De-evolution of a Soul Song

original. then..... white it up some..... British. Certainly one of the more impressive orchestrations for any pop song of the 60's, the Jamaican-born Jimmy James and his back-up group, The Vagabonds, hit it big on the Carolina Beaches with this one back in '68. Although not a "shag" song and not to be confused with the Fleetwood's 50's classic "Come Softly To Me", the beach music crowd was always quick to grab hold of a good slow-dance tune, and this one fit the bill perfectly. then..... white it some more.... American. Jimmy James and the Vagabonds Atco 6551, 1968 Billboard: #76 Originally, Jimmy was Michael James, and though apparently he was born in the States, he started out as a solo act in Jamaica, also home of the Vagabonds. They teamed up and relocated to Britain in the middle Sixties, where they established themselves as primarily a club band. Signed to Pye's Piccadilly label, they turned out a handful of singles in 1966, none of which made any chart noise on either side of the Atlantic. How Atlantic Records in the U.S. got wind of them is anyone's guess, but their Atco label issued, a mere two years late, a version of the B-side of James' second Piccadilly single. It wasn't, however, the same track; "Come To Me Softly" in its US version runs 2:45 (versus 3:25 for the British release), and while either way you get a ballad written by James himself and sung like Chuck Jackson with the rough stuff buffed off, the American release has sweetly-singing strings and sweeping piano arpeggios all over the place, not just during the instrumental break. The backing tracks are entirely different, so it's not a case of postproduction overdubbing. Atco followed with a Come To Me Softly album (33-222), containing a 3:20 version with a longer break; in typical American fashion, it turned out to be otherwise a truncated version of the Vagabonds' Piccadilly LP (The New Religion). Jimmy James got one more semi-hit for Atco, a remake of Neil Diamond's "Red Red Wine", which became his first chart hit in the United Kingdom. The Vagabonds lived up to their name, coming and going at irregular intervals, and James resurfaced during the disco era, retaining the Vagabonds name and working with producer Biddu, picking up some solid English hits, though only one, "I Am Somebody", would chart in the US. Oddly, it too was a B side.