Billy Paul Wins $500K in Dispute With Gamble & Huff
Published May 01, 2003
According to Eurweb and Soul Patrol, Grammy winning singer Billy Paul has scored a major legal victory against the legendary songwriting and production team of Gamble & Huff and Philadelphia International Records. Paul was awarded $500,000 by a Los Angeles jury for unpaid royalties on his classic recording 1971 of "Me and Mrs. Jones," written produced by G&H, from between 1994-2002.
"This case firmly establishes the rights of singers signed to small production companies to receive 50% of the money earned by the major labels that distribute the records. There is no question that Billy Paul's royalties had been improperly calculated for many years," said Seymour Straus, expert witness.
Gamble & Huff and Sony are expected to appeal the decision.
I am sorry to hear of this dispute, but I'm happy for Billy Paul, who doubtless can use the money more the G&H. I interviewed Leon Huff for a profile a couple of years ago.
Songwriters, producers, entrepreneurs - Kenny Gamble and Leon Huff were the
focal point of the urbane soul of the "Philly Sound" from the mid '60s through the early '80s. Their Philadelphia International Records was to the '70s what Motown was to the '60s: the preeminent black-owned entertainment enterprise in America and the conveyance of the finest soul music to the world.
The pair's work with the Intruders, Archie Bell and the Drells, Jerry Butler and Wilson Pickett is classic; but their innovations with the O'Jays, Harold Melvin and the Bluenotes, and their house band, MFSB, helped lay the foundations for both funk and disco and generated some of the '70s most enduring music.
Visionary/lyricist Gamble and pianist/composer Huff gathered a street-tough rhythm section of Philadelphia road and studio veterans - Earl Young (also of The Trammps) on drums, Ronnie Baker on bass, Roland Chambers and Norman Harris on guitar, Vincent Montana Jr. (founder of the Salsoul Orchestra) on vibes, multi-instrumentalist Bunny Sigler, Huff on keyboards - and melded this rhythmic muscle with horns and strings from the Philadelphia Orchestra to create a fine tuned machine that consumed and reconciled racial, sonic and thematic contradictions to generate a transcendent, melodic groove.
Kenny Gamble was born August 11, 1943 in Philadelphia, PA and grew up in the same neighborhood as songwriter/producer Thom Bell. Gamble and Bell wrote songs together as teens and recorded a duet, "Someday," for the Heritage label in 1959. They also formed a band, the Romeos, which played around the area in the early-to-mid-'60s, backed up black acts on the local Cameo-Parkway label (Chubby Checker, the Orlons, Dee Dee Sharp - later Mrs. Kenny Gamble for a time), and toured with Chubby Checker and Little Anthony and the Imperials.
- Billy Paul Wins $500K in Dispute With Gamble & Huff
- Published: May 01, 2003
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- Section: Music
- Filed Under: Music: News, Music: Classic Rock and Oldies, Music: Hip-hop
- Writer: Eric Olsen
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You would appear to be iTunes-centric at the moment! That is very cool that they list by composer.
Besides Billy Paul, wasn't there another legal battle with Gamble and Huff/Philadelphia International with Harold Melvin and with Sharon Paige?
many artists from the '60s and '70s have gone tocourt to have their royalties recalculated, or to try to change an unfair contract. It's too bad they were set up that way in the first place.
As the former lead vocalist for the band Instant Funk 70s disco group who recorded Got My Mind made up . I was never paid any money by salsoul records or anyone else . In 1999 I contacted them and was told that the record never sold enough for me as a singer to recive any money. I recorded 5 albums for their company ,and they are still selling the records 12inch and have but out new cds of some of the songs? All I got was sorry , how many others have been used!
Very sorry to hear that James - I guess the key is your contract. If you think you're entitled per your contract then you should pursue it with an attorney. Best of luck.
Don't tell the RIAA, but I had to snag "Cowboys to Girls" after reading this. I've heard so much about that song in the books I'm reading about '60s and '70s stars, including the Dells, Teddy Pendergrass and Marvin Gaye, that I needed to hear it for myself. It is charming. I see why everyone loves it. "Love is Just Like a Baseball Game" is sweet, too.
Eric, the problem I'm having with those groups is keeping who sang what straight. The Intruders, the Originals, the Chi-Lites, the Stylistics, etc., really can blend together if you're not familiar with them. One that does stand out from that era is Heatwave. I discovered an interesting later story about that. Heatwave leader Johnnie Wilder, the wonderful voice on "Always and Forever" has turned against performing secular music, though he still sounds good. I hope he realizes just how fine their work was again at some point. There ain't nuthin' sinful about it.
Gamble says, in T.P.'s autobiography, I think it was, that the souring of relations with CBS caused PRI to more or less shut down. CBS had backed out of distributing all but a few of PRI's acts. Since Teddy Pendergrass was the main star they were distributing, his accident sealed the breach. (He came back on Elektra.) I would have to look at the Billy Paul case to see how damages are apportioned, but will guess that CBS will be the main deep pocket.
Upcoming: Reviews of two bad books about Marvin Gaye.
I remember when I used to play shoot-em-up...
Just a note: you can sidestep the RIAA altogether if your local library has the box set of Beg, Scream & Shout! The Big Ol' Box Of 60's Soul, which includes "Cowboys to Girls." While you're at it, see if you can snag all 18 discs of the two volumes of The Complete Stax/Volt Singles 1959-1968, which includes most of what's mentioned here and then some. Altogether it'll give you more soul than you'll know what to do with. I've got a total of 652 soul classics on the iMac, most of which I've never heard, because I keep going back to my favorites. Rufus and Carla, Otis and Carla, my man Eddie Kirk, the Mad Lads, the Mar-Keys, the Bar-Kays, the Staples, the Soul Children, Isaac Hayes, Jeanne and the Darlings, the magnificent William Bell, Dyke and the Blazers -- and that's just the tip of a very huge, and very, very cool iceberg.
Tellin' the world/Sisters and my brother/We got more soul/Sisters and my brother/We got more soul/We got Ray Charles/Doin' his thing/We got James Brown, yeah/Doin' his thing too/We got mooooooooore soul, we got more soul...
Thanks guys, I share your fascination. Sifting through the "joyous agony" of '60s and '70s soul in its many variations, still roughly regionally-based at the time, is one of life's great pleasures. I have jsut a ton of these collections, but the "Philly Sound" one is among the very best. The Atlantic soul sets from the '50s to the '70s are outrageously full as well.
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Very Cool. Apple's iTunes music store searches by composer. I'm looking at 100 tracks composed by Leon Huff...