LaVern Baker (November 11, 1929 – March 10, 1997) – Born To Lose (1967)

This epic, bluesy heartbreak tale by the singer best known for "Jim Dandy" was arranged and conducted by the unsung genius Bert DeCoteaux.

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Legendary singer LaVern Baker helped shape rock'n'roll with her #1 R&B hit “Jim Dandy” in 1956, and was seldom absent from the R&B charts for the next ten years.

Born in Chicago, Delores Evans started singing in the city’s nightclubs at age 17. After several stage name revisions, she stuck with LaVern Baker.

She signed to Atlantic Records in 1953 and released her first single for the label that August, the superb R&B jam “Soul On Fire.” It had a sound that was ahead of its time and signaled a major talent had arrived.

Unfortunately, the record did not chart. Her first big hit came two years later with an uptempo song titled “Tweedlee Dee” (1955), which went to #4 R&B and #14 on the Billboard Hot 100. She then had her song stolen by the infamous cultural appropriator Georgia Gibbs, whose note-for-note cover became a #1 pop hit. This led Baker to unsuccessfully sue Gibbs for $250,000 and lobby Congress to pass legislation classifying covers as copyright violations, a request that went nowhere.

In 1956, she hit again with her classic “Jim Dandy.” Originally released as the B-side to “Tra La La,” a song she sang in Alan Freed’s 1956 film Rock, Rock, Rock, it reached #1 R&B and #17 on the Hot 100, selling over a million copies and helping shape the emerging sound of rock’n’roll. Her nemesis Georgia Gibbs tried her luck again, recording an identical cover of “Tra La La.” But this time Baker had the last laugh, because fans were buying her single for “Jim Dandy,” and Gibbs’ record flopped.

After leaving Atlantic for Brunswick Records in the mid-1960s, Baker and Jackie Wilson released a duet titled “Think Twice.” Three versions were recorded, one dubbed “Version X” with super raunchy lyrics that prevented it from being played on the radio but made it a much-bootlegged party record for the ages.

When the first season of the original Batman TV series became a runaway success in early 1966, Baker parodied her own hit “Jim Dandy” for the hilarious swinging soul explosion “Batman To The Rescue,” written by Lincoln Chase and released later that same year.

In 1967, she released the epic bluesy heartbreak tale “Born To Lose” b/w “I Need You So.” The A-side was written by “Frankie Brown,” a pseudonym for the prolific country singer/songwriter and guitarist Theron Eugene Daffan, with chorus and orchestra directed by legendary arranger/producer Bert “Super Charts” DeCoteaux. Production was credited to Brunswick A&R director Dick Jacobs and the label’s president, the notorious Nat Tarnopol who allegedly stole millions in royalties from the label’s artists and often assigned himself writing credits for songs he didn’t write.

Baker’s second-to-last LP (before one final attempted comeback album in 1992) came out in 1970 on Brunswick. It included “Born To Lose” and also her stellar 1969 single “I'm the One to Do It,” co-written by William Butler and Carl Smith and produced by Carl Davis, originally recorded by Jackie Wilson.

“I'm the One to Do It” soon became a classic on the UK’s Northern Soul scene. Original copies today sell for $100-$200 on Discogs.

The reason Baker stopped recording in the late sixties was that after a USO tour in Vietnam, she developed a serious case of bronchial pneumonia. She was flown to the Subic Bay U.S. Naval base in the Philippines, and after she recovered a friend told her they needed an entertainment director at the base’s Marine Corps Staff NCO club. She took the job and didn’t move back to the States until the base closed in 1991.

Rest in Peace, LaVern Baker.

Further info:

"LaVern Baker," interview by Skip E. Lowe, YouTube, 1995.

"Remembering Singer LaVern Baker," obituary, Fresh Air, NPR, March 14, 1997.

“Podcast #25: LaVern Baker,” by Katy Derbyshire, The Dead Ladies Show, September 19, 2019.

#soul #JackieWilson #BertDeCoteaux #LaVernBaker