Edwin Starr
Edwin Starr had a barrel-chested baritone that earned him a place in pop music history with the eternal protest song, “War”.
A native of Tennessee and raised in Cleveland, Starr’s first successful recordings were for the Ric-Tic label, a local competitor with Motown in Detroit. The company proved to be no match for Motown in the end, but it posed enough of a threat that Berry Gordy bought them out in the late ‘60s and acquired their roster of singers, the most notable being Edwin Starr.
He already had two hits for Ric-Tic: the prepostorously fun “Agent Double-O-Soul” in 1965 and the bubbly “Stop Her on Sight (S.O.S.)” in 1966. Both reached the R&B top 10 and “Agent” just missed out on the pop top 20.
In 1969, after a couple failed singles, Starr had his first proper Motown smash with the rollicking “Twenty-Five Miles”. It stomped its way to #6 R&B and #6 pop. Starr’s biggest hit came shortly thereafter. The Temptations had recorded Norman Whitfield and Barrett Strong’s “War”, but Motown didn’t want to release it as a single.
Starr enthusiastically volunteered to shout out the track. And shout he did. Whitfield re-arranged the song into a no-holds-barred denunciation of the Vietnam War and Starr had the hit of a lifetime as “War” topped the pop charts in 1970.
The stunning success of that bombastic psychedelic funk song led to a slew of lesser soundalikes. Only the triumphant “Time” (written by Starr himself) managed to equal, and in fact exceed, the sound and fury of “War”.
After Starr’s schtick as a soul-shouter denouncing war had commercially and artistically played out, it was 1973. A lackluster blaxploitation album marked the end of his time with Motown. He enjoyed a brief revival in the late 1970s with the disco hits “Contact” and “H.A.P.P.Y. Radio”. Thereafter Starr faded from the popular music scene.
He died of a heart attack in 2003 at age 61 and is buried in England. That country enthusiasticlly received Starr in his later career as his popularity in the US faded. Eventually Starr made the land his permament home and a successful second career entertaining concertgoers there for decades before his death.
Playlist on Tidal
ALBUM REVIEWS
Soul Master: B-
25 Miles: C
Just We Two: C-
War & Peace: C+
Involved: D