This 14-track collection of Brenda & the Tabulations' Top & Bottom singles covers the extremely fruitful collaboration between Brenda & the Tabulations and producer Van McCoy.
McCoy came to write (with frequent collaborator Joe Cobb) and produce their breathtaking Top & Bottom release, “And My Heart Sang (Tra La La),” a #12 R&B/#64 pop entry during the spring and summer of 1970. McCoy and Cobb also supplied the sassy up-tempo flip, “Lies, Lies, Lies.”
The group revived Dionne Warwick’s first Burt Bacharach/Hal David-penned smash from 1963, the saucy “Don’t Make Me Over,” as their next Top & Bottom offering .“Don’t Make Me Over” was a #15 R&B/#77 pop seller for the group, with McCoy and Cobb’s attractive mid-tempo “You’ve Changed” nestled on the opposite side.
“A Child No One Wanted,” the brainchild of McCoy and Cobb, elicited a deeply moving performance from Brenda and made it to #42 R&B at the beginning of 1971. Brenda and Maurice’s own “Scuse Uz Y’All” on the B-side was a wordless lark. “Those were the little songs we just threw in,” he says.
McCoy and Cobb never wrote a more perfect song for Brenda & the Tabulations than the magnificent ballad “Right On The Tip Of My Tongue,” which rocketed to #10 R&B and #23 pop in the spring of 1971–their biggest hit since “Dry Your Eyes.” Maurice remembers the song as being Brenda’s favorite. “If I walk down the street today,” he says, “people say, ‘I know you! I remember you–it’s right on the tip of my tongue!’” The alluring “Always And Forever,” yet another McCoy/Cobb collaboration, graced the flip side.
“A Part Of You” was another stately McCoy/Cobb theme that sailed to #14 R&B/#94 pop for the group that summer with the delicious “Where There’s A Will (There’s A Way)” on the flip.
Van and Joe’s “Why Didn’t I Think Of That,” a #34 R&B entry, closed out both 1971 and Brenda & the Tabulations’ Top & Bottom stint, the same duo’s pumping “A Love You Can Depend On” on the B-side