Patti LaBelle – The High-Octane Infrastructure of Soul

Welcome back to the job site, Soul Family. In this heavy, un-quantized episode of Max & Mello’s Architects of Soul, Lead Composer Max Soul and Head of Operations Mello Soul step directly onto the live tracking floor to audit the ultimate, load-bearing foundation of high-pressure vocal displacement—the one and only Patti LaBelle.

Before the arena lights, the silver space suits, and the multi-platinum solo towers, Patricia Louise Holt was being structurally engineered in the choir loft of the Beulah Baptist Church in West Philadelphia. This week, Max and Mello un-truncate the blueprint on how a shy church girl developed a vocal volume so massive it was known to re-zone entire theaters with a single, un-amplified note.

The structural audit digs deep into the early kitchen laboratory sessions with Cindy Birdsong, before tracking the arrival of the legendary quartet—Patti, Cindy, Nona Hendryx, and Sarah Dash—as Patti LaBelle and the Bluebelles. The Soul Brothers break down the intense, historical industrial standoff at the Apollo Theatre between Motown’s sleek, finishing-school precision and the Bluebelles’ raw, working-class Philly grit.

Then, the hosts unpack the messy, middle-of-the-night corporate raid where Berry Gordy poached Cindy Birdsong for The Supremes, forcing a total structural demolition and the rebirth of the space-age, intergalactic rock-soul powerhouse: LaBelle. Discover how a chance piece of cross-pollination on a package tour with the British rock giants, The Who, caught the eye of manager Kit Lambert and TV producer Vicki Wickham, re-zoning the group into silver lamé, metallic headpieces, and the Creole-funk masterpiece, "Lady Marmalade," co-produced by the master of the bayou groove himself, Allen Toussaint.

Finally, the blueprint covers the inevitable structural divergence of 1976, tracing how Sarah Dash held the frame together while Nona pushed toward gothic art-rock and Patti returned to her deep sanctuary roots. Max and Mello wrap the session by tracking Patti’s solo renaissance—including her brilliant MCA Records legal bypass to record the multi-platinum crossover smash "On My Own" with Michael McDonald, orchestrated by Irving Azoff, Richard Perry, and Burt Bacharach—all the way to her modern culinary empire.

Protect your sound, own your voice, and protect your masters. Peace and Soul y'all!

⏱️ EPISODE TIMESTAMPS

• 🕒 0:00 - The Sanctuary Specs & The Kitchen Specs: Bypassing standard broadcast clocks to deconstruct Patti’s earliest vocal boot camp inside West Philly's Beulah Baptist Church.
• 🕒 5:00 - The Apollo Showdown & The Motown Standoff: Philly grit meets Detroit's finishing school as the Bluebelles stand toe-to-toe with Berry Gordy's machine.
• 🕒 14:00 - The Midnight Poaching & Space-Age Re-Zoning: The structural demolition of the Bluebelles, cross-pollinating with The Who, and engineering "Lady Marmalade" with Allen Toussaint.
• 🕒 23:00 - The Burt Bacharach Plug & Legal Loopholes: Pure music business literacy. Decoding how Irving Azoff used a film studio permit bypass to secure a multi-platinum smash with Michael McDonald.
• 🕒 28:00 - The Culinary Skyscraper & Final Audit: Re-zoning the grocery aisle as a Culinary General Contractor at Walmart.
• 🕒 32:00 - The Final Tag & Sign-Off: Wise mentors, master protection, and the final quality check.

📲 LISTEN & SUBSCRIBE

• Original Tracks Library: Keep our studio sounds spinning! Check out the contemporary R&B and retro soul catalogue from Soul & The New Vibe directly on our audio networks.

••Feedback Floor: Leave a review on your platform of choice and drop your structural analysis in the comments!

Let’s keep this funk train moving! 🚂💨

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:11

Yo, welcome back to the job side, everybody. I'm Max Sowell, your lead composer and chief engineer on today's journey.

SPEAKER_00 0:16

And I'm Mello Sowell, your head of operations and vocal specialist. Hell yeah. And we're grateful that you tuned into Max and Mello's architects of soul.

SPEAKER_01 0:24

That's right. Today we're auditing one of the most powerful buildings in the history of music. A woman whose vocal displacement is so heavy, she's been known to rezone entire theaters with just one note. And I have seen that. We're talking about the godmother of soul, Patty LaBelle.

SPEAKER_00 0:36

Well, Max, where do we start?

SPEAKER_01 0:38

Where do we start?

SPEAKER_00 0:39

Talking about Patty is like talking about a high-pressure steam engine. People see the feathers, they see the hair, but they don't see the structural integrity it takes to stay on top for 60 years.

SPEAKER_01 0:48

Oh, exactly, Mel. And it all starts with the sanctuary specs. Because the Holt family and the church, well, that was their string, Mel, which we have seen with numerous architects that we've covered. So Patty, who was born, Patricia Louise Holt, obviously didn't just stumble into music. She was engineered by the Beulah Baptist Church in West Philadelphia.

