Harold Melvin & the Bluenotes featuring Teddy Pendergrass.
Harold Melvin & the Bluenotes > The Love I Lost
If you think you know this song because it was a ubiquitously enormous hit, listen again. The hit was “The Love I Lost Part 1” and this one is the whole six minute version.
So what difference does it make?
Well, I’d pretty much forgotten myself until I heard it again on satellite radio the other day. This record was at the height of HM&TBN’s tenure at Philadelphia Intl. with Gamble & Huff and when Teddy Pendergrass was at the height of his powers. And what heights they were.
Teddy was one of the great improvisers of all time. You can hear it about halfway through this record. Teddy starts working over the rhythm section and the repeated vocal choruses like it’s the last time he’s going to sing again. And while he’s doing it he takes us to church (as Dan Meth mentioned to me today) and teaches us things about our lives we didn’t know we didn’t know. Geeeezzz.
Just like the JBs track from a couple of weeks ago, you can listen to this one for about a million years. And even then we probably won’t actually know all it has to tell us.
–Fred
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On August 21st, 2007 at 12:00 am
Always thought this cut kills the 45. Also don’t overlook “I Miss You,” (kind of Bluenotes meet “Have You Seen Her.”)not a big hit but a great song. The Heptones did a great reggae cover of “I Miss You.”