R. B. Greaves (November 28, 1943 – September 27, 2012) – Let's Try It Again (1975)

Sam Cooke's singer/songwriter nephew wrote this upbeat soul/disco jam, arranged and conducted by McKinley Jackson of the Politicians.

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R. B. Greaves was a singer/songwriter and the nephew of Sam Cooke. During the sixties he recorded as Sonny Childe in the UK before returning to the U.S., where his debut single under his own name “Take A Letter Maria” hit #2 on the Billboard Hot 100 in 1969.

Ronald Bertram Aloysius Greaves III was born exactly eighty years ago on the U.S. military base in Georgetown, Guyana. His uncle was Sam Cooke, and he grew up in Florida on a Seminole Indian reservation. At age 20, he moved to the UK.

Before he found chart success under his own name, Greaves released several records as Sonny Childe. He was backed by a group made up entirely of white English musicians called the T.N.T., and together they released one full length album, To Be Cont’d… (1966), which consisted mostly of Sam Cooke covers. The following year Polydor issued their upbeat single “Heartbreak” b/w the slow jam “I Still Love You,” both tracks written by Greaves.

“Love Is In The Air (And It Is Catching)” (1968) was released as the B-side to “Handbags And Gladrags,” with both sides produced by future television theme song kingpin Mike Post. “Love Is In The Air” was covered two years later by the Hollywood-based gospel/soul group the Liberation Street Singers. Both versions eventually became favorites on the UK’s Northern Soul scene, particularly after Childe’s original was championed by DJ Guy Hennigan at Stafford all-nighters in the early eighties.

After he split with T.N.T. in the summer of 1967, Greaves returned to the U.S. and signed with Atlantic Records in 1969. His debut single “Take A Letter Maria” was a song Greaves wrote about a man whose wife had been unfaithful, and produced by the label’s president Ahmet Ertegun.

Recorded at Muscle Shoals Sound Studio on August 19, 1969, it featured Donna Jean Thatcher on backing vocals (better known by her future married name Donna Jean Godchaux, who sang with the Grateful Dead from 1972-79). Released the next month, the single shot up the charts and hit #2 on the Billboard Hot 100 on its way to going platinum, with 2.5 copies sold by the following year.

Greaves’ self-titled debut LP came out on Atlantic subsidiary ATCO that fall, and reached #24 on the R&B charts and #85 on the Billboard 200. But he struggled to follow up his big hit, and bounced from label to label over the next few years, leaving Atlantic for MGM, then 20th Century Records. There, he wrote the superb upbeat soul/disco jam “Let’s Try It Again,” released as a single in 1975.

It was arranged and conducted by McKinley Jackson of the Politicians, who also co-wrote the track’s second part, the mostly instrumental B-side “My Place Or Yours” with Greaves and executive producer Red Schwartz.

In 1977, he released his second full length album, which was again self-titled, issued on the short-lived, New York City-based Bareback Records label that was only in business from 1977-78.

The album’s first single was a remake of his own 1972 song “Margie, Who's Watching the Baby,” re-titled “Who's Watching The Baby (Margie).” Its B-side was a surprisingly deep message song, “The Gods Watch It All.”

“Black or brown, red or white, we all have dreams, let's dream tonight. Dream for the rich to understand to help the poor realize the land. Who in turn who show the old to help the young touch freedom's hand.”

The record took him back to the R&B charts, peaking at #66. It was his last single to chart, but other notable cuts from the album were also issued as singles, including the lyrically thoughtful “Home to Home,” released as a B-side, and the upbeat, autobiographical “Hollywood, It’s Me,” licensed by the German label Crystal and released only in Europe.

Greaves kept recording and performing for the next few years around Los Angeles, where he lived and worked for the rest of his life. He staged a brief comeback in the eighties, then eventually left the music business and worked full-time for a printing company, although he continued to write songs.

Happy 80th Birthday to the late great R.B. Greaves.

Further info:

“R. B. Greaves of 'Take a Letter, Maria' Fame, Dies at 68,” obituary, The New York Times, October 2, 2012.

#soul #funk #SamCooke #SonnyChilde #RBGreaves