SPEAKER_00 1:04

The church, Max.

SPEAKER_01 1:05

Oh, yeah, Mel.

SPEAKER_00 1:06

That's where so many of the cats come from, Max. The church in the black community is like boot camp.

SPEAKER_01 1:11

It sure as shit is.

SPEAKER_00 1:12

You ain't gonna just sit.

SPEAKER_01 1:13

No, no, no. Definitely, definitely. I played gospel in my younger musician days simply because every time I came across a great musician and I asked him how he got that way, typically he told me it was from playing in the church. Like, yo, I learned in the church. So, Mel, I went to the church. Okay, back to Patty. While her father, Henry Holt, was a railroad worker. He was also a singer with a technical gift for the blues and gospel.

SPEAKER_00 1:33

Right, Max. Her mother, Bertha, was the nurturer of the household, but it was the church choir that acted as Patty's first job site. A kid from West Philly finding her frequency in the choir loft of the Beulah Baptist Church. Her father, Henry, gave her the blues blueprint. And the choir that gave her the power surge.

SPEAKER_01 1:50

That it did.

SPEAKER_00 1:51

Patty was famously shy as a child, a quiet build, they would say, but a skyscraper in the sanctuary.

SPEAKER_01 1:56

Yes, she totally was. So once she stepped into the choir loft mellow, her vocal displacement was so powerful that she became a local legend before she was even out of her teens. And that's the peer lesson right there for the new vibe. You don't just start with the stadium. You start with the acoustic audit of the church or the basement. She wasn't just singing. She was learning how to project a frequency that could fill a room without a microphone, and she sure as hell could do that.

SPEAKER_00 2:18

Absolutely. Her parents weren't stage parents in the modern sense, Max, but the moral and spiritual infrastructure they provided gave her the resilience to handle the industrial grit of the music business later on.

SPEAKER_01 2:30

That's true, Mellow. Now in the late 1950s and early 1960s, Philly was a hotbed for vocal group Soul Fam. And as vocal music went from doo-wop to soul singers, well, Patty was very much a part of the early version of a group called the Ordettes. And when two of the original members left to get married, Patty and the remaining member needed new material to keep the group from collapsing.

SPEAKER_00 2:48

Luckily, and as we have seen so many times, it's that person who links the chain, Matt.

SPEAKER_01 2:52

Oh, it surely is Mello.

SPEAKER_00 2:53

The architect behind the scenes. In this case, a local friend introduced Patty to Cindy Birdsong.

SPEAKER_01 2:58

Oh, a bingo card.

SPEAKER_00 3:00

Cindy wasn't a classmate or a church member. She was just another girl from the neighborhood who had the vocal literacy and the look they needed to reinforce the frame.

SPEAKER_01 3:07

And once they met Mello, they realized that their frequencies matched perfectly. They spent their time practicing in Patty's mother's kitchen, not at school or a church. No, they were drafting their sound in private before they ever took it to a commercial zone.

SPEAKER_00 3:19

Yes, and the kitchen was their laboratory.

SPEAKER_01 3:21

Patty turned that around later on, too.

SPEAKER_00 3:23

Yeah. They would spend hours working on their step touch choreography and their harmony blends max. So as Patty and Cindy solidified their partnership, their local manager, Bernard Montague, realized the Ordettes needed more vocal reinforcement to compete with the heavy hitters. So he looked at another local group called the Del Capri's and identified two specialists, Nona Hendricks and Sarah Dash.

SPEAKER_01 3:45

Oh, those sound like familiar names.

SPEAKER_00 3:47

Mm-hmm. Architect behind the scenes, Max.

SPEAKER_01 3:49

Yeah, that's the cat, right? And the results, Mello. By merging the best elements of the Ordettes, which was Patty and Cindy, with the best of the Del Capri's, Nona and Sarah, they created the quartet that would eventually become Patty LaBelle and the Bluebells.

SPEAKER_00 4:00

Patty and Cindy were the architectural core of that early sound. While Patty provided the high frequency leads, Cindy provided the structural blend that allowed the group to compete with the Motown sound. They were a vocal construction crew with a Philly grit that the industry wasn't ready for.

SPEAKER_01 4:14

That's right, and we're going to deconstruct how that grit stood up against the Motown finishing school when we come back. Stick around, we're just getting scaffolding up. You're in the house with Max and Mellas, Architects Assault.

SPEAKER_00 4:23

Be right back, y'all. We would much appreciate it, Soul Fam. Sure would. Now, Max, let's get back to the breakdown on the godmother of soul. So now we have the four girls, Patty, Cindy, Nona, and Sarah, starting to perform in Philadelphia in the early 60s as Patty LaBelle and the Bluebell. They were built on the standard girl group specs, you know, matching dresses, choreographed moves, and doo-wop harmonies.

