Kenny Gamble

Now let's paint the full picture.

About a year into my internship at the legendary Philadelphia International Records with Kenny Gamble and Leon Huff, in comes a firecracker from the University of the Arts rocking a natural pinned-up updo and the cutest dancer attire.

I'm remembering an off-the-shoulder look.

We just clicked over old boyfriends and crazy spreadsheets and our obsession with Alicia Keys.

They exploited me." But did they really play you, or did you play yourself? Like, n- like it's not like there weren't people that didn't know Black neighborhoods had tremendous value before gentrification.

You, you do know that, right? You do know that there were people like Kenny Gamble in Philadelphia who took all his money and bought every house he possibly could in Philadelphia because he understood that having property near downtown or near the river was, was, was valuable.

You, you do understand that.

You...

But you know, you, you...

Listen, you hit that, that, that spirit in me, 'cause I'm from Philly, and so when you say old school, I start thinking of, you know, Kenny Gamble and Leon Huff.

Absolutely.

Right? I'm like, man.

And, uh, And again, sort of using the song that on one hand, like if you read the lyrics just without any, you know, if you just read the lyrics without any backing to them, they're not anything, you know, overly like, you know, overly political or overly ambitious or anything like that, but set to the music and set to kind of the way that the, you know, all of the arrangements have, it's really an impressive work.

Yeah, I mean, this was originally written by Kenneth Gamble, Leon Hough, Cody Gilbert as well in Philadelphia, Philadelphia International Records, Harold Nevin on the Blue Notes, very primary act of the Phillies' soul sound.

And they, as you said... it's a politically charged album, wake up everybody that it's part of.

And you get the sense of there's something more to that record than just like a torch song, right? It is, it is a torch song, but in, in this like setting of political strife, racial strife, you know, Like late 60s, early 70s, things are burning.

Yeah.

Who'd you have in mind? Kenny Gamble, Leon Huff.

We're on fire.

OJs, Billy Paul, Three Degrees, Teddy Pendergrass, Philadelphia International, on fire.

Janet was on her tricycle at my house with my daughters.

And I said, okay, it's now noon.

Okay, I call Kenny Gamble on the phone.

I said, you got time? I'm bringing the Jacksons.

When their original seven-year record deal came up for review, most of the brothers and their father and manager, Joe Jackson, decided they would rather look for another label that would also pay them more than the very tight-fisted 2.8% of royalties they were getting from Motown.

Rival label Epic offered them the services of star writer-producer team Kenny Gamble and Leon Huff, the hitmakers behind The O'Jays, Billy Paul, and Harold Melvin & The Blue Notes.

Oh, uh, and also a generous 20% of royalties, [laughs] almost seven times what Motown had been paying them.

Most of the group jumped at that chance, but not middle brother Jermaine, who had married [laughs] Berry Gordy's daughter, and so was more or less obliged to stay at Motown, and so did the group's name.

So much great music out of Philadelphia.

Teddy Pendergrass, the OJs, Tom Bell, the Mighty Three, Kenny Gamble, Leon Huff, the Stylistics, all that music came out of there.

Stylistics, that's what I was thinking of.

Yeah.

creating custom labels instead of buying an established sole label, the report advised CBS to partner with the top producers to create semi-autonomous custom labels.

This strategy led directly to the creation of the legendary Philadelphia International Records with Kenny Gamble and Leon Huff.

And the fourth point, was avoiding major acquisitions.

Counter to some popular myths, the report explicitly warned CBS against trying to buy a major player like Motown or Atlantic or Stack, fearing antitrust issues and high cost.

You should be angry because you sat on that property for 30, 40, 50 years and didn't want to live there, right? Like you didn't want to be there.

Kenny Gamble in Philadelphia, a great friend of mine, a man I really respect, He talks about that.

He talks about in the 70s how he got his record deal and he didn't want to waste his money.

He went to some old Jewish man and said, I don't want to spend my money on fur coats and Cadillacs and whatever.