The G.C Cameron Interview
A conversation with the cult soul singer from McCall Creek, Mississippi.
Selected Works is a weekly (usually) newsletter by the Te Whanganui-a-Tara, Aotearoa (Wellington, New Zealand) based freelance music journalist, broadcaster, copywriter and sometimes DJ Martyn Pepperell, aka Yours Truly. Most weeks, Selected Works consists of a recap of what I’ve been doing lately and some of what I’ve been listening to and reading, paired with film photographs I’ve taken + some bonuses. All of that said, sometimes it takes completely different forms.
Hailing from McCall Creek, Mississippi, G.C. Cameron rose to fame at age 22, when he joined Motown Records to become the lead singer of their legendary group The Spinners. After a string of well-received releases, including the hit record ‘It’s A Shame’, co-written and produced by Stevie Wonder, Cameron left The Spinners to pursue a solo career.
On a trip to San Francisco’s Fantasy Studios circa 1977, Cameron teamed up with Harvey Fuqua, Greg Crockett and Elgie Stover to craft some of his finest works. A full album was recorded, but only two tracks saw the light of day, released through the short-lived UK label Flamingo.
In 2023, Soundway released a four-track EP including Cameron’s two in-demand deep cuts, as previously released on Flamingo - the deep and dubby disco workout ‘If I Love You’ (Instrumental) and soul ballad ‘Live For Love’. For this release, they paired them with two unreleased recordings rescued from the vault after languishing in obscurity for four and a half decades. The modern soul dance number ‘Thank You Baby’, backed by Jeanie Tracy and Martha Walsh, is a shining jewel that displays Cameron’s full range, whilst the vocal version of ‘If I Love You’ elevates the recording on the dancefloor while joining dots that never existed.
Below, you can read a conversation-style interview I conducted with Cameron. For the sake of readability, the text has been edited and condensed.
You originally recorded the music we're talking about today in 1977. What has it been like revisiting that period of your life?
Oh, man, it is such a wonderful experience to be here to explain how, by my faith in my creator, I got through that time. Back then, it seemed easy, but the mission was hard. I’ve always loved this journey, no matter how difficult it got. It’s been a blessing to look back on that and still be here to see this new world. Being from Mississippi, I was raised on a farm picking cotton, hauling paperwood, and doing everything. I bring an ancient lifestyle to the table. Now, we’re in a technological era where satellites are going to different planets to gather information before our eyes, and I’m still here.
Here’s a question for you. Do you think your relationship with music has been kismet? Was this always your fate?
I don't think there could have been a different pathway. If there was a different pathway, you and I wouldn’t be talking today.
How early in life did music start for you?
My mom was a singer. My six older brothers are singers. My three sisters are singers. It was inevitable, but when I turned seven, I heard Jackie Wilson. He set off a firestorm in my musical senses. From that point, I was reaching to be as close to Jackie Wilson as I could be. My musical heroes were Jackie Wilson, Curtis Mayfield, Sam Cooke and Hank Williams, Sr. Those were the four guys I studied more than anybody.
What sort of singers were your mother and siblings?
Church singers and gospel singers. I was someone who always made up my own songs. I always heard a different melody than what everyone else was listening to. I heard what they were listening to, and I loved it. At the same time, I heard something else, and I still do.
Would you say you always had a vision for something that wasn’t here but could be?
That's right. You hit it on the head. I felt another colour that human eyes had not seen. I heard another sound that was not normal for the ears of the inhabitants of Earth. It was almost as if it was a cosmic travelling melody. My mind was manifesting something I didn’t realise I desired to achieve. It was a tranquil sound that would - not so much lull the world to sleep but - unite the world in the direction of one beat. One world, one beat, one heartbeat. Every time your heart beats, eight other billion hearts beat. We're all on the same beat. We're just one world of people and music.
Do you remember the first time you bought a record?
When I was young, I never bought records. I always preferred to sing what I was hearing. I heard and learned everything Jackie, Hank, and all those cats did, but what I really heard was myself. I just heard me.