SPEAKER_01 5:43

Which was pretty much at the time. The vocal ceiling, even early on, Patty's voice was just too big for the standard zoning laws of pop. While other groups focused on the blend, Patty was already testing the structural stress of her upper register. Go could sang, man. Damn that go-kins. She was. She still can. She definitely still can. So they originally got signed to a small label as the Bluebells, named after Bluebell Records. And when that label folded, they were picked up by Newtown Records, and the name Patty LaBelle and the Bluebells was etched into the Metropolitan Directory of RB.

SPEAKER_00 6:13

And don't forget, Max, at the time they were the rivals, chief rivals to the Supremes. They certainly was.

SPEAKER_01 6:19

Certainly. Certainly. They certainly were, Mel. That's right. That's right, Mel. The friction between Patty LaBelle and the Bluebells and the Supremes was a classic industrial standoff between surgical precision and raw structural power. The tension peaked between 1963 and 66, during the height of the girl group construction boom, which tons of girl groups at the time. So while both groups were drafting the future of Seoul, they were working from two completely different technical blueprints.

SPEAKER_00 6:44

Yeah, the Bluebells were known for their gowns, but they weren't polished in the Motown sense. While Barry Gordy was sending the Supremes to finishing school to learn how to walk and talk for the high zoning white clubs.

SPEAKER_01 6:53

That's right, because Barry could make some money.

SPEAKER_00 6:55

Exactly. But at the same time, the Bluebells were coming at the audience with Philly grit.

SPEAKER_01 6:58

Yeah, they were the hardcore working class.

SPEAKER_00 7:00

Exactly. The friction was about class versus soul. Patty famously said they felt like the country cousins compared to the sleek Motown machine. And this would be the Motown finishing versus the Philly Foundation match.

SPEAKER_01 7:10

That's right, Mo. We ended up with a vocal displacement war. You see, Soul Fam the Supremes, led by Diana Ross, were engineered for the radio frequency, light, airy, and pop friendly. The Bluebells, on the other hand, were engineered for the live theater. When they shared a stage, Patty's vocal barn would often blow the structural integrity out of the room, making it hard for a precision group like the Supremes to follow, but it did.

SPEAKER_00 7:30

So it's the cusp of 1964-65, and there's a legendary story about the two groups sharing a dressing room at the Apollo Theater.

SPEAKER_01 7:38

That's right, Mello. The Supremes had the industrial backing of Motown, with matching luggage and a fleet of the systems. So berry like. The Bluebells were the general contractors, though, and they did their own hair and ironed their own dresses. Well and the friction, it wasn't just professional either. It was about the economic divide, Mello, between a major label empire and an independent soul shop. Could not have been more opposite if they tried.

SPEAKER_00 7:59

No, Max, and I love the story about them sharing that room at the Apollo.

SPEAKER_01 8:02

Yeah, me too.

SPEAKER_00 8:02

The Supremes had the industrial backing of a corporation, and Patty's crew had the spirit of the independent shop.

SPEAKER_01 8:08

But then, Mello, the ultimate structural breach happened. In 1967, Florence Ballard was being pushed out of the Supremes. And Barry Gordy, of course, needed a replacement specialist who could fit the Supremes blueprint immediately. And knowing Barry, as we well do, Mellow, take our guess at what his next step was. Shade. Shade.

SPEAKER_00 8:25

Yes, that's we know how you know how Barry operates. Barry Gordy looked at the bluebells and identified Cindy Bird's song as the perfect fit. She had the look, the voice, and the stage literacy required. Just like every Barry Gordy story, we find some shadiness.

SPEAKER_01 8:38

Oh, no doubt. We certainly do, Mellow. Apparently, Cindy left the bluebells to join the Supremes in the middle of the night. How does that for Barry Gordy drama? Sneaky. It is so. So this left Patty Nona and Sarah with a collapsed frame. They were suddenly a trio instead of a quartet. Like, what the fuck? Forced to redraft their entire professional future, and this forced a transition, going from the bluebells to label in 1970. But it wasn't just a rebrand mellow, it was a total control demolition of their previous career.

SPEAKER_00 9:04

Yeah, so they decided to kick the walls down, they went from being girl group laborers to sonic architects of the future. After Cindy Birdsong left, Patty, Nona, and Sarah were stuck in a structural loop, playing the same old school R and B circuits. And by 1970, the Bluebells were a trio, Patty, Sarah, and Nona. And their career was definitely stalling in the States.

SPEAKER_01 9:23

Okay, so fan, we always talk about cross-pollination. And here we see an amazing example of just how the perspective of being in another genre can open your eyes to things that the people that are living in it cannot see. So in the mid-60s, the Who, which was a absolute powerhouse British rock band, they were on their first major tour in the United States. And during that era, well, tours weren't solo missions like they kind of are today. They were package tours that put completely different architectural styles on the same stage. Across pollination. Yes. Mel and I talked about this when we talked about Bill Graham and the film or in Aretha, season one and episode six, y'all. Uh-huh. Because Bill was all about the cross-pollinating of styles.

