Caressors, The – I Can’t Stay Away / Sir Joe – Every Day (I’ll Be Needing You) 45 (Soul Direction) 7″ Vinyl

The Caressors needs no introduction as a veteran of the Northern soul Dance floors and an elusive 45, as most have been sat in collectors’ boxes for many years, with only a few appearing for sale in collector’s circles and internet auction sites.

The Sir Joe track is one that has been around in sales boxes and on collector’s tapes and CD’s for the best part of 30 years without really breaking into the mainstream of the DJ playlists. This maybe down to its rarity and of course obscurity to many people outside the hardcore of collections.
This is one release that Soul Direction had planned some time ago, but do to pressing plant constraints has taken it’s time, but happy to say it has had some dance floor exposure recently, which is something that has been long overdue.

The Caressors – I Can’t Stay Away – Soul Direction Origins SDO1008A

Co written by Rufus Mitchell and George Charles Brown and released in 1968. Mitchell had a involvement in a few Ru-Jac outings including tracks with Winfield Parker and Gene & Eddie. According to the Label owners at Ru-Jac and other artists at the stable, no one recalls anything about the band at all. At that point they decided to change the label colour to yellow and adopted a new font for the label text, and The Caressors was the first release in the new colour. Other than a promotional photo of the group attached to an artist contract, they seemingly formed, recorded and disappeared again. They could have well been session singers who sometimes performed a song in the studio but never pursued a further career together.

Sir Joe – Every Day (I’ll Be Needing You) – Soul Direction Origins SDO1008B

Penned and performed by Joe Quarterman himself in 1970 and remains an elusive 45 in the world of collecting. Joseph Patrick Quarterman hailed from the Shaw neighbourhood in Washington D.C. He started writing songs at a young age and after graduating from Dunbar High School he met song writers Eddie Best and Don Downing and began singing lead vocals with a Washington. DC group called “The Knights” and adopted the name Sir Joe.” He later formed a recording group Sir Joe and The Maidens” after most of the knights went into the armed services. The Baltimore label primarily active between 1963-1974, with one additional release in 1980. “Ru-Jac” was named as such based on the initials of its founder, Rufus Mitchell, and associate Jack Bennett. The record label had no studio so recordings were usually done at Edgewood or Virtue studios so we can presume these tracks were recorded at one or both of these studios.

Licensed courtesy of Omnivore Recordings – Soul Direction Records