Soul And / Or Related Artists
facts of life

Facts Of Life

The Facts Of Life comprised of:

Chuck Carter

Jean Davis

and

Keith Williams

The Facts Of Life were, essentially, protege's of Millie Jackson.

Millie Jackson credits friends' Keith Williams and Chuck Carter with teaching her how to sing at the outset of her music career.

She met Jean Davis (Tyrone Davis' sister) on the road, Jean was opening for Tyrone and they became friends.

Millie wanted to produce individual records on Keith, Chuck, and Jean but time restraints prevented that so she assembled them into Facts Of Life.

They were similar to the Soul Children but less dynamic than the Memphis group.

Millie produced them independently but couldn't achieve a deal with a major label and was about to give up when Brad Shapiro (Millie's producer) offered Facts Of Life a contract with his Kayvette label.

Others artists to release records on Kayvette include the Meadow Brothers and Jackie Moore.

Their first single was the late Homer Banks and Carl Hampton's 'Caught In The Middle,' it did well on Southern stations but never mainstreamed.

However, the second release, a remake of the country hit 'Sometimes,' went to the Number 31 spot on Billboard's Pop Chart during the spring of 1977.

Kayvette hurried an album out, Millie was hot at the time, and had little time for the project.

'Sometimes' contains mostly deep soul wailers including a remake of the obscure 'Hundreds Pounds Of Pain' written by Billy 'Tyran Carlo' Davis & Rose Marie McCoy, a twist on Gene McDaniels' 'Hundreds Pounds Of Clay.'

George Jackson & Raymond Moore contributed two songs, and they tried another country standard 'Looks Like We Made It.'

Poor packaging, including typos, mis-spelled words, and a bad picture hurt the album's appeal, despite the problems, RCA Records plucked it for mass distribution.

A second LP, 'A Matter Of Fact', spawned no hits.

Overloaded, Millie concentrated more on her career, and other than mass mailings, little promotion took place.

She also produced and managed male singers, Eddie McCloyd, and Billy Nichols, and was raising a family.

Jean, Keith & Chuck separated and never reformed again.

Real Player

Albums:

Sometimes (RCA Records 1978)

A Matter Of Time (Kayvette Records 1978)

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