LP/ Digital
Fitz Gore
"Soundmusication" (Sono-115)
Spiritual Jazz LP 1980
July 08, 2022

LP/ Digital
Dieter Bihlmaier Selection
"Maskerade" (Sono-116)
Fusion/ Spiritual Jazz LP 1974
December 09, 2022

LP/ Digital
Embryo
"Meets The World" (Sono-117)
Unearthed 1970s Ethno Jazz
Who knows when?

CD & Vinyl-LP: Sonorama C-22/ L-22

DON ADAMS – WATTS HAPPENING

* = previously unreleased bonus track from the Wewerka Archives, Munich
** = different version from the album “The Black Voice” on the United Artists label

Musicians among others (exact line-ups per track cannot be confirmed):
Don Adams: Vocals, Lothar Meid: Bass, Joe Quick: Guitar, Jimmy Jackson: Organ, Hermann Braeuer: Piano
Wolfgang Karasek: Drums, Wolfgang Pap: Drums, Dusko Goykovich: Trumpet,
Charly Tabor: Trumpet, Gunter Erik: Trumpet, Olaf Kuebler: Tenor Sax,
Rolf Hartmann: Baritone Sax, Hermann Gmeinwieser: Trombone
Unknown: Flute, plus unknown String Ensemble

Recorded 1969 at Trixi Studio, Munich
Sound Engineer: Wolfgang Schmidt
Produced by Hans Wewerka, published by Edition Modern

can compete on a scale as one of the most soulful jazz groups to emerge out of Europe.


And what tough players Don got to boot: Dusko Goykovich, Lothar Meid or Olaf Kuebler still belong to some of the most respected jazz players and to the cream of the local 60s jazz scene from Munich. Back then Motown got exported from Detroit and was fused with the beat wave and the pop music to become “Mod”, a European form of Soul, R&B and Jazz with own parties and dress codes. Don Adams met many celebrated musicians in Munich, listened to their music and jammed with the best of them. Performing as a blues and soul singer was his way of striving for relief! The result is a stunning album of “blue eyed” Soul and Jazz music, entitled after the famous 1965 “Watts riots” in the Los Angeles area of the same name, initiated by the Black Power movement as a blueprint for the actions of European and Latin students in the second half of the 60s.

In Munich, Don Adams has been around the block a few times! Born 1942 in Glasgow under the real name Donald McKay, he was the youngest of his seven brothers and sisters. The dainty boy soon learned boxing and went to training every evening. Although being a dedicated follower of soulful singers like Otis Redding or Jackie Wilson, his violent temper was dreaded by the whole school. While coming over to Germany in the late 60s as a staff member of the musical production “Hair”, he decided to stay in the Bavarian capital right after the divorce from his first wife Rhonda, and soon started to sing with a local band called “The Mocho`s”.

While hanging out at the famous jazz club “Domicile”, he met sax player Olaf Kuebler, who recently characterized him as a true blues singer with heart and soul: “It was not good to argue with this real Scottish streetfighter, who even became a half-professional boxer in the late 60s”. Don joined many spontaneous club sessions then and soon got the reputation for being “the black voice from Munich”, also responsible for giving the one or other black eye to the people who did not like his performances. At the time he often sang at Munich`s GI-club “Tabarin”, the common meeting point for black US-soldiers, who Don and Olaf used to call “the ink heads”. At the “Tabarin”, Don Adams even saved Olaf Kuebler`s life on one particular evening, when Olaf was misbehaving again with the typical self-importance of his sax playing.

With this previously unavailable album, Don Adams payed homage to some of Otis Redding`s most fascinating and diverse musical moments. The outstanding soul ballad “Home Again Hello” was re-recorded in 1972 for inclusion into his second and last artist album “The Black Voice” on the United Artists label, that could not compete with the high musical quality of the debut LP and remained unnoticed, while the great and peviously unreleased instrumental version of “Ev`ry Minute, Ev`ry Hour”, featuring the trumpet of the great Dusko Goykovich, was recently traced in the huge archives of producer Hans Wewerka.

Later in 1973, Don became a member of the german pop ensemble “Love Generation” and married his professional colleague Gitta Walther. After many TV shows and the reception of awards like the “Goldene Europa”, their marriage was divorced in 1976 and Don moved on to Hamburg for joining “The Les Humphrey Singers” and performing as a guest singer on an album by Peter Herbolzheimer. But due to his bad habits and the many excesses of the past, Don was not in the best of health anymore. It soon became clear that he ruined his voice and could not perform as a vocalist anymore. He finally married a polish woman in London, where he died in 1995 suffering from a liver disorder.

(Ekkehart Fleischhammer/ Sonorama, May 2007)


Excecutive production for re-release by Ekkehart Fleischhammer, original recordings from the Wewerka archives mastered by Carsten Daembkes, original front cover design by Rainer Kunert, adapted by Patrick Haase, design by rab.bit. Original LP released 1969 on the German Sunset label and the Spanish Belter label in tiny amounts only. Thanks to Gitta MacKay-Walther, Olaf Kuebler, Adrian Thomé and Andreas Rothgangel for supplying unknown background information. This release is dedicated to the fiery soul of Don Adams.