Baby Washington-You Never Could Be Mine b/w The Time

I just checked the Google and yes, Ms. Washington is still alive and still working.  I'll bet that she still puts on a great show.

What a voice!  Justine "Baby" Washington.  I love the bands on these records too, and the arrangements.  Check out the call and response between the horns and the guitar on "You Never Could Be Mine."

It's always funny to me that people say that there was a dead spot in Rock n' Roll between like 1959 and 1963, that it was all these saccharin, corporate white guys like Fabian and Neil Sedaka or something. The pitch is that the Beatles came along and saved Rock n' Roll.  Not true at all.  '59 to '63 was the period of Baby Washington's greatest output, for one thing, not to mention Ike and Tina Turner, the great girl-groups like the Shirelles and the Marvelettes, and Phil Spector.  There was a ton of great stuff in the R & B charts off in that parallel universe.  Del Shannon was pretty hot stuff, and even Freddie Cannon and Bobby Rydell had their moments.  After 1962 there was Surf Music, I was in high school in New York at the time and I loved Surf Music, and the related Hot Rod Music.  There was a lot of great black music that made the "white" charts too, like Gary U.S. Bonds, "New Orleans" and "Quarter to Three," and Hank Ballard, "Let's Go" and, dare I say it, "The Twist."  Not a dead spot at all.

There are good CD's around of all of Baby Washington's stuff, and it's all great. You can type "baby washington" in the upper left-hand corner to go to earlier posts of mine about her.