Harold Butler – Gold Connection

Harold Butler – Gold Connection

Doctor Bird

CD/DL

Out now

2CD set of Lloyd Charmers productions, headed up by keyboardist Harold Butler’s 1978 Disco/Reggae LP. Also included is Dobby Dobson’s Sweet Dreams R&B album from the same year and a raft of bonuses. Ian Canty writes…

Gold Connection is another edition in Doctor Bird’s series focussing on the production work of Lloyd Charmers. We join proceedings during the latter part of the 1970s, when Roots was the dominant Kingston style. But what is put forward for our consideration here is mostly a world away from that. The R&B that was key to the development of the Sound Systems in Jamaica of the 50s informs Dobby Dobson’s Sweet Dreams and Harold Butler and Co strike out firmly towards the dancefloor on the album that gives the collection its name.

Logically enough this set leads off with nine numbers from Harold Butler’s Gold Connection album. They come over as a slightly MOR amalgam of Reggae and Disco, the latter of which was then at its height as a worldwide phenomenon. With fairly anonymous female vocals floating above some tight rhythmic moves, reflective piano and synth, LP opener Darling I Like It is typical of the fare on offer here. It isn’t really to my taste to be brutally honest, but to be fair some of the items on the LP work better than others.

A solid Roots pattern is overlaid on Do It Any Way and this helps it come over as a convincing dart towards the dancefloor and the Funk accoutrements are vital in making the lengthy title track pack a punch. K.C. And The Sunshine Band’s That’s The Way I Like It is covered faithfully, but the lazy vibe and upfront guitar of Ire Rocker provides more invention, although it appears to be built around the structure of The Floaters’ Float On hit single. On the whole Gold Connection I found a little underwhelming, but having said that closing missive Fly Robin Reggae is good fun and steadily works up a head of steam.

Charmers himself starts off the extras added to this disc under the alias of C.H.A.R.M. with a busy organ near-instrumental cut of Skin Tight. Under his own name he also provides the oddly named but entrancing L. Sucks and goes full-on Disco on Sing La La. Richard Ace was, much like Lloyd, a wiz on the old Joanna and a good singer too. He gets the chance here to show what he could do on cool 1976 single Supernatural Thing and the pure R&B of Stand Up And Be Counted.

My Last Date by Sister Stern is a Proto-Lovers Rock effort and Gathering finds long-running vocal group The Africans successfully making the leap towards a Roots/Jamaican Folk direction. This disc ends with Delroy Wilson’s fine Imagination 45 and Lloyd’s suggestive Tootsie Wootsie Lollipop (La La La), one that has a bit in common with a certain Serge Gainsbourg/Jane Birkin hit.

Highland Ralph “Dobby” Dobson features among the bonus material of disc one with a very soulful Just A Dream and Sweeter Than Honey’s lilting groove. 12 inch mixes of each track are among the bonus items on disc two, including some nice Dub touches applied to the extended sections. Both highlight his velvety voice and on disc two of this set his 1978 Sweet Dreams album takes centre stage. This collection is very much a nostalgic look back to the R&B sound Dobson first made an impact with in the late 1950s as part of vocal group The Twilights. This was of course totally out of step with the Roots Reggae that was state of the art in Jamaica at the time, but the first track Whispering Bells yields a cheerful and fresh sense of momentum that is lovely to witness.

On Oh Gee the listener can discern how the Jump Boogie rhythm transitioned into Ska and a slower Win Your Love For Me is skilfully and touchingly delivered. Sweet Dreams the song is finely judged and the musicians really show their stuff on a heartfelt Don’t Believe Him, Donna. Dobby ends Sweet Dreams with a decent take of the much-covered The Great Pretender.

We finish off here with another eight bonus items. Lloyd Charmers’ fast moving Disco 12 inch cut of Stay shapes up as a further tilt at the dancefloors, with Richard Ace’s Wish You Were Mine finding him deep in a mellow R&B mode. Supernatural Thing 12″ briefly restores a tough Reggae beat, but Stale Mate and You’ll Always Be On My Mind are performed back in an easy-going Soul fashion. An instrumental version of Lloyd’s aforementioned Stay ends this set.

Anyone picking up this as a Doctor Bird release and expecting Reggae will be disappointed, but as far as I was concerned Sweet Dreams represented a pleasing change of pace and well-deserving of a fresh hearing. The Gold Connection album is a little more niche though, Reggae crossed with Disco that doesn’t really add up to more than the sum of its parts. Having said that, some lively bonus selections bolster disc one and offer something worthwhile. In summary this set is more an interesting period piece that shows a 1970s Jamaica away from the hip sound of Kingston, than a couple of great long players put together. However there is enough here of to divert the confirmed Lloyd Charmers fan and it is easily accessible for anyone who digs R&B as well as Reggae.

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