Garland Green (born June 14, 1942) – I Can't Believe You Quit Me (1969)
This stellar jam was co-produced by Joshie Jo Armstead and Mike Terry, the flip side to the singer/songwriter's biggest-ever hit.
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Garland Green is a singer/songwriter whose career began in the 1960s, best known for his 1969 top-five R&B hit “Jealous Kind Of Fella.”
Born in Mississippi, Garfield Green Jr. was raised there until 1958, when he moved to Chicago at age 16. While he was in high school, one weekend he was singing in a pool hall when he was overheard by Argia B. Collins, who owned a chain of barbeque restaurants in the area. Collins subsequently paid for Green to attend the Chicago Conservatory of Music where he received vocal training and learned to play the piano.
Green won a talent show in 1967 and first prize was an opportunity to open for Lou Rawls at an upcoming concert. In the audience that night was Ashford & Simpson’s former songwriting partner Joshie “Jo” Armstead and her husband Mel Collins, who had recently formed Giant Productions. They set Green up with a recording session in Detroit and released his debut single, the beautiful love song “Girl I Love You” b/w “It Rained Forty Days And Nights,” an upbeat heartache tale written by Armstead. She co-produced both sides with Jack Ashford’s former songwriting and production partner, Motown Funk Brother Andrew “Mike” Terry.
The single was a regional hit and picked up by MCA subsidiary Revue Records for national distribution. Revue put out several more singles by Green, but in 1969 he switched to another of the company’s subsidiaries, Uni Records. His first single on Uni was the stellar jam “I Can't Believe You Quit Me,” co-written by Armstead and James Lewis Venson and produced by Armstead and Terry.
Its B-side was a song titled “Jealous Kind Of Fella,” co-produced by Armstead and Terry and co-written by Armstead, Green, R. Browner and M. Dollison. Despite being the single’s B-side, the track caught fire and went to #5 on the Billboard R&B charts, eventually selling over a million copies and becoming Green’s biggest ever hit.
Uni released a full-length album by Green, but he soon left MCA and also split with Armstead and Terry. He next signed with Atlantic sub-label Cotillion Records, and released the heartfelt slow jam “You Can't Get Away That Easy” (1972) co-written by Larry Wade, Terry Collier, and Billy Butler, b/w the upbeat financial self-empowerment anthem “Get Rich Quick.”
In 1980, Green self-released his Gospel Rap mini-album on the label Love LA Music Company. Besides its inspirational title track, it featured the socially conscious anthem “Let’s Make A Better Place.”
Happy Birthday to the great Garland Green.
Further info:
“Soul singer Garland Green couldn’t quite turn luck and talent into stardom,” by Steve Krakow, Chicago Reader, August 16, 2023.
#soul #funk #Chicago #GarlandGreen