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“A product of Radio Corporation of America”
every
Groove label informs us. During it’s nearly three
year existence, from early 1954
until late ’56, it showcased some
of the finest rockin’ blues and
black rock ‘n’ roll ever to shake a juke-box. Do not confuse these recordings with
the pop-rock material that appeared on a later re-incarnation of Groove in the
early 1960s - this here is the real hot stuff! A garland should be handed to Mickey
Baker, whose gutsy guitar work is the matrix on nine of these titles. He was a great
influence and his name should be a household word; accordingly, we dedicate this
album to him.
When Cecil Gant’s companion shouted
“Get in the groove, old boy, get in the
groove”,
on one of his late Forties sessions she could hardly have imagined that,
within four or five years, RCA-Victor, the largest record company in the USA
would have done just that. For they picked up on this once hip phrase to name
their newest Rhythm ‘n’ Blues label - Groove. RCA had lost interest in the blues
market, losing much of their sales to the pushy independents like Chess, Atlantic,
Savoy andAladdin, but by 1953 they wanted ‘in’again, no doubt to pull the lucrative
black R&B market back into their fold. So the Groove label began in February
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