Do you ever wish sometimes that you could travel back in time to see the bands that you missed in concert in your youth? We do, especially when happening upon videos like the one below.
The year was 1973, the artist, Gladys Knight & The Pips, captured live on the Midnight Special performing their hit “Neither One of Us,” the title track off their last album for Motown. If ever a performance laid bare all that was special about a band, it’s this one: Gladys’ flawless, soulful lead vocal with just the right added texture, the Pips’ pitch-perfect harmonies, and my goodness, check out the Pips’ light-as-a-feather footwork! They were floating on air.
Do you ever wish sometimes that you could travel back in time to see the bands that you missed in concert in your youth? We do, especially when happening upon videos like the one below.
The year was 1973, the artist, Gladys Knight & The Pips, captured live on the Midnight Special performing their hit “Neither One of Us,” the title track off their last album for Motown. If ever a performance laid bare all that was special about a band, it’s this one: Gladys’ flawless, soulful lead vocal with just the right added texture, the Pips’ pitch-perfect harmonies, and my goodness, check out the Pips’ light-as-a-feather footwork! They were floating on air.
The track was, at that time, the band’s highest charting single, reaching #2 on the Billboard Hot 100. They would go on to hit #1 the very next year with “Midnight Train to Georgia” at their new label, Buddah Records, having left Motown in frustration over their perceived “second string” status to the Supremes and Marvin Gaye, among others. One would imagine Motown’s Berry Gordy still wishes he had played that one differently! Enjoy.
By Robb Patryk
Listen to this track, and all others featured in this series, on the Flashback Soul playlist at Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/user/robb.patryk/playlist/1DDb0sGAD1uAhVVACKWq7M