Garnet Mimms (born November 26, 1933) – Stop And Check Yourself (1972)

The great singer with a voice that outshone soul legends collaborated with songwriter Truman Thomas in the early 70s to create this super funky gospel-flavored jam.

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November 26th marks the 90th birthday of Garnet Mimms, the unsung sixties soul singer whose gospel roots were evident in his powerful voice. He went to #1 R&B in 1963 with his first single “Cry Baby,” later covered by Janis Joplin.

Born in Ashland, West Virginia, an unincorporated community in McDowell County near the Virginia border, Mimms’ given name was Garrett but he somehow acquired the nickname Garnet. Some sources (including Wikipedia) list his birthdate as November 16, but birth records on file at the county courthouse show it was November 26.

He grew up singing gospel in church. After his family moved to Philadelphia in 1952, when he was 18, he joined several gospel groups including the Evening Stars and the Harmonizing Four.

Mimms served in the Army, where he put together a doo-wop group called the Deltones. He then returned to Philly and in 1958 formed another vocal group, the Gainors, featuring Sam Bell, Willie Combo, John Jefferson, and Howard Tate, who Mimms would later help become a star. The Gainors recorded several singles without success, and in 1961 Mimms and Bell left and joined the Edna Crockett Ensemble, singing what Mimms described years later as “‘hot gospel,’ what you called ‘hot rock’ in a club.”

Playing one night at The Underground, a club on Spruce Street in downtown Philly, their manager Bill Fox introduced them to local producer Jerry Ragovoy, who was moving to New York to work with fellow producer Bert Berns. After writing their first song together, they invited Mimms to come record it, which he did, backed in the studio with the (uncredited) Gospelaires, consisting of Dionne Warwick, her sister Dee Dee Warwick, and Estelle Brown. The song was “Cry Baby,” and it went to #1 R&B and #4 on the Billboard Hot 100 when it was released on United Artists in August, 1963. It would later be covered by Janis Joplin on her final album Pearl, issued posthumously in 1971.

In the wake of the song’s mega-success, Mimms and Bell formed a new group, Garnet Mimms and the Enchanters, with additional members Charles Boyer and Zola Pearnell. They followed it up with a cover of the 1958 Impressions ballad “Your Precious Love,” which peaked at #36 on the Hot 100. Eventually the group signed with the Warner Bros. R&B subsidiary Loma, while Mimms went solo and stayed at United Artists, with Ragovoy continuing to produce both acts. It was Mimms who introduced former Gainors member Howard Tate to Ragovoy, which led to their hugely successful, on-and-off musical partnership that spanned several decades.

Mimms released a half-dozen singles over the next few years, including his amazing first solo record “Tell Me Baby” (1964). But another hit eluded him until Berns and Ragovoy co-wrote the emotional love song “I’ll Take Good Care Of You.” It went to #15 R&B and #30 on the Hot 100 in the spring of 1966.

He toured with most of the soul and R&B greats of the sixties including Sam Cooke, Otis Redding, Jackie Wilson, James Brown, and Jimi Hendrix, who he opened for in the UK during 1967. Many who saw him considered Mimms’ powerful voice to be just as good as if not better than those of the bigger names he shared stages with.

In 1972, Mimms collaborated with the mysterious songwriter Truman Thomas, who some believed did not exist and was instead an alias for Sly Stone. But there really was a Truman Thomas, a keyboardist originally from Texas who played with King Curtis. He wrote and arranged the phenomenal, gospel-flavored “Stop And Check Yourself” for Mimms.

Produced by the Lloyd Price Group, it was released on GSF Records, the music division of a New York-based independent film company.

Mimms wrote its B-side, the heartfelt “Another Place, Another Time,” which was arranged by Thomas. Later that year, GSF followed up the single with one more with material from the same recording session. The stellar jam “Somebody, Someplace” was written by Prince Phillip Mitchell, b/w “I'll Keep Loving On,” another superb track written by Mimms and arranged by Thomas.

Five years later in 1977, with soul taking a back seat to the disco and funk dominating the nation’s airwaves, Mimms returned to the charts with the funky dancefloor anthem “What It Is,” credited to Garnet Mimms & Truckin’ Company.

Written and produced by B.T. Express producer Jeff Lane and Brass Construction leader Randy Muller (who also arranged for B.T. Express and later produced Skyy), the single went to #38 R&B and #44 on the UK singles chart.

Mimms’ father died in 1978, and the loss caused him to re-evaluate his secular musical career. He became a born-again Christian in 1980, and has only sung gospel since, despite lucrative offers over the years to perform his sixties soul classics. As he explained in a 2019 interview:

“I started reading the Bible, and Jesus said you can only have serve one master, you can’t “serve God and mammon.” And either you’re with me or you’re against me. And I believe that. I asked Eddie Holman — Eddie is an assistant pastor of a church right here in West Philly, and I was at his church one Sunday — and I asked him, I said Eddie, I said, how do you feel about going to England and you’re singing “Hey There Lonely Girl,” and your pop records and whatnot? He said well, Garnet, that’s the way I make my money. I said, but how’s your relationship with the Lord? He’s said, “God told me it’s alright!” That’s it! Case closed! If God told you that, I ain’t got nothing to do with it, you know what I mean? He said God told him it was alright! ... (But) I believe the Bible, and I just believe that I should not do that.”

Happy 90th Birthday to the great Garnet Mimms.

Further info:

“Famous soul singer Garnet Mimms was born in Ashland,” Bluefield Daily Telegraph, March 29, 2010.

“Revisiting The Career Of Gospel-Singer-Turned-Hit-Maker Garnet Mimms,” by Ed Ward, Fresh Air, NPR, July 20, 2015.

“The High Key Portrait Series: Garnet Mimms,” by Josh Pelta-Heller, WXPN, January 28, 2019.

"Garnet Mimms: From the pulpit of soul to the pulpit of church," by Rachel Ishikawa, Gospel Roots of Rock and Soul, WXPN, March 13, 2019.

#soul #funk #GarnetMimms