Ruby Winters "Just Like A Yo-Yo" 45 (Diamond 1969)
Please excuse some of the surface noise on this record, it's not the cleanest 45 in my collection but I have such an affection for it and it's not that invasive I felt like this song deserved some air time and it's also a good excuse for me to put in on 15 times in a row.
There's scant biographical information I can find about Winters outside of her being born in Kentucky, raised in Cincinnati and being introduced to the small New York label on a duet with Johnny Thunder (The saucy "Make Love To Me") in 1967. She had a few minor hits though this particular track is not one of them. Why it wasn't a sizable hit (at least maybe in chicago which Diamond seemed to have some line on, a bunch of their records making noise in the already busy Chicago market.
Not to belabor the point, but hot damn, why was this record not a hit? Winters has an amazing voice, she sounds like her voice would be a little thin with a subtle, but dominant falsetto yet she carries so much weight (including holding an amazing note/wail as the song approaches the end) and is so affective with her voice that you're never thinking of anything except how sad you feel for the way this bozo is treating her in the song.
The song also has a pretty high production quality that you maybe wouldn't associate with a label of this size. A pretty straightforward mid-tempo pop soul the song is replete with backing arrangements that speak to a much higher budget that someone who's only had two or three minor hits. There are some wind arrangements in the back ground, touches of strings (very sparingly arranged with a really nice feel for emphasis at the end of phrases), clean, on key, well mixed background vocals and a good job in the control booth tucking the bass into the rhythm track in a song dominated by the drummer.
Not a terribly expensive record (just don't excited if you see the label in bin somewhere, 9 times out of 10 it's Ronnie Dove and NEVER the ray men - link and vernon wray's alternate spelling) and works in a lot of settings if you let dancefloors determine your purchasing habits (which I'm totally guilty of).
