Chad's Records...Chattanooga, Tn.

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Comment by Shelley "SoleMann" King on August 2, 2009 at 3:08pm
As Chattanooga record store owner Chad Bledsoe sifts through the hundreds of vinyl discs that fill nearly every space in his shop, he pauses at a copy of gospel singer Keith Green’s 1983 album.

“This is a Christian singer that’s pretty unknown, but he’s really good,” Mr. Bledsoe said passing through the dusty albums. “I like turning people onto obscure stuff that I like.”

Wearing an indie rock band t-shirt with black hair hanging past his shoulders, Mr. Bledsoe, 41, sits in his store, Chad’s Records, at the corner or Lindsay and Vine, and talks about records like they are part of his family, which they have been for the past 20 years.

Through the advent of the CD and the demise of the cassette tape, Mr. Bledsoe’s store has survived, and at the core of that existence has been his love of records, especially the rare, vintage kind.


Staff Photo by Margaret Fenton
Chad Bledsoe, owner of Chad's record store on Vine Street, sells a couple of vintage vinyl records to Molly Schimpf Saturday. Chad's is celebrating 20 years of selling unique records in Chattanooga this November.
He prizes an unopened copy of Lynyrd Skynyrd’s 1977 album, “Street Survivors,” which initially was released with a cover depicting all seven members of the band surrounded by flames. That cover was pulled after the 1977 plane crash that killed lead singer Ronnie Van Zant.

Mr. Bledsoe bought the store in November 1988 when he was a 21-year-old college student. His parents had wanted him to take a more traditional path — finish college and and get a steady job with benefits — but Mr. Bledsoe wanted to to do something different.

“I saw so many people that would go and do all this stuff — they were going to be this and that — and then they’d change their career and start all over again,” he said. “I thought, I don’t want to waste a lot of time.”

At the time, he was a customer of a record store owned by Bob Courter on Brainerd Road and Seminole Drive. The owner was asking $5,000 for the business, which Mr. Bledsoe said included some posters, a counter, display cases and about 2,000 records.

He remembers thinking about a new car he bought a couple years earlier that was more than twice the cost of the store, and he said he decided it was a good deal.

“When he told me the price, I thought, that’s real affordable,” he said. “It was worth trying because it wasn’t like I was going to get this fortune of stuff, but it had all the things I needed.”

He began acquiring merchandise, and by the time he moved to a new location on Lee Highway eight years later, he needed 80 crates to hold all of his records. He stayed there for three years until moving in 1999 to his current spot near UTC.

“I took a huge cut in traffic flow and it still hasn’t come back to what it was (on Lee Highway),” he said. “All of these businesses (nearby) kind of struggle, and you can’t tell from what day to the next how busy it is going to be.”

In the years he has been on Vine Street, the record store business has changed drastically. Though he carries new and used CDs and DVDs, and he even still sells a few cassettes, much of his stock these days consists primarily of vintage records. Including a growing stock of newly-issued albums, he has about 25,000 records. He buys and sells them on eBay, which he said has revolutionized the way older albums are sold.

The prices for the rare and obscure albums became more reasonable once sellers were able to see what people actually were willing to pay, he said.

“It tests the water a lot better,” the business owner said.

Jimmy Howard has been buying his music from Chad’s Records since the late 1980s, following him through all the moves over the years. Mr. Howard, who lives in Chickamauga, Ga, said he collects old music and puts it on CDs. Mr. Bledsoe always gives him a fair trade, he said.

“He’s always got the good stuff,” Mr. Howard said. “He’s the only one in town that has the hard-to-find records.”

Today, th

Introspection

Entr'acte

  1. play Norman Brown — Night Drive
  2. play Norman Brown — Feeling
  3. play Norman Brown — Still
  4. play Miles Davis — miles 1
  5. play miles 2
  6. play miles 3
  7. play miles 4
  8. play miles 5
  9. play Marvin Gaye — I Met A Little Girl
  10. play Santana — 01 Singing Winds, Crying Beasts
  11. play Santana — 02 Black Magic Woman-Gypsy Queen
  12. play Mongo — 02. Afro Blue



The history of the Butlers/Raw Soul is dense, but for all of us music nerds, that's normal. It is not totally clear what year the Butlers actually formed but they released their first single in 1963 on Liberty Records. That single was "She Tried To Kiss Me" and another single followed on Guyden entitled "Lovable Girl." After the Guyden single the Butlers took a break not recording another record until the single "Laugh, Laugh, Laugh" was released on the Phila label in 1966. The group also backed Charles Earland and Jean Wells on one Phila single ("I Know She Loves Me"). 