I used to listen to a radio station in Nashville, Tennessee, called WLAC. There were two jocks, one named Hossman Allan and another one called John Richbourg. They were two guys that played everything. They played every kind of music you can think of. I remember everything about these guys. When I was in the Marines and on a Mediterranean cruise, I'd stay awake on the deck at night. Even when we were out in the Atlantic, we could pick that station up. By then, I was grown, but when I was seven, on the farm, milking cows and picking cotton, WLAC was the station we listened to. I was like a sponge; I remembered every song, every melody, all the artists, the names, and all of that stuff. It's just a blessing, and I'm humbled.
Tell me about the first time you decided to be a singer.
The first time I ever stood before an audience was when I was 12 years old at Lillie Mae Brian High School in Franklin County. I sang with my friend, Frank Williams, the late Frank Williams. He was the lead singer for The Jackson Southernaires, a great gospel group from Malaco Records in Jackson, Mississippi. That was my first experience. From that point on, it was destiny.
Was that a defining moment in your life?
It was when I crossed the threshold. This whole thing runs off heroes. I always try to tell people that. If you live together, that guy you married, that woman you married, that’s your hero or queen. We’ve got to have faith to rise above adversities. Heroes are what it’s all about. We take the road, make the commitments, and do the trials, but we have to get help along the way.
What was it about Jackie Wilson, Curtis Mayfield, Sam Cooke and Hank Williams, Sr. that spoke so strongly to you?
They were all soul singers, meaning that they could sing anything. There are country singers, rock singers, jazz singers, or gospel singers - and then there are soul singers. A soul singer does exactly that. They get to your soul, enter you from a spiritual perspective, and heal that part of you that needs healing. A soul singer can do blues, jazz, gospel, country, or western. All of that comes with whatever's in the doctor's bag.
When I think of those people, it's about how well they breathe life into a song. You do that as well.
Thank you. I’m trying to get it done right this time. I love it when people believe in me. That helps me get things done. Having been a marine, it’s natural for me to achieve if I’m given the right purpose. I believe we all need a dream to encourage us. Music is that dream for me. I want to sing in front of people for as long as my heavenly father, who gave me this voice that belongs to him, allows me to.
When did you realise you have something special?
On my way to Japan in 1963 with the 1st Marine Air Wing. After someone heard me singing with the troops, the entertainment officer asked me if I would sing for the officer's wives up on the top deck. Of course, I agreed. That was my job, and the people onboard really appreciated what I was doing. When I got to Japan, I became a military policeman. While I was there, I would sing at the M Club. They loved it. It was all training for when I got with The Spinners a few years later.
How old were you when you joined the Marines?
I was seventeen.
You started performing when you were twelve and joined the Marines when you were seventeen. What happened during those five intervening years?
We moved to Detroit and then returned to Mississippi for two years. I went to school, worked at car washes and entered singing competitions. Then, I went back to Detroit until I was seventeen. My educational adventure was cut short, and I had nothing to do, so my cousin suggested we join the Marines. When I was sixteen, I took the test and passed it. But I had to wait until I turned seventeen to join and put on my naval armour in 1963. It was great culture, man.
It must have been remarkable to be in Detroit in the 1950s and 1960s.
Like I was telling a friend earlier, Detroit is a music town. Motown was universal. As far as I’m concerned, it was an out-of-planetary experience. If I was an alien, that’s what I’d be listening to now.
When did you leave the Marines and join The Spinners?
I came home on September 17, 1967. By October, I was the lead singer of The Spinners. Dennis Edwards [from The Temptations] was a dear friend of the family for years. Dennis knew I was in Vietnam. He and my late brother Dave were very close. When I came home in September, Dennis called David and told him there was a group at Motown looking for a lead singer and that I needed to get over there right away.
I got to Motown and walked into the artist development department. That's where The Spinners were: Bobby, Billy, Henry and Pervis. They were in front of the mirrors where Charlie Atkins and Mr Maurice King taught us dance routines. I'm there meeting the guys, and about 10 minutes later, Marvin Gaye and Harvey Fuqua come into the room, and we talk. Marvin asked me to sing something. I grabbed a Jackie Wilson song and hit about a quarter of a note. He said, “He'll do. You guys sign him up right away.” That's the way it went down. I got with the cats. The next day, we started rehearsing because the following month, we were opening up for Marvin at the Apollo Theatre.
It’s like something out of a fairy tale.
