Cindy Gibson had a Dynodynamic-helmed single out on the short-lived General imprint predating her Arctic 45 (but not by much) coupling producer-writer Weldon Arthur McDougal III’s punchy charmer “I’ll Always Love You” and the Johnny Stiles-penned “A Lovely Summer Night.” The Tiffanys once again earned credit on the label for their backing vocals. “Her real name was Cecilia Shields,” notes guitarist Bobby Eli. “Cindy was her pseudonym.”
Gibson’s only Arctic offering came out in February of ‘65. Kenny Gamble, soon to turn up on the imprint himself, wrote the beguiling mid-tempo “Step By Step,” Cindy’s delicious lead answered by a melodious male vocal group.
Weldon and his colleagues had struck temporary paydirt in late 1964 by beating Motown to the punch. They’d hurried Nella Dodds’ cover of the Supremes’ “Come See About Me” out as a single before Motown got around to pulling it off their Where Did Our Love Go album. Having Cindy Gibson wrap her pipes around the beguiling “Whisper You Love Me, Boy,” recently out on Mary Wells’ Motown album My Guy without seeing light of day as a single, must have thus seemed a worthwhile gambit. Gibson does the Holland-Dozier-Holland copyright up right over a gliding groove illustrating the Dynodynamic braintrust’s affinity for approximating the Motown sound while adding their own signature touches.
If Cindy gigged much on the local club circuit, Bobby Eli wasn’t aware of it. “I only saw and heard her in the studio,” he says. “Just a one- or two-off singer.”
