Edwin Starr
October 2008ZANI - His Last Ever Interview
In early 2003 Edwin Starr, the incumbent American soul singer living in England, played his last ever tour around the major industrial towns and cities of Britain, working as hard as ever, pushing himself into squeezing every ounce of sweat out a set list that took in songs from every major Motown star of the sixties and seventies. What is amazing about Edwin Starr is that at the elderly age of sixty-one he was still performing songs with the same passionate wretch from the gut and with as much meaning as he did when he was 25. He was an extraordinary man. He began his recording career after serving a compulsory stint in the U.S. army during the months of the Cuban Missile Crisis, and quickly became the main attraction of the Chicago based record label, Ric-Tic. It was later rumoured that Berry Gordy Jr. bought Ric-Tic, solely to acquire Edwin Starr.
But regardless of the reputation Edwin had gained, he had to fight as much as everyone else at Motown in order to have his records released. When his song “Twenty Five Miles” was repeatedly turned down by the record label, he chose to play his ace card and performed it on a local television show instead of his current single. It gained a tremendous reaction from the audience and Edwin was finally given the go ahead to record a song that has since become a Northern Soul classic.
It was a few years later when Edwin recorded his only crossover hit, “War”, a song that still carried the same resonance then as it did today. Written by Barrett Strong during the chaos of the Vietnam War, it was an expression of the madness and loss of direction felt in an America divided by racial and ideological conflict. It was felt at the time that as ordinary citizens couldn’t vote to leave the war, or freely protest without the threat of violence from the establishment, then one way to make a statement was through art and expression in music. The song became a number one record in the popular charts of most of the Western nations, sending a signal that even if the war was not coming to an end, the public support for it was.
It was the eternal magic of songs like “War” and “S.O.S” which allowed Edwin to still be performing to packed concert halls many decades after they were written, and unfortunately, just a few weeks before his death. I had the tremendous privilege to interview Edwin less than three weeks before he died. We met in his dressing room behind the stage at the Philharmonic Hall in Liverpool, and spent a little over half an hour together, talking about his career and his thoughts of Britain. It was sadly his last ever interview. We spoke about current music and the emerging talent shows such as “Popstars” and “Pop Idol”, which weren’t really music, but the mechanics of record company marketing exposed on television. When we left the dressing room we spent some time talking to Geno Washington, who was the supporting artist on the bill, and then shook hands before he took to the stage. Looking over my shoulder as I left, it was hard to imagine that a few weeks later he would be gone. The one comforting thought is his music is still here. I suggest you put on his old records as you read over this interview and maybe you can hear his voice come through.
ZANI: Hi Edwin, welcome back to Liverpool. How have you found it playing here?
EDWIN STARR: Great! We don’t play here that often but every time we do play here we have a really good time. Someone just reminded me that we played this theatre on the Dancing in the Street show, which was very good.
ZANI: I was reading about that show just before I came here tonight. I heard it went down very well. What do you think of Britain as a place to play?
EDWIN STARR: Well, for the last twenty years Britain has been my home and the place I’ve played more than anywhere else. I do more work in here than I do anywhere else in the world.
ZANI: The British public certainly like you. I was also reading that you’ve been recently voted the most popular soul singer of all time on a British Mod website. How does it feel to get that kind of admiration from your fans?
EDWIN STARR: It feels great. It’s an honour, especially when you look at the list of people they had to choose from.
ZANI: Yeh, you were voted more popular than Otis Redding, Marvin Gaye, the Temptations…
EDWIN STARR: You know what I think decided it... I have consistently been here in England, playing concerts, being seen and being heard for such a long time. Most artists come in and out of the country, they stay maybe two weeks or a month and then they leave for a couple of years and go back home. Whereas, we’re here all the time; we’re here month in and month out, year in and year out. Although, we do other things, like in the Continent, but our main concentration is in England and playing to those fans, the people who listen to Northern Soul, the Scooterists.
ZANI: I’d like to ask about when and how it began for you, how you came to this moment where you are a respected and popular singer today. Where and when did you first start to sing?
EDWIN STARR: I began in 1955. There was an amateur show happening in my neighbourhood and I had a group called the Future Tones who entered into the show. Originally the group was called the Imperials but we rapidly found out that there was another group called the Imperials so we had to change that. We played together from about 1955 to1960 as the Future Tones and we were known as the number one group in Ohio. This was during the group era and in the town where I lived there were loads and loads of groups. It was an exciting time.