By the time I was two months out of Vietnam, we were opening for Marvin Gaye at the Apollo, man!
That must have made for quite the contrast.
It was a different world. It was a dimensional transitional period of existence. War is the ugliest, worst part of man. The blessing was to be able to overcome all the firefights, ambushes and carnage of what went down through singing. I put down the M16 and grabbed a microphone. The power of music was more potent than the weapon of destruction. That was when music had more power than the gun.
In 1970, The Spinners released ‘It's a Shame’, produced by Stevie Wonder. You were the lead vocalist. Tell me about it.
That was unusual. It felt like something only God, my most high father, could make happen. It didn’t feel manmade at all. Honestly, speed is the greatest friend in the world. I was coming home from this terrible place, and I met these people who put me in the arena with lions. I hadn’t even grown claws yet, and there was a tree I needed to climb. I had to grow my claws real quick.
What was it like when you started cutting solo records?
The first one was Love Songs & Other Tragedies. After that, I had Willie Hutch in my corner. Willie Hutch and I were on a journey. We did two albums together. He was a great singer, artist, producer, and writer. He's also a Marine. He was my comrade, and we had a lot in common. We were doing the thing at Motown. I also did a lot of singles, which was great, but it was difficult to find a groove because I worked with so many producers. I think I had more to offer than they were ready to deal with. Being the genius that he is, Stevie Wonder understood me perfectly. He laid it all out when we made ‘It’s A Shame’. That was a one-take song. When I think about it, I might have messed myself up by doing too much.
After all, people do call you the man with six voices.
If I had a chance to do it now again, I would do the songs the way they should have been done then. By then, I was living in Beverly Hills. To be honest with you, I don’t think I wanted to sing anymore for a while because there wasn’t much I needed at the time. We had a maid, servants, secretary, and kids. Marvin Gaye and Anna Gordy Gaye lived with us for a while. We had 14,000 square feet, man.
Lucille Ball was my neighbour. She lived across the street from me. Rod Stewart lived behind us. To a certain degree, that went to my head because we were the only black family living west of Sunset and Beverly Hills, my friend. I had to go through some things before coming back to Earth, which is where I should have been in the first place.
When you think about it, where did you really want to take your music?
I wanted to take the music in a universal global unity direction. I guess you can say the What's Going On? doctrine. Marvin and I were together a lot during that time. It was the real stuff. He put his heart and soul into it. He’d tell us that it wasn’t him. It was the spirit writing the songs. I think Motown should have had a department for that kind of music.
Where did you see them trying to take the music instead?
They were on a roll from the R&B crossover and were headed towards rap and some hip-hop. They saw the future from one eye, but they closed the other eye to the realities that were the soul of the people. CDs don't have grooves. They’re a flat surface, but the funk is in a groove.
Can you talk about the Live For Love EP that Soundway has reissued?
Greg Crockett and Harvey Fuqua were up in San Francisco at the record company with Sylvester. I was still with Motown then, but we faced some contractual difficulties. Let’s put it that way. I was lost in the wilderness with nothing to do and nowhere to go. I went there, and Harvey and Crockett produced ten songs for me. They gave me ten tracks, and I went into a room and spent a week writing. This was at Fantasy Studios in San Francisco. We were working on a 24-track desk.
What happened was I did the songs, but Harvey couldn't release them because my contract was with Motown. Barry, being both his brother-in-law and my brother-in-law, put everybody in a precarious situation. So it just sat on the shelf. Harvey released a couple of tracks overseas, but nothing happened on a serious level.
You’re talking about the 7” on Flamingo, right?
I never knew about that at the time. Put it this way: I had no knowledge of it until recently. It was good to see they were interested enough to follow through and get the songs out. I always thought they were good songs. We were blessed to do this at that time. Crockett, myself, Harvey and the whole crew up there. It was a great experience, but I couldn't use it.
What do you remember about writing 'I Love You', 'Thank You Baby' and 'Live For Love'?
I was familiar with the Bay Area, but I hadn’t spent a lot of time there. The place had this feeling of freedom. I don’t know if it was the bridge or the water. I love the water thing. Being close to the ocean, a pond, river or creek, I love it. Water is that way for me. Being in that era with geniuses like Crockett and Faqua was amazing.