SPEAKER_00 10:01

Twelve tones, play them any way you like. Yeah, so because of this tendency, Max, which unfortunately we don't really see today at all. I know it's sad. No, uh, but the Bluebells were booked on several of the same package tours as the Who. Can you just imagine? Well, just imagine the structural contrast. Uh you have the British invasion of and the power pop of Pete Townsend and Roger Daltrey, followed by the raw soul displacement of Patty and the Girls.

SPEAKER_01 10:22

So Mel, Kit Lambert, who managed The Who, was notorious for watching every show from the wings. Now, he wasn't just checking the sound specs for his own band. He was literally a student of audience dynamics. And Kit's motto was hey, you never know till you see for yourself. And Kit Lambert, well, he was thorough in his desire to see what worked and what wasn't working.

SPEAKER_00 10:40

So he watched Patty LaBelle take a mic and literally demolish the room, Max.

SPEAKER_01 10:44

I have seen that mo. It's true. I've seen it many times too. Oh, I know. Patty could torture any room she's.

SPEAKER_00 10:48

I've seen her put the mic down and walk away from it and still be heard every word.

SPEAKER_01 10:56

She's off mic and on mic, and you wouldn't even know the difference. I mean, it's just unbelievable. So Kit realized that the Bluebells possessed a sonic violence, a raw, high decibel of energy that was actually more rock and roll than most of the rock bands at the time. He saw that their internal gears were spinning faster than the girl group gowns they were wearing.

SPEAKER_00 11:15

Yeah, well, Max Lambert stayed in touch with their management, and when the group hit a structural ceiling in the U.S. around 1970, he saw an opportunity to pivot the asset. Right. And here's where the architect behind the scenes shows up for the girls, Max.

SPEAKER_01 11:27

So you may say to yourself, why would he do that? And because that, as we've seen time and time in the show, telling us to support each other because what you receive, you pass on. Guess what that does? It expands exponentially. You see, Soul Fan, Kit knew the British mod scene, was obsessed with authentic American RB. And he figured if he brought the Bluebells to London, he could use his industrial influence to redraft them for a more progressive audience. So they took a working visa to England to play a residency at a club called The Revolution.

SPEAKER_00 11:56

So next comes that handoff, because Kit didn't just book them.

SPEAKER_01 11:59

No, he did not.

SPEAKER_00 12:00

No, he curated their environment. By placing them at the Revolution, he ensured that they were being watched by the lead architects of the London scene, including his close friend Vicki Wickham, another architect to plumb the connection.

SPEAKER_01 12:11

Exactly, Mel. Vicki Wickham was a high-powered media developer in London. And she was the producer of the groundbreaking music show Ready Steady Go. I remember Ready Steady. It was great, yeah, it was an amazing show. She went to the club as a fan, but she left as an architect. Vicky watched them performing their old school girl group routines, the matching gowns, the polite choreography, and she realized there was a zoning error here. Oh my god, the world was changing, rock and roll was getting louder and grittier, and these women had voices that could shatter a stadium. Yet here they were trapped in lace blueprints.

SPEAKER_00 12:40

And Vicky didn't want to just manage the max.

SPEAKER_01 12:42

No, hell no.

SPEAKER_00 12:43

No, just she wanted to gut the building. Rip it out. She approached them with a radical site plan. Number one, stop pleasing the industry. Hell yes. She told them to stop trying to be the polite alternative to the Supremes.

SPEAKER_01 12:53

That's right, Melo. Fuck that. Number two, let's change the acoustic load, Vicky thought. She encouraged them to listen to rock, funk, and soul fusion.

SPEAKER_00 13:00

And then number three, the kicker of the new identity. That's it. She rebranded them simply as Labelle. It was a move away from the front woman and backups model toward a joint venture trio where every member was an equal pillar.

SPEAKER_01 13:12

Damn right, Melo. She told them to be a rock band with soul voices. Now that's a structural shift that changed the whole neighborhood of RB. Exactly. Without Vicky spotting them at the revolution, we might never have gotten the Space Age Labelle.

SPEAKER_00 13:23

And that's the peer lesson for season two, episode 15, y'all. Sometimes you need an outside architect to see the potential in your foundation. Truly. Yeah, the girls knew they were powerful, but Vicky gave them the planning permission to be radical. No permit needed, ladies, so just kick it.

SPEAKER_01 13:37

Yes, just kick it. Damn straight, Mello. So Vicky takes over managing them essentially, redrafting the group. She realized that the soul frequency of the time was shifting and the bluebells needed demolition. And so Melo, she blew it up real good.

