5 / 10
5
love the sound of Clyde McPhatter, you will also like
Let Me Know Tonight
, because
this is one of the two songs which recall some early Drifters’ work. An almost exact
replica of
Honey Love
by the Drifters is presented here for the first time with
Oh, You
Sweet Girl
, that probably has stayed in the can for this reason. (Another group who
released a spinoff of
Honey Love
were the Larks with their late 1954 recording of
Honey From The Bee
on Apollo.) On the fourth song from this session they backed
Varetta Dillard (not included here).
From all the four fantastic releases on Groove, only two (
A Kiss And A Vow
and
Bamboo Rock And Roll
) entered a fen local charts. Nevertheless, the NITECAPS must
have been popular for some time, because Otis Williams (of Detroit’s Temptations)
remembered having seen them live.
“... when I started going to the rock ‘n’ roll shows
at the Fox Theater. For 98 cents or a dollar, you saw an amazing lineup ... There were
times I got so caught up in listening to LaVern Baker, The Royal Jokers, Chuck Berry,
The Nightcaps”
[as they were sometimes billed]
, Frankie Lymon and the Teenagers, ...
that my uncle would have to come ... looking for me.”
As you see, being part of the
concert audience of some fifties’
package tours must have been a
thrilling experience. Of the
Hamilton brothers, Al is well
known to soul music fans as Al
Kent, a name under that he
entered both the R&B and pop
charts with
You Gotta Pay The
Price
on Ric Tic in 1967. When