ZANI: What happened after you entered the talent show? Did you start recording with the Future Tones?
EDWIN STARR: What happened was; I joined the army for two and a half years, which wound up being three years when President Kennedy put an involuntary extension on everyone who was in the army.
ZANI: Were you conscripted?
EDWIN STARR: Well, I did join voluntarily because of the advice I’d been given by my father. He was a career soldier, so he knew enough about the whole ins and outs of the army. I joined early because I thought it would be the best way to get in and get out quickly. That was the plan. I volunteered for the draft, which meant that I only had to do two years, but when Kennedy made the extension, I was one of the ones who had enough time to be extended. Which was…okay. It was only like another eight months that they extended.
ZANI: Have you ever thought about what would have happened if you hadn’t been conscripted into the army?
EDWIN STARR: I did at the time. I thought I would never get back into music. I was so relieved when I got out in 1962 and I went immediately back to singing with my group. By 1963 I was spotted by a guy named Bill Doggett, who was an organist. And I travelled with his show until early or mid 1965. Then I met another guy who was a DJ nicknamed ‘the Baron Taylor’ and he took me to a record company, and we did a deal, and the very first record I recorded was a song called ‘Agent OO Soul’. That particular record went to number one.
ZANI: Where there any singers at the time who you admired or you were basing your vocal style on?
EDWIN STARR: Oh, I loved everybody. There were some great singers during that time. In fact, unfortunately, one of those singers that I really liked, Hank Ballard, from the Midnighters, just recently died about two weeks ago. There were a lot of really good singers. Unfortunately, the times have taken their toll; Joe Tex, Otis Redding, you name them…
ZANI: Once you had that first number one record, did you have a plan for what you were going to do next?
EDWIN STARR: Well, you couldn’t really say “That’s what I want to do next”. The record industry is a world within itself. You can only be lucky if you have a place to record. It’s not like it used to be where everybody has a record company to belong to. Many companies today don’t have to spend a lot of money on development or they don’t spend money on trying to build an artist. They’ve got all these new television interventions. The artists come to them with built in audiences just from television. So they have enough smarts about them to know, regardless if the artist is the lowest man on the totem pole, he’s still going to sell X amount of records. So they know whatever investment they make is guaranteed. They’re gonna get a certain amount of that money back.
ZANI: The emergence of these talent shows as a way to find pop stars is really hurting music. These people can’t really sing and don’t have the talent to find a recording contract without auditioning in front of judges.
EDWIN STARR: It is truly the sad thing about it. How they disillusion the young talent that comes up. They make them believe that it’s all peaches and cream. They’ll all have big cars and big mansions and the whole bit. Okay, and maybe some of them will be lucky enough to do that, but because they don’t have any experience, they won’t know how to handle it. They won’t know how to contain it or to keep it. You know, half of them don’t even do interviews because they don’t know how to do an interview. And what would they talk about? Say, “What did you do before you started singing?” “I worked at McDonald’s”. You know, there’s no history. And me, myself personally, in order for there to be any kind of longevity there’s gotta be some history.
ZANI: Is there any new artist today who compares to the quality of the Motown artists?
EDWIN STARR: I wish I could say there was.
ZANI: I thought it was just me who thought like that.
EDWIN STARR: Believe me when I tell you, if you’re still doing this in ten years from now it won’t be one of those Pop Idol acts you’ll be doing this with. It just won’t! The music industry is trying to correct itself by going back to its roots, because we need to go backwards in order to go forwards. This music we hear on television today isn’t any good.
ZANI: I’ll leave you with a final question because I can see it’s almost time for the show. Do you have favourite moments from your career which you think were more memorable than others?
EDWIN STARR: I’ve had quiet a few. I performed in Chicago, Illinois at the Reco Theatre with Otis Redding and Aretha Franklin, and that was a memorable occasion. I played Wembley, here, with Bruce Springsteen. Unfortunately, I’m not one of those people who take lots of photos or carry a camera, you know, because if I did I’d have stacks and stacks of photos I could show you of all the bands I’ve ever worked with.
ZANI: I’ll leave it there because I can see your manager is waiting to take you on stage. Thank you very much for the interview.
EDWIN STARR: You’re welcome. I hope you enjoy the show.
Words: Peter Michael Wallace/ZANI ©
