Ignored             Obscured              Restored

The mission of Song of the Week is summed up in the three-word tagline: Ignored. Obscured. Restored.  Finding deep cuts and overlooked gems that have slipped below the radar is what this blog is all about.

A fine example is today’s SotW pick — “Come Home Baby” by Wilson Pickett.

Pickett had already tasted success as lead singer for the Falcons on the 1962 hit he co-wrote, “I Found a Love.”  But a few years later, searching for another breakthrough, he signed with Atlantic Records in 1964.

Atlantic paired him with producer Bert Berns and arranger Teacho Wiltshire to record a new song written by Brill Building legends Barry Mann and Cynthia Weil, already known for the song “On Broadway.”  Berns cast the track as a duet with Tami Lynn (though some sources mistakenly credit Cissy Houston).

The result was a slick pop-soul record, in keeping with Berns’s polished productions of the time.  But the single didn’t chart, and it’s largely remembered as a minor misstep — too smooth and urbane, lacking the raw, gospel-infused grit that would later define Pickett’s Southern classics like “In the Midnight Hour” and “Mustang Sally.”

Author Joel Selvin offered a vivid take on the song in Here Comes the Night:

Instead of his customary gospel chorus on “Come Home Baby,” Berns paired Pickett with the sole female voice of Tami Lynn, whose guttural growl rolls right into the foreground alongside Pickett’s more mannered vocal, starting with a snaking Ooh, yeah inserted between the first two couplets over the introduction.  The dialogue between the two vocalists takes hold on the chorus, while the horn section builds behind them, giving the production the grandeur of a Phil Spector record without the murkiness.  Every detail of Teacho Wiltshire’s arrangement – the spare verse accompaniment, the brassy crescendos, the muted trombone on the instrumental bridge – is in front of the production.  Pickett, unlike most lead vocalists on Berns productions, sounds slightly remote from the emotional content of the Barry Mann and Cynthia Weil song, reluctant to fully commit, but with the background vocalist singing rings around him on the chorus, literally, his reliance on a cool professionalism seems judicious.

Even though the track sank into obscurity upon release in early 1965, it stands tall as a lost treasure — a hit in my book.

Enjoy… until next week.