Brenda Holloway is among Motown’s most revered artists of the 1960s, although she was commercially less successful than many of her Hitsville peers. A new two-CD compilation of rare and previously unissued material by the singer, Spellbound, is due for release this month on both sides of the Atlantic.
Universal Music has licensed the Holloway recordings to David Nathan’s SoulMusic Records, which has previously re-released Motown albums by Thelma Houston, Valerie Simpson, Syreeta and the Dynamic Superiors.
Spellbound contains 33 tracks from California-born Holloway’s 1963-67 tenure at Motown, with many written and produced by the company’s Los Angeles creative team of Hal Davis, Frank Wilson and Marc Gordon. There are also the singer’s versions of songs associated with Kim Weston, Gladys Knight & the Pips, and the Velvelettes, as well as demos of tracks recorded by the Supremes.
The new package was compiled by Paul Nixon, who was responsible for earlier, U.K.-sourced Motown catalog projects by Tammi Terrell, R. Dean Taylor and Shorty Long, among others, and for two recent vinyl boxed sets, The Early Motown EPs. He also worked on Brenda Holloway’s The Motown Anthology, a 2005 release.
Spellbound was produced by Nixon and Nathan, with liner notes by Sharon Davis, who interviewed Holloway for this release. Next month, the singer is due to perform at a “Northern Soul” weekend event in the U.K.