SPEAKER_00 13:49

She surely did, Max. She told them to ditch the wigs, the sequins, and the choreograph step touch. She wanted them to act like a rock band with soul voices, rebranded as La Belle. They swapped the gowns for silver, lame, intergalactic feathers, and metallic headpieces. They looked like they had just landed a modular space station in the middle of a Harlem street corner.

SPEAKER_01 14:07

That's quite a view. So the rebrand and the rebuild is on. And in 1974, they went down to New Orleans to record the Nightbirds album. But they didn't just hire a standard pop producer. They brought in the master of the bio groove, Alan Tucson, a masterful architect who we will visit in the future. Definitely we have to get to him. Without a doubt. Alan brought the Creole Engineering, the surgical funk, tight horns, syncopated piano, and grit heavy bass lines.

SPEAKER_00 14:31

Patty, Nona, and Sarah weren't just singing lead and backup, they were layering frequencies. Nona was writing deep social political lyrics while Patty was providing the vocal fireworks.

SPEAKER_01 14:40

And this smell culminated in the most badass of tracks from these girls. Lady Marmalade, released that year. Well, Noah, the track became the commercial skyscraper of the era. That track bridged the zoning divide between the church and the club. It was a commercial skyscraper built on Creole grit. It hit number one on the pop charts, proving that a group of black women in spacesuits singing about a New Orleans street walker can bridge the zoning divide between the church and the club. How badass is that?

SPEAKER_00 15:06

Okay, and speaking of zoning divides, we're going to divide the show again right here and take a short break.

SPEAKER_01 15:10

That's right. We'll be right back to talk about the next step in the journey of our girl Patty.

SPEAKER_00 15:57

So, Max, we got to talk about the solo renovation phase.

SPEAKER_01 16:00

Yes, we must.

SPEAKER_00 16:01

Yeah, but first let's talk about the decommissioning of LaBelle in 1976, which officially stretched into the public split of 1977, which was a classic case of structural diversions.

SPEAKER_01 16:09

The group didn't collapse because of a lack of success, Mellow. They disbanded because the three main pillars of the group, Patty, Nona, and Sarah, were pulling the acoustic weight of the building in three completely different directions. By 1976, the material specs of the group had worn thin, leading to a controlled dismantling of this trio.

SPEAKER_00 16:25

It's true, Max. As successful as they were, there were three intersecting forces at play here, and that created a structural fracture or creative rift, stylistically, basically rock versus soul. Three ladies, three paths, Max.

SPEAKER_01 16:37

Yep, three paths soul, fam. First Nona Hendrix, who is the group's primary songwriter and wanted to push LaBelle into a much more radical, aggressive gothic rock and new wave frequency. She was writing dark, political, and sexually fluid lyrics that were pushing the boundaries of the era.

SPEAKER_00 16:51

And then we have Patty Max, LaBelle's foundation. Patty, at her core, was rooted in gospel, soul, and traditional RB.

SPEAKER_01 16:58

The chitch.

SPEAKER_00 16:59

Right. She was becoming increasingly uncomfortable with the aggressive rock direction and then the ultra-radical concepts.

SPEAKER_01 17:04

I will bet that she was.

SPEAKER_00 17:05

Yeah, Patty felt they were moving away from the soul frequency that built their foundation.

SPEAKER_01 17:09

And because Vicki Wickham had re-engineered them as a joint venture trio mellow, well, there was no official lead singer on paper. So there was constant tension regarding the vocal spotlight. Fortunately, there was Sarah Dash, number three, who is the ultimate structural liaison of LaBelle. In the architectural layout of the group, if Patty was the high frequency skyscraper and Nona was the avant-garde rock foundation Mellow, Sarah was the harmonic anchor holding the entire frame together.

SPEAKER_00 17:32

She surely was, Max. But when the divergence started happening between 1974 and 1976, Sarah found herself caught directly in the middle of a massive industrial tug of war.

SPEAKER_02 17:42

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 17:43

Being the middle pillar became a dilemma, and Sarah's position during the split was complex, defined by three main factors.

SPEAKER_01 17:49

That's right, Mellow. Sarah was the classic diplomat, sort of the peacekeeper of the joint venture. And on paper with Vicki Wickham, well, Vicki Wickham structured them as three equal partners. But psychologically, the tension between Patty and Nona was a massive load-bearing strain. And Sarah spent a lot of energy trying to balance the egos and the creative friction, acting as the buffer, so the group could finish their tour dates at the very least.

SPEAKER_00 18:11

Musically, Sarah was incredibly literate and versatile. She sure was. The vocal chameleon of the trio, really. And she could sing the high soprano or drop into a deep, sultry alto.

SPEAKER_01 18:20

Yes, sir.

SPEAKER_00 18:21

But because she could sing anything, she felt caught between the two styles. She loved the traditional soul and gospel roots that Patty wanted to protect, Max, but she also appreciated the daring, futuristic, and sexy edge that Nona's rock writing brought to the table.

