BILL BUSH - VELVET TOUCH / I'M WAITING - RONN 17 **MINT - PLAYED ONCE**
£
1,020
$
1,351
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Description
Presented in a very special sale; a new, MINT condition copy of the northern soul track, ‘I’m Waiting’ by Louisiana R&B performer, Bill Bush. It is the b-side of ‘Velvet Touch’. This is an original copy, but from the artiste's personal stock so is 'new' having never been sold or exchanged.
(NB following a request to check that this single is pressed 'centre' I have played it once. To my ear the track plays dead on-centre).
It is one of just a few copies remaining in Bill’s personal possession, and one of the 100 pressed as a favour (for a fee) by label owner Stan Lewis. This is the only copy from Bill’s small, mint condition private stock that will be released in the next two years (until April 2015). I am selling it on his behalf.
This copy has been released for sale following Bill’s recent visit to the UK, when, now 70 years-of-age, he attended the New Untouchables / 6Ts Crossfire event to ‘take a bow’ after the track was played by DJ, Sean Chapman.
The disc was made and used to promote the Bill Bush Combo, essentially a live act that was formed when Bill left The Fabulous Carousels in 1965. It was not intended for commercial sales, not an attempt at a hit, more like a business card that said, ‘We are recording artists’ which meant more money and better gigs.
Bill assumes many were thrown away by agents who received hundreds of singles, rather than kept in record collections as people might have done with a record they liked and bought themselves But most of the 100 pressings were used (all of the other copies that have surfaced since 2005 will have been from that source).
It comes not in a branded sleeve, very few if any were ever sold commercially in Stan Lewis’s shop (Bill thinks he may have stocked half-a-dozen at the time). The manila sleeve is the one provided by the pressing plant that Lewis used, which he had been made a partner in by Leonard Chess as payback for distributing Chess in the Southern States. Copies of the track in Ronn/Paula/Jewel sleeves have probably been transferred later rather than at the time.
This copy is played just once to ensure no defects. It remains in the sleeve that it was placed in at the pressing plant and has been in Bill’s possession since 1965. I think I can safely describe as MINT.
‘I’m Waiting’ was written in around 30 / 40 mins while the band recorded in a TV repair shop in Shreveport. It is, in my opinion, a remarkable, complex and sophisticated jazz/soul masterpiece, yet the other side was the focus. ‘Velvet Touch’ is a nice enough swamp pop ballad that Bill claims has been three months in the making. When I asked him recently what he was trying to make with I’m Waiting’, in other words, what was it meant to be (that age-old riddle of records that are so obviously simply “Northern Soul”) he replied: “It was meant to be the b-side.”
Good luck, expect to break into a sweat as this auction closes! Please ask any questions, but what’s to ask, it’s in new condition and it’s for sale.
PAYMENT WITHIN 24 HOURS OF AUCTION CLOSING AS PROCEEDS GO TO THE ORIGINAL ARTISTE. ITEM WILL BE RELISTED IF NOT PAID FOR WITHIN THIS TIME FRAME. POST IS REGISTERED POST / INTERNATIONAL SIGNED FOR, ONLY.
