Carolyn Veal was a singer from Brunswick, Georgia who was discovered by Walter Rayfield. Rayfield was also the producer and talent scout who brought John Ellison and the Soul Brothers Six to Jamie and Phil-LA of Soul Records. He also brought Alfreda Brockington to Phil-LA of Soul and had John Ellison produce and write her first record, “Your Love Has Got Me Chained and Bound.”
Rayfield drove a truck for the postal service, which was how he found the Soul Brothers Six in his regular route to Rochester, New York, where they were from at the time. He brought them to Philadelphia and continued to hunt talent from an office across the street from the Uptown Theater on North Broad Street.
Carolyn Veal he found in Brunswick, Georgia. He had an address there, so he seems to have moved there, though he told Jamie Records at the time of introducing Carolyn Veal to Jamie that he was on his way to Chicago. He also said that he had “recorded something better than Alfreda and wanted Jamie to have first crack at it.”
He must have shied away from a title so close to Alfreda Brockington’s “Your Love Has Got Me Chained and Bound” because he at first called “Your Love Is Like A Chain Around My Heart” “Softly I Lay My Head,” which the label suggested changing to the ultimate title.
The Carolyn Veal session produced three recordings. The third one was going to be the original first A side and was probably then kept over for a further release. “Hold On To It” is a strong uptempo number that appears here for the first time from the Jamie/Guyden archive