SPEAKER_01 18:34

Yeah, literally caught between a rock and a hard place.

SPEAKER_00 18:37

Yeah. She didn't necessarily want to choose between the cathedral and the stadium. She liked the hybrid that they had built.

SPEAKER_01 18:42

Oh, she sure did, Mello. But the intense schedule of touring in heavy spacesuits, makeup, heels, combined with the pressure of following up the massive commercial success of Lady Marmalade, well, that created severe internal anxiety and emotional exhaustion.

SPEAKER_00 18:54

It's true. Patty later admitted in her memoirs that she was experiencing hyperventilation and panic attacks on stage towards the end, Max. The breaking point occurring during a weekend residency at New York City's Beacon Theater in 1976.

SPEAKER_01 19:06

Yeah, it was coming. The internal communication had completely broken down at all. Nona was dealing with immense personal and creative stress. And reportedly, she spent part of the performance singing with her back to the audience or screaming into the microphone. I can't even imagine that.

SPEAKER_00 19:19

Yeah, it must have been some scene. Patty realized right there on the stage planks that the structural integrity of the group was entirely gone. But instead of letting the building collapse in public, they made a strategic decision to decommission it. Patty and Nona on opposite sides and Sarah in the middle.

SPEAKER_01 19:34

Yeah, Mello Sarah reportedly was devastated. I mean, she felt that the group was just as madly as they just achieved the true global scale. So while she understood that the internal communication had completely eroded, it truly was a hard pill to swallow to watch a gold certified headlining marquee act dissolve because the main pillars couldn't agree on the blueprints anymore.

SPEAKER_00 19:52

But decommissioned they did, Max. They finished out their 1976 commitments and quietly went their separate ways to launch solo ventures in 1977.

SPEAKER_01 20:00

Patty went on to pursue the traditional soul and pop ballads that suited her massive vocal register.

SPEAKER_00 20:04

Nona launched a solo career exploring experimental art, rock, funk metal, and new wave.

SPEAKER_01 20:09

And once the liquidation was finalized in 1977, Mella, well, Sarah didn't look back with bitterness. She used the opportunity to prove her own value as a soul proprietor.

SPEAKER_00 20:17

That's right. She shifted her zoning toward the dance and disco sectors, Max, scoring a massive solo club hit with Cinnamon in 1978.

SPEAKER_01 20:24

Which is a killer tune.

SPEAKER_00 20:26

Later, her incredible session literacy caught the attention of rock royalty, leading her to tour and record for years as a vital member of Keith Richards' expensive winos and guesting with the Rolling Stones.

SPEAKER_01 20:36

Not a bad life, not a bad life. And now Mello, after LaBelle was decommissioned in 76, Patty was the sole proprietor for the first time in 16 years. And it wasn't an easy build. She spent nearly a decade in the renovation zone. And since we are in the zone as well, we're gonna take it and zone out for a few minutes with a break.

SPEAKER_00 20:55

You're listening to Soul Fam to Max and Mellow's Architects of Soul, and we're talking Patty LaBelle.

SPEAKER_01 20:59

Yes, sir, we surely are. Stick around. We will be right back.

SPEAKER_00 21:34

And we were back with Max and Melo's Architects of Soul. So Patty LaBelle's solo renovation phase was a true test of her industrial resilience, Max.

SPEAKER_01 21:42

Sure was, Mello.

SPEAKER_00 21:43

See, when LaBelle disbanded, Patty was left without her vocal crew and without the futuristic blueprint that had made her a star.

SPEAKER_01 21:49

And finding the architect who provided the global plug, well, it wasn't a single event either, Mello. It was a series of structural repairs that led her back to the top of the skyline.

SPEAKER_00 21:58

So for nearly seven years, Max, Patty. Was signed to Epic Records slash CBS Records. She was releasing solid soul specs like You Are My Friend in 1977, but the zoning was off. She finally did have a solo number one hit in uh 1983 with If Only You Knew. Great song. Yeah, but the industry was trying to fit her back into the standard RB floor plan, and she wasn't seeing the massive scale she deserved. Massive scale. Massive, massive scale she deserved.

SPEAKER_01 22:22

But she was performing like a Titan, Mellow. I can attest to that. When she rolled through the Apollo, man, she was killing it. And this was way later on. So I could only imagine what she sounded like then. But the radio frequency, well, it just wasn't picking her up. Airplay, I guess, became scare play. Patty was like, Well, I need a new drafting team.

SPEAKER_00 22:39

She surely did, Max. By 1984, Patty was feeling that structural drift at Epic Records.

SPEAKER_01 22:44

Yeah, that sinking feeling.

SPEAKER_00 22:45

Yeah, they weren't giving her the marketing budget or the contemporary production assets she needed. She was effectively trapped in a non-cross-pollinating RB only floor plan.