For me, women are the greatest in the world, so writing lyrics there was so easy because there were so many of them to write about. We’d go out to these clubs like the Golden Lion. One night, this girl came in wearing a black rose on a white dress. That image was so dominating to me. I couldn’t get it off my mind until I finished writing about it. That’s how the songs came to me. It was all about observing people.
I tell you the truth. I took 'If I Love You' from the national anthem. That's why it sounds like that. Think about it. It's a melody that touches people; nothing is stronger than a national anthem in this country.
You first met Harvey Fuqua at that audition for The Spinners with Marvin Gaye, right?
Yes. We had known each other for a while by the time we did these recordings. I married his wife, his ex-wife. So we shared the same wife. Harvey was my husband-in-law [laughs]. He was just the greatest cat in the world. That was a very interesting time. Life was great and pure, and there was much learning going on. The music industry was hot. The Spinners were hot, I mean, the blue notes were hot. Philly was filling their Cheerios in, you know, Kenny and Leon, Gamble and Huff. That thing was happening big. The Stylistics. Music was keeping us cool.
Can you tell me about Greg Crockett and Elgie Stover?
Crockett and I speak regularly. We're the only two left from that team. He’s a bass player, guitarist extraordinaire and genius. I didn't know him at all until I got there. Harvey asked me to come up. I came up, and they gave me the tracks. I got introduced to everyone, started writing the stuff, and that was it.
Elgie Stover was Marvin Gaye’s go-to man. When Marvin needed something, Elgie was there. There were two Stover brothers. One was Kenny Stover and one was Elgie Stover. Kenny Stover was the driver for Barry's mother, Mama Bertha. Elgie was Marvin's go-to man who helped Marvin all the time with music and different things at the house. They were great guys. Talented as heck, man. Very smart. very witty, if you will.
It sounds like you guys got the opportunity to chase something through music.
Yeah, we were in a world of transition at both ends. We were there when the good times were better and the best times were getting ready to worsen. It was a strange time. We're blessed to have been in it, a part of it and come through it with an understanding that we could have done nothing to change that. Music is the only thing that would tame and calm us down.
What were the eighties like for you?
I moved back to Mississippi from Beverly Hills. Frank Williams, my buddy from elementary school that I spoke of, was running the Malaco Records gospel department. Frank got me with Malaco. I did an album with Malaco called Give Me Your Love (1983). It was one of the greatest albums I've ever done, but there was still a Motown contract overshadow.
Afterwards, I got with a few other groups. Honestly, man, I was recuperating in the studio during the eighties, working in clubs, meeting people, and hanging out with old friends. I returned to Beverly Hills and cut an album for my late wife, Gwen. I was writing for people like that and hanging out with my son and Marvin’s wife, Anna, one of the most incredible, wonderful human beings in the world. I spent a lot of the decade putting the past in perspective. Then I started correcting the mistakes I’d made as I went home to be with my mum, dad, cousins, aunts, and uncles. That was healing for me. It helped me better understand who I am, who I was, and who I will always be.
Then I guess places like the UK and Japan started calling you in the nineties?
Yeah. The UK, Ian Levine, promoters in Asia, Japan. Recordings, groups and lots of music. I moved around a lot, got married again, had a new family, watched them and realised the importance of it. I realised that I needed to work, and I realised that singing was the work that I was doing. So I got busy with that.
After moving to Myrtle Beach in the nineties and doing a song with The Tams called 'Walking Dr. Bill', which went to number one on the beach circuit, I moved back to Mississippi. I was working on my Shadow CD. I didn't have any money, but I was blessed to have friends who knew what I was doing and supported me. Julie and Charlie Daniels down in Myrtle Beach were just the greatest people in the world. Tyler Greenwell and Ron Summers, of course, were there with me and their families during this whole thing. They got me through that period. I moved back in 1999, and in 2000, The Spinners called me back. For the next three years, we were on a roll.
After I left them for a second time and had a chance to rest up, I got a call asking me to join The Temptations. So, I became a Temp for five years. All up, I did two albums with The Temptations, two albums with The Spinners, and ten albums by myself.
FIN.
If I Love You by G.C Cameron is out now on Soundway Records [Buy here]
It's Fuqua. His name is Harvey Fuqua. Not "Faqua."