because her voice is still quite young sounding but I thought I should add it to this Blog as it's on this same album.

Born September 21, 1953, in Miami, Florida, influenced a generation of female singer-songwriters and also influenced the world of hip hop, who sampled some of her more famous material. Born singing gospel with the family group, the Echoes of Joy, Wright began switching to R&B music in 1965 when she was only 11. In 1969, she released her first album, My First Time Around, at the age of 16, and scored her first hit, Girls Can't Do What Guys Can Do.

But it was not until the end of 1971 that Wright's most successful phase of her career took place.
The song, Clean Up Woman, became a Top 5 pop and R&B hit, and would later influence a remix of Mary J. Blige's Real Love single with the sample of its guitar riffs; R&B girl group trio SWV's I'm So Into You also featured a sample from Clean Up Woman, as did Afrika Bambaataa's song Zulu War Chant, and Sublime's Get Out! remix. Beyonce has sampled Girls Can't Do What The Guys Do for her hit Upgrade U. In 1974, Wright scored big with the songs Tonight is the Night (about a real-life love affair that happened with Wright when she was a teenager) and Where is the Love (which won her a Grammy for Best R&B Song).

After experiencing a brief slump in the early 1980s, she rebounded founding her own record label, Ms. B Records, and in 1988 made music history by being the first woman to have a gold record on her own label, with the release of Mother Wit, which featured two of her biggest hits in years, No Pain No Gain and the After The Pain. On both songs, Wright displays her powerful upper register capabilities and seven-octave range.

By 2001 a compilation album The Very Best of Betty Wright was released, along with her first studio album for several years, Fit for a King.
Still recording music to this day, she now mentors several young singers, and has done vocal production for the likes of Gloria Estefan, Jennifer Lopez and Joss Stone.

Betty Wright collectables are; Good Lovin/Paralyzed (Deep City 2378) £172 & Man Of Mine (Alston 3736) £60 1977. The above album and the Clarence Reid album are now on CD and as usual I have vinyl for sale.