SPEAKER_01 22:53

And who the heck wants that anyway? Meanwhile, as Patty's trying to pivot Mellow, an architect behind the scene appears. We love this stuff. Enter Irving Azov, who just taken the reins as the head of MCA Records. Azoff wasn't just trying to put together a standard movie record, Mellow. He was executing a massive corporate rezoning of the entire MCA label.

SPEAKER_00 23:13

Exactly, Max. When Irving Azov took over MCA in 1983, the label was jokingly referred to in the industry as Music Cemetery of America for the MCA. Yeah, exactly. It was stagnant. Azov's grand blueprint to fix this was to use the Hollywood movie soundtracks as a launch pad.

SPEAKER_01 23:30

This is so brilliant, Soulfam.

SPEAKER_00 23:31

Yeah, so it's to break new sounds and scout major talent without the financial risk of signing them to full album deals up front. Pretty crafty, Max.

SPEAKER_01 23:38

I would say so, Mel. So producers Don Simpson and Jerry Bruckheimer were editing Beverly Hills Cop Soulfam, and they needed an energetic, high-octane, synth-heavy electric pop sound to match Eddie Murphy's fast-paced comedy style. They had the electronic score coming together from Harold Falthmeyer, but they needed a massive, massive commanding voice. Massive commanding voice that could piece through the heavy rolling Jupiter 8 and Lindrum synth textures of 1984 production. There's that Lindrum again.

SPEAKER_00 24:03

Exactly. This is where the engineering behind the scenes gets deep, Max. See, Richard Perry was already working closely with MCA on the soundtrack because he produced the Pointer Sisters Neutron Dance.

SPEAKER_01 24:12

Badass song.

SPEAKER_00 24:13

Oh yeah. Which was originally written for another movie but got reassigned to the famous cigarette truck chase scene in Beverly Hills Cop.

SPEAKER_01 24:20

And seeing how perfectly Richard Perry's ultramodern synth pop production fit the movie's framework, well, MCA started looking for other powerhouse vocalists who could pull off that same high-energy crossover vibe. We know who that is. Now Patty was still stuck at Epic Records, criminally underutilized and mismanaged. But because the soundtrack albums are handled under separate film studio legal permits, well, MCA realized they could hire Patty as an independent subcontractor for the movie without needing a full-blown release from her primary label. Fucking brilliance.

SPEAKER_00 24:48

And and Max, because movie soundtracks are handled under separate legal permits than the standard solo artist contracts, MCA's music supervisors were able to hire Patty as an outside subcontractor to record a couple of tracks for the film, Wink Wink.

SPEAKER_01 25:01

Nudge nudge. Say no more.

SPEAKER_00 25:03

Yeah, even though she was still technically signed to Epic CBS.

SPEAKER_01 25:06

So brilliant. They handed Patty New Attitude, produced by Howie Rice, and Stir It Up, produced by Faltenmeyer and Keith Forzy Mellow. MCA didn't just want her for one track, Mellow. They gave her two key positions on the track list because they knew her vocal displacement was the only thing big enough to anchor the movie's main montages. So she cut New Attitude and stirred up for the movie mellow. Then Beverly Hills Cop exploded into December of 1984. New Attitude became a top 20 pop hit and an iconic cultural anthem. And now MCA executives looked at the data and realized they had just engineered a massive pop hit for an artist signed to another label. How fucked up is that? So how do you like that Mellow? They immediately moved to buyer contract out from Epic, officially bringing her over to the MCA roster full time in 1985 and saving their asses.

SPEAKER_00 25:47

Exactly. And this Max is where the timeline gets highly strategic. See, Richard Perry and Bert Baccharek didn't just show up when she arrived at MCA. They were the master builders brought in to design the framework for her monumental 1986 crossover album, Winner in You.

SPEAKER_01 26:01

And Richard Perry was already a legendary pop soul specialist, as we said before, having resurrected the Pointer Sisters' career with the massive pop hits like Neutron Dance. Oh my god. Which was also on the same Beverly Hills cop soundtrack, which was an amazing soundtrack, especially for the time. So Irving brought Perry in to act as the key production anchor for Patty's new solo blueprint.

SPEAKER_00 26:21

Richard Perry's job was to update her sonic equipment. Sure was. He produced multiple heavy hitter tracks on the Winner and You album, including O People and Twisted, injecting that pristine mid-80s high-fidelity synth production that allowed her massive voice voice to produce to pierce the global pop charts.

SPEAKER_01 26:38

And here comes the architect Mo, Bert Bacrack and his songwriting partner, Carol Bayer Sager, who we explored when we did the Deion Warwick, Don't Make Me Over, podcast season one, episode nine, y'all were brought in in the exact same 1985 booking window.

SPEAKER_00 26:51

Bert Backerak wasn't trying to produce an entire funk album, Max.

