Flaming Ember

One of my favorite one-hit wonders has always been "Westbound Number Nine" by classic white soul group "The Flaming Ember", an 1971 one-shot that I just love.

I've been hearing that song for, oh, 25 years now. And I've never known jack about the band...

...until last night,when I spent some time working on a Wikipedia article that led me to try to write a piece on the band...

...which led me to this wonderful interview with former band members Mike Plunk and Jim Bugnel.

Talking about the band's heyday, when they were a bunch of white boys from Detroit being managed by Motown legends Holland, Dozier and Holland:

Well I'll tell you, when we were with Ric Tic Records, we got a lot of recognition from the black recording industry. George Clinton was a friend of ours and he wrote "Hey Mama Whatcha Got Good for Daddy." We were also doing the music tracks for other artists so we had a reputation for being a funky group. The black people were well aware of us, so when we played the 20 Grand for the first time, the place was packed with superstar artists and record people. We were well received and got a standing ovation. We met Joe Louis who came with Wilson of Wilson sports equipment, and a few of The Temptations were there, along with other Motown and Ric Tic artists. I remember, after doing our show, I was walking down the center isle and a lady sitting at the bar stopped me and said that we were really great and I said, "Thank you very much." Then when I got to the end of the bar, the owner asked if I knew who that was that stopped me and I said no. He said that it was Dionne Warwick. What a compliment.