100 Mavericks # 65 Darondo

Bay Area Soul Man. Released three singles during his career, all of them quite excellent and then pretty much vanished from the map for a couple of decades. All of his records have something otherworldly about them. They're spacey and eclectic, with something of the aura of fifties doo wop to them. In the man's own words,'You can hear a bit of everything. There's a little jazz and a little soul. They say if you black you supposed to have soul. I got Latin flavor in me so there's some Latin in it. Definitely got the Blues in it. I sound kinda' country but I grew up in the Bay Area.'

There's also Sly, Al Green and James Brown, the most obvious reference points. In Legs, posted below he gobbles like Screaming Jay Hawkins and almost seems to prefigure Prince on terms of the sheer strut on below. Heavily be-ringed and with a fifties quiff he cut an utterly distinctive figure. Reputed to be a pimp and engaged in somewhat shady dealings though he always remained cagey on the matter. His music is deep and resonant and quite magnificent. He died three years back, still having not quite received his due. Understandably for a man who only released three singles during the peak of his career, but the 2005 anthology Let My People Go is well worth tracking down.