Showing 76 - 100 of 1450
Artist: Ray J
Arriving on the heels of big sister/R&B star Brandy, rapper Ray J parlayed his success on television into a music career at the age of 14. Born in McComb, MS, Ray J's family moved to Carson, CA, when he was still a toddler, landing him in the center of the entertainment industry. He started auditioning for commercials at age eight, scoring... [+] Read More
Artist: Ray Charles
Ray Charles was the musician most responsible for developing soul music. Singers like Sam Cooke and Jackie Wilson also did a great deal to pioneer the form, but Charles did even more to devise a new form of black pop by merging '50s R&B with gospel-powered vocals, adding plenty of flavor from contemporary jazz, blues, and (in the '60s) country.... [+] Read More
Artist: Dire Straits
Dire Straits emerged during the post-punk era of the late '70s, and while their sound was minimalistic and stripped down, they owed little to punk. If anything, the band was a direct outgrowth of the roots revivalism of pub rock, but where pub rock celebrated good times, Dire Straits were melancholy. Led by guitarist/vocalist Mark Knopfler, the... [+] Read More
Artist: P.O.D.
While they play around with the infectious grooves of reggae and Latin music as well as the heavy deliverance of hip-hop and rock, San Diego's hard rock four-piece P.O.D. has defined a universal message. They're born-again Christians and their faith takes a central place in their music.
Formed in 1992 in the SoCal neighborhood of San Ysidro,... [+] Read More
Artist: Extra Fancy
Extra Fancy was one of the handful of post-alternative punk bands to be led by an openly gay frontman. Although the promotion of lead singer Brian Grillo's sexuality helped gain the band notoriety, it prevented them from breaking through into the mainstream and sent them into difficulties with their major label.
Grillo, bassist D.A. Foster,... [+] Read More
Artist: Seal
Seal emerged from England's house music scene in the early '90s to become the most popular British soul vocalist of the decade. Although his earliest material still showed signs of acid house, by the mid-'90s he had created a distinctive fusion of soul, folk, pop, dance, and rock that brought him success on both sides of the Atlantic.The son of... [+] Read More
Artist: Lupe Fiasco
Chicago-based Muslim MC Lupe Fiasco began rapping in junior high school and joined a group called Da Pak several years later. The group signed to Epic, released one single, and split up, all before Fiasco reached the age of 20. Thanks in part to the vocal support of Jay-Z, L.A. Reid signed Fiasco as a solo artist to Arista, but before anything... [+] Read More
Artist: The Brides of Funkenstein
During his heyday as a bandleader and organizer, George Clinton had several elements of his Parliament/Funkadelic empire signed with record labels. The Brides of Funkenstein were a female group who accompanied his other bands on tours. They recorded for Atlantic from 1978 to 1980. While Chaka Khan's sister Taka Boom was once a member, the... [+] Read More
Artist: Marilyn Martin
Eighties pop/rock vocalist Marilyn Martin is best known for "Separate Lives," a 1985 duet with superstar Phil Collins that soared to number one on the pop charts and was heard in the film White Nights. When that single was burning up the charts and Martin was signed to Atlantic as a solo artist, there was plenty of reason to believe that she... [+] Read More
Artist: Philip Michael Thomas
Acting rather than singing has been the arena that gained Phillip Michael Thomas his fame. He played Detective Ricardo Tubbs on the hit television series Miami Vice for five years in the '80s, and before that had been featured in such films as Sparkle. Thomas tried to parlay the television stardom into musical success, but his mid-'80s LP for... [+] Read More
Artist: Dean Martin
Enjoying great success in music, film, television and the stage, Dean Martin was less an entertainer than an icon, the eternal essence of cool. A member of the legendary Rat Pack, he lived and died the high life of booze, broads and bright lights, always projecting a sense of utter detachment and serenity; along with Frank Sinatra, Sammy Davis,... [+] Read More
Artist: The Mac Band
The McCampbell brothers, from Dallas by way of Flint, MI, formed the Mac Band in Los Angeles. They earned some quick R&B success with their debut LP The Mac Band featuring the McCampbell Brothers in 1988 for MCA. "Roses Are Red" topped the R&B charts, and put the Mac Band in the unusual spot of having its one-shot be a number one hit. They never... [+] Read More
Artist: Jim Cole
