It’s a time warp track, you hit play and you instantly feel weightless, like your inhibitions are being carried off by a helium-filled disco-ball. This version was a feverishly, infectious hotbed of euphoria and carefree youth and the best use of cowbell I’ve ever heard in my life. He basically said, “how about I re-write and change that ‘bell’ into an innuendo about (basically anything but a telephone) because we need to get in on some of that disco money”.Īnita pushed back but eventually recorded the new re-written version of the song and her life was never the same again. Frederick respected her decision not to do the song and admired her artistic integrity at such a young age… yeah that didn’t happen. Anita was a 23 year old woman and wanted to make warm, loving ballads instead, the type of music that made your heart weep for a love it had never felt before. “Ring My Bell” was a gimmicky, jingle made to be sung by pre-teens talking telephones, basically some ‘Sesame Street’ bubblegum pop. Anita wasn’t too hot on the song and you can understand why to be honest. The story goes that Knight had agreed to work with Anita to put together a three song demo, but became so enthused by the promise of her voice that he decided that they should make a whole album instead! After all of the recording sessions were done, the album was more or less finished and ready to go, ‘more or less’ meaning that there was something missing, maybe just one song to set the whole thing off and Frederick thought he had just the song in his collection… a song by the name of “Ring My Bell” that he had written for Stacy Lattisaw, an 11-year old artist he was trying to sign to his label. Luckily for Anita, Holmes was good on his word, connecting her with Frederick Knight – the owner of the independent record label, Juana – in 1978. In an attempt to make sure that she was financially secure, Anita put the psychology degree that she had obtained at college to use and started substitute teaching at an elementary (primary) school. Holmes became her manager and quickly got to work trying to secure a record deal for his new act, but as you can imagine the story of a manager promising you a big break in the music industry and giving the usual “I’m going to make you a star” speech is one that we’ve all heard once too often. While auditioning for a musical play (Godspell) she caught the attention of Chuck Holmes an administrator at the college who also happened to dabble in music on the side. It wasn’t until she attended college (Rust College) where she saw the potential to pursue music as a career and began training to perfect her craft. It was apparent from an early age that Anita had a passion for singing and like most black artists of that time, began her musical journey singing gospel in churches. There wasn’t another one, but before we get into that, let’s find out about/celebrate the one that she did have!Īnita Ward was born in 1957 in Memphis Tennessee into a family of music lovers, her mother and father, Juanita and James, both used to sing and her brother was a drummer. I thought “Hmmmmmmmm one hit song? That can’t be right, ‘Ring My Bell’ came out in the late 70’s, she must’ve had another one, that song’s too good for her not to have at least stumbled on across another one”. If I made money from these posts he’d probably be entitled to some kind of cheque, but I don’t, so he won’t be getting anything apart from my never-ending respect and gratitude for his contributions to our culture and that’s worth more than any dollar amount (let’s hope he fell for that).ĭuring the interview he raised a really interesting point about pressurised nature of comedy and existence being akin to a shark in the ocean – either keep swimming and pushing out put new material or stop and cease to exist – but what stood out to me the most were the words “Comedy’s not like music, there’s no such thing as a ‘one-hit wonder’ with comedy you can do one song, you can Ring My Bell “Anita Ward”, she can still travel, she can still do concerts”. Those of you who have been following the “Before Bluetooth” series closely since it’s introductory post, will be aware that the fabled origins of this legendary series date back as far as six days ago, but the seeds for this particular post were planted much much earlier courtesy of a 2015 Breakfast Club Interview with Damon Wayans.
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