Gangster Boy by The Reality Band and Show

If you are not a top end disco or soul collector with deep pockets you probably wont know won't know this record, it's as rare as its gets. My 'Gangster boy' odyssey started for me around 12 years ago, soul collector and D.J David Ripolles played an acetate at Prestayn soul weekender and it blew me (as well as a few other deepfunk heads) away, I asked dave what it was, he said the acetate was credited to Wanda McDaniels.

Myself and Malcom Catto (Drummer in excellent band the Heliocentrics ) started tracking the record and eventually got it touch with Co-Producer Ronald Crawley. We had the opportunity to do the record but the sticking point was nobody had a clean copy of the record to make a recording from and there were no tapes. Roll on 10 years and I secured a mint copy and got perfectly clean recording so here we are.

The record was not performed by Wanda McDaniel's & Ultimate choice as it has been credited up till now. The band was 'The Reality Band And Show' from Newcastle Pennsylvania. The backing band was Ultimate Choice and the backing singer was Wanda McDaniel's (Producer Ronald Crawley sister). The lead singer was called Gladys, what happened to her we don't know but what a voice.

It was recorded in 1977 at Asterix Studios in Wilkinsburg Pennsylvania, 300 copies were pressed up to test the market response which surprisingly was lacklustre. So as these things go it was forgotten about and everyone moved on to the next thing.

The Label owner of 'Appleray' and its parent 'Pittsburgh Music Industry's' Ray Mitchell is no longer with us and we did not manage to find any more members of the band or uncredited chief engineer Ralph Camino. Ray recorded a couple of other decent 45s on Appleray but nothing quite touches this Disco Soul Perfection.

What a record, top of the stack, a perfect 10. Just Buy it.

Tracklist

1.	Gangster Boy	3:51

2.	All You Need Is Time To Mess Around	2:51

Credits

released June 2, 2015

License