JIMMY HUGHES

Two years before Percy Sledge recorded "When a Man Loves a Woman," Jimmy Hughes made the Billboard top twenty with Southern Soul's first major pop hit.

Hughes, a cousin of Sledge, was born February 3, 1938, in Leighton, Alabama. Like many Southern soul acts, he got his start in gospel music, performing with a group called the Singing Clouds during his high school years.

In 1962, Hughes auditioned for Rick Hall at the FAME Studios in Muscle Shoals, Alabama. Hall recorded Hughes on a song he (Hughes) had co-written with producer Quin Ivy, “I’m Qualified.” The Philadelphia-based Guyden label picked it up for national distribution, but it was not a hit. Hughes took to performing Rhythm & Blues songs in local clubs while keeping his day job at a rubber factory.

In early 1964, Hughes presented Hall with another original song, “Steal Away.” (He had based it on the gospel number, “Steal Away to Jesus.”) Recorded in one take, the ballad took off in the South and soon hit the national charts, making it the first Southern soul record to do well in the pop market. “Steal Away” served as a prototype for later, more successful, soul acts like Johnnie Taylor and Al Green. It also landed FAME a distribution deal with the Chicago-based Vee Jay label. Hughes’ debut album, also titled Steal Away, came out on Vee Jay in 1965.

Though “Steal Away” was Hughes’ only major pop hit, his records continued to sell to the burgeoning soul market. With Atlantic now handling FAME’s distribution, his 1966 release, “Neighbor, Neighbor,” became a top five R&B smash. A year later, “Why Not Tonight” also went top five.

In 1968, Hughes signed with the Memphis-based Stax label, who issued his music on the Volt subsidiary. His debut for Volt, “I Like Everything About You,” reached #21 on the R&B chart, but none of his subsequent releases did much. Frustrated by what he deemed Stax’s lack of promotion, coupled with his weariness of touring and being away from his wife and children, Jimmy Hughes quit the music business in 1970. He underwent job retraining and found work with the government, making parts for nuclear power plants in the Tennessee River Valley. From then on, Hughes limited his singing to the church.

Allmusic.com states that Jimmy Hughes died in 1997. He was, in fact, alive as recently as 2009, when he told an interviewer, “I would like to see the person that’s happier than what I am now. I’m really satisfied. I don’t really have any desire to go back into [the music business].”

Charted singles:

“Steal Away” (1964) R&B #2, Pop #17
“Try Me” (1964) Pop #65
“Neighbor, Neighbor” (1966) R&B #4, Pop #65
“I Worship the Ground You Walk On” (1966) R&B #25
“Why Not Tonight” (1967) R&B #5, Pop #90
“It Ain’t What You Got” (1968) R&B #43
“I Like Everything About You” (1968) R&B #21