SPEAKER_01 26:55

Not sure he could.

SPEAKER_00 26:56

No, he was just brought in to build the crown jewel of the project.

SPEAKER_01 26:59

Which he could.

SPEAKER_00 26:59

Yeah. He laid down the acoustic piano foundations for On My Own and engineered the cross-coastal modular build with Michael McDonald that gave Patty her first and only solo number one pop single on the Billboard Hot 100. He was the lead architect who understood the massive scale of the scale of her voice. And Bert and Carol Bayer Sager.

SPEAKER_01 27:17

And that's the industrial connection right there, Soul Fam. Bert Backrack wrote On My Own, and he knew he needed structural magnitude. He didn't just want a singer, he wanted a vocal cathedral. Well, Patty sure was that Mello. She could easily handle a massive pop ballad without losing that soul foundation.

SPEAKER_00 27:33

And that surgical move of pairing her with Michael McDonald. That plug. Yeah, that plug was a stroke of production genius. They paired Patty with Michael McDonald Max. To them, it was the ultimate blue-eyed soul, means the high octane Philly Soul collaboration.

SPEAKER_01 27:45

Now that is a cross-pollinating modular bill, Mellow. Snap those parts together. Ah, technology soul fan, moving the world of music forward. They recorded on opposite coasts. Patty and Philly, Michael in LA. They didn't even meet, but the harmonic alignment was so tight it hit number one on the pop charts.

SPEAKER_00 28:02

I remember it well. It's a pure lesson for us for soul and the new vibe. Sometimes the plug isn't in your own backyard. You have to find the architect who sees your vocal frequency and knows exactly where it fits in your global skyline.

SPEAKER_01 28:13

Exactly, Mello. Patty proved that the building might go through a renovation. But as long as the foundation is solid, you can always rebuild bigger. And speaking of rebuilding bigger, union rules call for a break right now. Don't piss off the union, Max. Play nice and take the break. You're probably right, Mello. I usually piss someone off. Okay, Soulfam, we'll be right back to talk about the Patty Pie and Pi.

SPEAKER_00 28:31

Oh, yeah, the pie, yes.

SPEAKER_01 28:31

Oh, the pie and power.

SPEAKER_00 28:32

You're kicking it with Max and Mello's architects of soul, and we're talking the great pat of the bell.

SPEAKER_01 28:36

Don't go nowhere. So Mella, we're coming to the final inspection of this episode. But before we wrap, if you like this content, please give a like or subscribe to our channel and check out the video version on our YouTube page just to see the job site in action.

SPEAKER_00 29:31

Max, we can't talk about Patty without talking about the kitchen rezoni.

SPEAKER_01 29:35

Ah, the Patty Pie Empire. Man, she didn't just slap her name on a box, Mel. She'd been a culinary general contractor her whole life. In fact, she used to cook for the stage crew in her dressing room. And when I was working on Latifa and on Tyra, she came to both shows and she cooked. And yeah, she could cook.

SPEAKER_00 29:51

Girl could cook. Yeah, she took that nurturing spec and engineered it into a retail monument. When a fan video went viral in 2015, Walmart was selling one pie every second. Now that's industrial demand.

SPEAKER_01 30:03

Yeah, she rezoned from the stage to the grocery. I don't know. It's the 360-degree brand, which is what today's market is. She showed us that an artist brand architecture doesn't have to stop at the microphone. You can build in the living room and the kitchen at the same time. Kind of like a couple of songwriters who uh are doing a podcast.

SPEAKER_00 30:18

A podcast, exactly. Same kind of thing. It's about domestic literacy. Whether she's hitting a high note that shatters the frequency specs or baking a crust. The structural integrity is the same. She's feeding the ears and the stomach.

SPEAKER_01 30:30

With a flaky warm crust. Now she made the industry build a new wing just to house her talent in her business.

SPEAKER_00 30:36

Yeah, but she most definitely did, Max. Well so, fam, this has been a heavy art at Max. From the Beulah Baptist Church to the spacesuits of the 70s to the Patty Pie Empire.

SPEAKER_01 30:44

Yeah, Patty LaBelle is the master architecture resilient. She taught us in Soul of the New Vot that you don't have to fit into the industry's floor plan, which we fucking love. You can draft your own future, even if it means changing the materials midway through the build.

SPEAKER_00 30:57

She stayed a slave to the soul while mastering the 10% music, 90% business ratio that Quincy Jones always talked about.

SPEAKER_01 31:04

And it's the truth. Business works. And as always, at the end, we'd like to close with our final thought and our hope for all of us our art, our craft, and our creations.

SPEAKER_00 31:16

Keep that soul fire burning, protect your sound, nurture your creativity, own your voice, and remember the lessons from the giants who came before.

SPEAKER_01 31:24

And yes, protect your masters and seek out wise makers who can guide you on your journey. And until next we meet, peace and soul, y'all.