Where The Girls Are, Volume 5

Like the doo wop domain, the girl group category is full of diverse delights. The ultimate in crossover music, and truly beyond color, it's a fact that, 30-odd years after the event, the ethnic origin of some of the best-loved girl group performers remains unknown. Thus, recordings that might otherwise be considered pop, or pure pop, and those of the soul, or even deep soul, variety can, and do, fit quite happily into the genre, alongside some performers of the singer-songwriter inclination. A meticulous and painstaking four years in the making, and drawn exclusively from the vaults of the mighty Columbia family of labels, Where The Girls Are, Vol 5 serves to illustrate this diversity perfectly.

Practically a Who's Who of 1960s songwriters, this collection contains creations from many of the Brill Building's brightest stars. A building by name, yet an entire district by nature, that legendary New York edifice today lends its appellation to a complete genus of composers.

Leading the parade here are Gerry Goffin & Carole King with songs performed by The Orchids, singing actress Peggy Lipton, soul sister supreme Erma Franklin and Dorothy Jones, session singer extraordinaire and leader of the ubiquitous Cookies. Boy genius scribe Van McCoy is represented via delicious offerings from The Sweet Things, Aretha Franklin and Northern Soul legend Sandi Sheldon. The once mysterious Miss Sheldon is pictured and interviewed in the lavish booklet. Elsewhere, The Pussycats sing Shadow Morton, the delectable Bernadette Peters performs Brute Force, patrician TV star Nancy Ames renders a great Bert Berns number and Marlina Mars, ex of The Clickettes, gets to grips with the songbook of Burt Bacharach & Hal David. Other Brill Building legends showcased include husband and wife teams Ellie Greenwich & Jeff Barry and Barry Mann & Cynthia Weil plus Bob Crewe, Neil Diamond and Phil Spector, to name just a few.

Not solely Broadway-based, this latest delve into the female world also offers selections committed to magnetic tape in Chicago, Detroit and Philadelphia. Nashville is represented by those southern Supremes wannabes The Poppies, and sunny California by Becky & The Lollipops, The Bootiques and Doris Day, who gives Chubby Checker a run for his money with a downright demented dance craze ditty.

An acknowledged auteur's medium, the multitude of studio geniuses on hand here includes Jack Nitzsche, Curtis Mayfield, Curt Boettcher and Jerry Ross, ensuring an impressively varied soundscape throughout. Producers Helen Miller, Clyde Otis and Lou Adler also feature, as do the inimitable Kenny Gamble & Leon Huff, manning the controls for the great Laura Nyro & Labelle, whose atmospheric contribution is, perhaps, the most enigmatic track ever included on a girl group compilation.

Their names say it all really - The Little Foxes, The Surfer Girls, The Glories, The Opals - one can almost hear the music in one's mind, so evocative are those monikers. Add to all this, desirable tracks by young starlets like Patty Michaels, Jan Tanzy, April Young and Tracey Dey, and you have yourselves what might be the most gorgeous and playable girl group compilation there has ever been.

It was Ace Records' Rob Finnis who first used the chocolate box metaphor when describing a previous all-distaff collection. Musically sweet and succulent, copiously annotated and luxuriously illustrated throughout, that scrumptious analogy could well have been at the forefront of the minds of the compilers of this mouth-watering set. One well-nigh expects to find each selection entwisted in a differently colored foil wrapper.

-Mick Patrick/Ace UK