As you might be noticing, the Butlers were doing a fair amount of recording but not achieving much success. The group's recordings sold regionally but never had the promotion to make an impact on the national scene. After the single with Phila, the Butlers moved to the Fairmount label (part of the Cameo-Parkway family) and released a handful of singles, some being reissued singles of the past. The Butlers were with Fairmount for 1966-67 and then moved to Sassy Records. Sassy released the group's greatest single (in my opinion) "Love (Your Pain Goes Deep)" b/w "If That's What You Wanted." A copy of that 45 sold for just under $500 last summer on eBay. Even though that isn't that much in the world of record collecting--it's still a hefty sum. The Butlers released another single on Sassy ("She's Gone" b/w "Love Is Good") that appears to be even 
harder to come by then the "Love (Your Pain Goes Deep)" single.

 

The true history become a bit blurred here as the AMG biography states that the Butlers last record was released on C.R.S. in 1974 (". However, between 1971 and that single, Frankie Beverly formed a group called Raw Soul and released a number of singles. Some of the songs recorded by Beverly during this period are "While I'm Alone," "Open Up Your Heart," (both on the Gregor label) and "Color Blind." "Color Blind" was released by the Eldorado label and rerecorded by Maze. Beverly's big break came when Marvin Gaye asked Raw Soul to back him on a tour. Gaye helped Beverly/Raw Soul get a contract at Capitol. Beverly decided to take the group in a different direction, a name change occurred, and Maze was created. 

The above isn't the most complete history of Beverly but hopefully someone will know a way to get in touch with the man or his management because a comprehensive pre-Maze history needs to be done on Frankie Beverly (his real name is Howard, by the way). Below you'll find every Frankie Beverly (pre-Maze) song available to me right now ("Color Blind" will be up soon). 

If you have a song that is not included below, shoot it over to funkinsoulman (at) yahoo.com and it will go up in the next Frankie Beverly post (later this week--highlighting Maze). Also, if you have any more information please share your knowledge. The Butlers material has been comp-ed sporadically (usually imports) but the entire Maze catalog has been reissued and is available. 

Enjoy.  "She Kissed Me" (Fairmount, 1966 or 1967) 
 
 "I Want To Feel I'm Wanted" (not sure which label or year) "Laugh, Laugh, Laugh" (Phila, 1966) "Because Of My Heart" (Fairmount, 1966 or 1967)
   
 "Love (Your Pain Goes Deep)" (Sassy, 1967)
   
 "If That's What You Wanted" (Sassy, 1967)
 



Frankie Beverly is one of those cats that has lasting power. He started in the music business doing a tour with doo wop group the Silhouettes and then formed his own group called the Blenders. The Blenders never recorded a single, Beverly wouldn't appear on wax until forming the Butlers a few years later. Along with Beverly, the Butlers included Jack "Sonny" Nicholson, Joe Collins, John Fitch, and Talmadge Conway.

Beverly would later enjoy great success fronting Maze and Conway would become a
well-known penning Double Exposure's
"Ten Percent" and the Intruders' "Memories Are Here To Stay." 
 While Maze is a phenomenal group, Beverly's work before that group will always stand out as his best (imo).

The Butlers produced tunes that most Northern Soul fans would kill for and Raw Soul gave the funksters something to pursue. If, by chance, you know of a way to get in touch with Frankie Beverly or his management, please drop me an e-mail. It would be absolutely great to do an interview with him about his pre-Maze work. He's still playing out, most recently doing a New Year's Eve show in Atlanta.
:: Funkinsoulman ::

Power...Through Simplicity ♪♫♪

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