‘She’s A Doll’ is a new compilation from Ace Records that offers 24 femme fronted tracks from deep in the vaults of the old Warner Bros label – an offshoot of the movie company whose execs thought a music outlet aimed at the late 50s burgeoning teen market made economic sense. As it turned out the label wasn’t as successful as those suits had hoped – the label and studio was taken over by Seven Arts in 1966 and by the 70s the label was aligned with the Elektra/Atlantic grouping.
That said over its existence Warner Bros enjoyed some success (the Everly Brothers anyone?) and issued plenty of great music across all genres. ‘She’s A Doll’ offers plenty of that “great music” – much of it classy soul. Indeed the collection opens with the Three Degrees’ ‘Contact’… their 1968 (and only) Warner Bros outing. Amongst other familiar soul names on the album are The Royalettes, The Cookies, Ramona King and Lorraine Ellison whose typically dramatic ‘In My Tomorrow’ closes the collection. Lorraine, of course, was pacted to the Warner Bros soul subsidiary Loma and the album offers plenty of obscurities from that source.
Another familiar name amongst the credits is Sylvester. Before he became Sly Stone he was a jobbing writer and producer and here he’s responsible for Gloria Scott and the Tonettes’ ‘I Taught Him’ – a far cry from ‘Dance To The Music’.
‘She’s A Doll’ also offers plenty of classy 60s pop – none classier than the Brian Wilson penned and produced ‘He’s A Doll’ from the Honeys.
‘She’s A Doll’ is out now on Ace Records.
