"The Monkey Time" | ||||
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Single by Major Lance | ||||
from the album The Monkey Time | ||||
B-side | "Mama Didn't Know" | |||
Released | June 7, 1963 | |||
Genre | R&B | |||
Length | 2:46 | |||
Label | Okeh | |||
Songwriter(s) | Curtis Mayfield | |||
Producer(s) | Carl Davis | |||
Major Lance singles chronology | ||||
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"The Monkey Time" is a song written by Curtis Mayfield and performed by Major Lance. It reached No. 2 on the U.S. R&B chart and No. 8 on the U.S. pop chart in 1963. [1] It was featured on his 1963 album The Monkey Time, [2] was arranged by Johnny Pate and produced by Carl Davis. [3]
The track ranked No. 49 on Billboard magazine's Top 100 singles of 1963. [4] [5]
Labelle was an American girl band who were a popular vocal group of the 1960s and 1970s. The group was formed after the disbanding of two rival girl groups in the area around Philadelphia, in Pennsylvania, and Trenton, in New Jersey: the Ordettes and the Del-Capris, forming as a new version of the former group, then later changing their name to the Blue Belles. The founding members were Patti LaBelle, Cindy Birdsong, Nona Hendryx, and Sarah Dash.
Patricia Louise Holte, known professionally as Patti LaBelle, is an American R&B singer and actress. She has been referred to as the "Godmother of Soul".
Laura Nyro was an American songwriter and singer. She achieved critical acclaim with her own recordings, particularly the albums Eli and the Thirteenth Confession (1968) and New York Tendaberry (1969), and had commercial success with artists such as Barbra Streisand and the 5th Dimension recording her songs. Wider recognition for her artistry was posthumous while her contemporaries such as Elton John idolized her. She was praised for her strong emotive vocal style and 3-octave mezzo-soprano vocal range.
The Four Lads were a Canadian male singing quartet which, in the 1950s, 1960s, and 1970s, earned many gold singles and albums. Its million-selling signature tunes include "Moments to Remember"; "Standing on the Corner"; "No, Not Much"; "Who Needs You?" and "Istanbul".
Mary Esther Wells was an American singer, who helped to define the emerging sound of Motown in the early 1960s.
The Miracles were an American vocal group that was the first successful recording act for Berry Gordy's Motown Records, and one of the most important and most influential groups in pop, rock and roll, soul and R&B music history.
The Funk Brothers were a group of Detroit-based session musicians who performed the backing to most Motown recordings from 1959 until the company moved to Los Angeles in 1972.
"Nowhere to Run" is a 1965 pop single by Martha and the Vandellas for the Gordy (Motown) label and is one of the group's signature songs. The song, written and produced by Motown's main production team of Holland–Dozier–Holland, depicts the story of a woman trapped in a bad relationship with a man she cannot help but love.
"You've Really Got a Hold on Me" is a song written by Smokey Robinson, which became a 1962 Top 10 hit single for the Miracles. One of the Miracles' most covered tunes, this million-selling song received a 1998 Grammy Hall of Fame Award. It has also been selected as one of The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame's 500 Songs that Shaped Rock and Roll. It was recorded by the Beatles for their second album, With the Beatles (1963). Many other musicians also recorded versions.
Gonna Take a Miracle is the fifth album by New York City-born singer, songwriter and pianist Laura Nyro, with assistance by vocal trio Labelle. It was released on Columbia Records in November 1971, one year after its predecessor Christmas and the Beads of Sweat. The album is Nyro's only all-covers album, and she interprets mainly 1950s and 1960s soul and R&B standards, using Labelle as a traditional back-up vocal group.
The Miracles were the Motown Record Corporation's first group and its first million-selling recording artists. During their nineteen-year run on the American music charts, the Miracles charted over fifty hits and recorded in the genres of doo wop, soul, disco, and R&B. Twenty-six Miracles songs reached the top 10 of the Billboard R&B singles chart, including four R&B number ones. Sixteen charted within the top 20 of the Billboard Hot 100, with seven reaching the top ten and two – 1970's "The Tears of a Clown" and 1975's "Love Machine" – reaching #1. A third song, the million-selling "Shop Around", reached #1 on the Cash Box magazine pop chart. The Miracles also scored 11 U.S. R&B top 10 albums, including 2-#1's.
The Miracles Doin' Mickey's Monkey is an album by The Miracles, released in 1963 by Tamla Records. It includes the group's Top 10 smash single "Mickey's Monkey", written and produced by Holland-Dozier-Holland, which was later recorded by several other artists. "Mickey's Monkey" popularized "The Monkey" as a novelty dance. Also included is another H-D-H dance-oriented single, "I Gotta Dance to Keep From Crying", a Billboard Top 40 hit. The album peaked at No. 113 on the Billboard 200.
Nightbirds is an album by the all-female singing group Labelle, released in 1974 on the Epic label. The album features the group's biggest hit, the song "Lady Marmalade," and it became their most successful album to date.
"The Bells" is a 1970 single recorded by The Originals for Motown's Soul label, produced by Marvin Gaye and co-written by Gaye, his wife Anna Gordy Gaye, Iris Gordy, and Elgie Stover.
Alessandro Carmelo "Teddy" Randazzo was an American pop songwriter, singer, arranger and producer, who composed hit songs such as "Goin' Out of My Head", "It's Gonna Take a Miracle", "Pretty Blue Eyes", and "Hurt So Bad" in the 1960s.
"I Gotta Dance to Keep from Crying" is a 1963 hit by the Miracles on Motown's Tamla label. It was written and produced by Motown's main songwriting team, Brian Holland, Lamont Dozier, and Eddie Holland.
Labelle is the debut album of American singing trio Labelle, formerly a four-girl group known as Patti LaBelle & The Bluebelles. This was Labelle's first release for Warner Bros. Records.
I Like It Like That is an album by Motown group the Miracles, compiled for the UK market and released on the UK Tamla-Motown label as one of its initial group of six albums in March 1965. There was no equivalent album to this in the USA. It is known as the Miracles' "forgotten album".
American R&B singer Patti LaBelle has released eighteen studio albums, three live albums, fourteen compilation albums, and forty-seven singles. To date, LaBelle has sold 50 million records worldwide. According to RIAA, she has attained six gold and one platinum album in the United States. LaBelle has also charted forty-three hits on Billboard's Hot/R&B Hip-Hop Songs, 13 of which reached the Top 10.
"The Wah-Watusi" is a song written by Kal Mann and Dave Appell and performed by The Orlons. It reached No.2 on the U.S. pop chart behind Bobby Vinton's "Roses Are Red ", No.5 on the U.S. R&B chart, and No. 12 in Canada in 1962. It was featured on their 1962 album The Wah-Watusi.