Jim Cole was an associate of Isaac Guillory, the Cuban-born guitarist who for 25 years was a popular recording session player in England. Cole shows up as part of the back-up on Guillory's self-titled 1974 Atlantic album, eventually reissued on CD by the Guillory family label. Whatever Cole did after 1974, he didn't hang around with Guillory,... [+] Read More
Artist: Rupee
Soca sensation Rupee (born Rupert Clarke) got his start with the Barbadian reggae group Coalishun, which he joined in 1997 after strong showings at area talent contests. Though he began as a chanter in the dancehall style, Rupee soon discovered calypso song, and in 1998 wrote the international soca hit "Ice Cream." The song launched his solo... [+] Read More
Artist: Ospreys
East Harlem, NY-based R&B group the Ospreys formed in 1955. According to Marv Goldberg's profile in the December 1977 issue of Yesterday's Memories, their lineup -- lead Robert Council, first tenor Maurice Williams, second tenor Jackson Thompson, and bass John Miro -- represented a kind of neighborhood supergroup assembling the best voices from... [+] Read More
Artist: Nancy Martinez
Best known for her Latin-flavored 1986 club hit "For Tonight," Nancy Martinez never became a major pop star in the U.S. but fared well in dance clubs in the 1980s. The big-voiced dance diva was born in the U.S. but spent most of her pre-adult life in Montreal, where she studied classical piano as a child before studying acting and singing in... [+] Read More
Artist: Bill Deasy
Pittsburgh native Bill Deasy began his career as part of the group the Gathering Field, which gained attention from Atlantic representatives based on the strength of Pittsburgh radio putting the band's debut album, Lost in America, in heavy rotation. Atlantic reissued the album in 1996, but the album and subsequently the band were quickly... [+] Read More
Artist: Herb Abramson
Herb Abramson was the first president of pioneering jazz/R&B/pop label Atlantic Records. Born November 16, 1920, in Brooklyn, NY, Abramson, who was a blues, jazz. and gospel music enthusiast, began collecting records in his teens. Meeting fellow jazz record collectors brothers Ahmet and Nesuhi Ertegun in Washington, D.C., in the early '40s, he... [+] Read More
Artist: World's Greatest Jazz Band
This all-star group was founded in 1968 by Dick Gibson at his sixth annual Jazz Party. Despite the impossibility of living up to its outrageous name, the band was indeed the finest in Dixieland/classic jazz. Co-led by Yank Lawson and Bob Haggart, and also featuring Billy Butterfield, Bud Freeman, Bob Miller, and Ralph Sutton, the WGJB originally... [+] Read More
Artist: Ahmet Ertegun
Ahmet Ertegun, along with his brother Nesuhi, plus engineer/producer Tom Dowd, producer Jerry Wexler, and others such as writer Jessie Stone, helped create and hone the Atlantic Records jazz, R&B, and pop empire in the '50s and '60s. The Erteguns arrived in America from Turkey and forged a company to record, distribute and publicize the sounds... [+] Read More
Artist: Tammy Rogers
Fiddler Tammy Rogers was born in Tennessee in 1966 and raised in Irving, TX. As an adolescent, she was taught classical music but also performed regularly with her family at bluegrass festivals. After graduating college, she joined Patty Loveless' backing band, which she followed with a stint backing Trisha Yearwood. After leaving Yearwood,... [+] Read More
Artist: Charthogs
A band with an unfortunately over-optimistic name, the San Fernando Valley based quartet the Charthogs was one of seemingly hundreds of poppy alternative rock bands swept up in the post-Nirvana major-label signing spree. Singer and guitarist Danny Pinnella, guitarist Mat Dennis, bassist Ric Markmann (formerly of alt-rock no-hopers Cry Charity),... [+] Read More
Artist: Mary Stafford
Mary Stafford became the first black woman to record for Columbia Records, releasing records under the name Mary Stafford & Her Jazz Band. After moving east from Missouri in the mid-'10s, Stafford worked with Eubie Banks, Bessie Smith, and Madison Reed in Atlantic City and Baltimore. She was backed up by Charlie Johnson's Orchestra (which... [+] Read More
Artist: Nicole Renee
One of the more promising R&B artists to emerge in the 1990s, Nicole Renee first came to the attention of the urban contemporary world when she was one of the hosts on BET's Teen Summit. During her four years with that show, an adolescent Renee did on-camera interviews with quite a few big names in R&B and rap. However, she wasn't planning to... [+] Read More
Artist: Craig David
R&B sensation Craig David was barely out of his teens when he took a hold of the U.K. pop circuit, twisted it around, and threw it back on its bum during fall 2000. This fresh-faced native of Southampton, England, was merely playing into his love of funkadelic hip-hop and crooning urban stylings when he started writing songs as a teenager. His... [+] Read More
