70's Soulstress: Bettye Crutcher

[herbalizer12]

Something has been bugging me for years!

I have owned this fantastic soul LP by Bettye Crutcher called "Long As You Love Me" (released in 1974. Enterprise/Stax Records.), but little is known on this singer?

I know Issac Hayes is affiliated with Enerprise and that the album is layered with the lushness of the Memphis (Muscle Shoals) Symphony Orchestra/players, but did she release any more albums in the 70s and, if still alive, what is she doing now????

The album contains many gems like "Sleepy People", "When We're Together", the Portishead-sampled, Hammond organ melodies of "So Lonely Without You" and, I guess, the more well-known disco-soul track "Sugar Daddy".

She sounds a little like Ann Peebles, Carla Thomas, etc, but I'd deeply appreciate more info on her and if this was her one and only album. I've checked some really source-worthy soul books and there's no listings of here at all!

Regards,
herbalizer12 :)

[DISCODISK]

HERBALIZER12 youve got me going on this somewhere in the back of my mind i remember a later album in the decade than this but thats all thats coming for now!
bettye was a girl of many talents she was also a writer and producer in fact she was a BIG writer at stax ,solo and in groups of 2/3/4 and at her best alongside the late great homer banks,you compare her to carla well she wrote for carla! also johnny taylor the staples and many more you could say she was the 'dozier 'of stax she also produced at atlantic when stax folded

[herbalizer12]

Thanks Discodisk!

Having dug a little deeper, I have found out she was a vital part of a song-writing team that she once shared with Mack Rice (who, incidentally, co-produced her album).

She was a pioneer songwriter of the 70s "cheatin'" genre. Her songwriting credits include the likes of Booker T & MGs, Staple Singers, William Bell, Carla Thomas, Judy Clay, Johnnie Taylor, Margie Joseph, The Emotions, Ollie & The Nightingales,Chuck Brooks, etc.


Crutcher actually wrote "Who's Makin' Love" and was part of the "We-Three" writing team with - as you say, Disco - Homer Banks and Raymond Jackson.

What exactly did she do or work for at Atlantic Records, do you know, Disco?