(Early R&B / Doo Wop) The Flares-Foot-Stompin' - 2002, MP3 (tracks), 128 kbps

Known for their 1961 up-tempo dance doo wop hit "Foot Stompin', Pt. 1," the Flares were related to, but not exactly the same as, the 1950s Los Angeles doo wop group the Flairs. The lineup changes undergone by both the Flairs and the Flares are difficult to track and digest, but basically the Flairs were formed by teenagers in L.A. in the early '50s and founded by future the Coasters member Cornell Gunter. Managed by Buck Ram (whose most famous clients were the Platters), the Flairs recorded for Modern, ABC-Paramount, and Antler. By 1960, just two of the original Flairs -- Tommy Miller and George Hollis -- were left, the quartet had expanded to a quintet, and female singer Beverly Harris was a member. At that point, they were recording for Felsted and changed their name to the Flares.
"Foot Stompin', Pt. 1," boasting infectious interaction between the lead harmonizers, the bass singer, and rhythms that were indeed created by foot stomps, got to number 25 in late 1961. The Flares never followed that up with another hit, though they recorded more than half a dozen subsequent singles over the next couple of years or so, occasionally under the name the Peppers. Many of these sides were too-similar variations on the early soul-dance craze vibe that had fueled "Foot Stompin', Pt. 1," sometimes featuring lead female vocals. It's hard to keep up with the exact personnel shuffles of the lineup during the early '60s, but Aaron Collins (who wrote much of the Flares' material, including "Foot Stompin', Pt. 1") and Willie Davis were certainly involved in singing on their recordings and shared lead vocals on "Foot Stompin', Pt. 1," though they weren't always identified as members in publicity materials. Even more confusingly, several female singers recorded and performed with the group (who were pictured in press shots as a quintet with four guys and one girl), and the Flares that toured were not always the same as the Flares that recorded in the studio. At any rate, not many were paying attention to such matters by the time they disbanded around 1964.

Like many a one-hit early rock & roll vocal group, the Flares never came up with anything else to match their sole smash ("Foot Stomping Pt. 1") creatively or commercially. So this 26-track collection of 1960-1963 material will be of interest almost solely to serious doo wop collectors, assembling most of the songs from the singles they did for the Felsted and Press labels (including the Press single they did under the name the Peppers), adding a few tracks from their 1961 album and three previously unreleased cuts. The Flares were good singers and their records had solid R&B/rock & roll backing with shades of soul, blues, and jazz, but they came up against the limitations so common to many second-division groups of the era: their material wasn't that special and also stuck to a formula too often. In the Flares' case, that formula was up-tempo early soul records wedded to a type of dance, whether it was "Hand Clappin'," "Doing the Hully Gully," "Shimmy and Stomp," "The Monkey Walk," or covers of "The Stroll" and "Pony Time." Occasionally they broke away from that pattern, though not with astounding results, as on the contrived two-part novelty "Rock and Roll Heaven" or several cuts that find a female vocalist taking the lead part. Some of the later cuts edge toward a more modern sound akin to early Motown sides by groups like the Contours, though the songs and production weren't as good. The liner notes gamely make sense of the group's complicated and confusing evolution from the '50s doo wop act the Flairs into the related but different early-'60s aggregation of the Flares.