Marcia Barrett
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
| Marcia Barrett | |
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| Background information | |
| Birth name | Marcia Barrett |
| Born | October 14, 1948 |
| Origin | St Catherine, Jamaica |
| Genre(s) | Dance-pop, Dance, Soul |
| Occupation(s) | Singer |
| Instrument(s) | Vocals |
| Years active | 1970 - present |
| Label(s) | Hansa Records, Sony-BMG, BSC Music |
| Associated acts | Boney M. |
Marcia Barrett (born 14 October 1948, St Catherine, Jamaica), was one of the original vocalists with the prominent pop vocal group, Boney M.
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[edit] The early years
She was brought up in England and like many other aspiring artists, she moved to Germany in the late 60s where the creative environment was blossoming at the time. She joined a band and soon after found herself touring with people like Karel Gott and Rex Gildo, gaining stage routine and performing experience. In 1971, she was signed to Metronome and released her record debut "Could Be Love", a song penned for her by Drafi Deutscher. It sold very poorly and is today a highly sought collector's item among Boney M. fans. Nevertheless, she kept touring with a selection of songs like "Son of a Preacher Man", "Oh Happy Day", "Big Spender" and another Deutscher-composition "Londonderry", later to become a big hit for Boney M. as "Belfast".
[edit] The Boney M. years
In 1975, she was asked to join the group Boney M. which by then was merely a group of models and dancers to do discotheque and TV performances of a song recorded by producer Frank Farian, called "Baby Do You Wanna Bump". Always wanting to be a solo singer, she only reluctantly joined. The single was slowly starting to take off in the Benelux countries. When singer Claudja Barry left the formation early 1976, Marcia suggested a fellow Jamaican she'd met, Liz Mitchell, as her replacement. Liz Mitchell also happened to be a singer - and so Frank Farian decided to try Liz and Marcia for a follow-up recording to "Baby Do You Wanna Bump". The resulting recording was "Daddy Cool" and Boney M.'s first album Take the Heat Off Me, 1976. After a performance in the German TV show Musikladen in September, the group was suddenly on top of the charts all over Europe, and a series of hit singles and albums followed over the next decade.
[edit] Marcia Barrett as a singer in Boney M.
Although Boney M. counted four members, only Liz Mitchell and Marcia Barrett were in the studio when Boney M.'s records were recorded. Producer Frank Farian (and from 1982-85 also new male member Reggie Tsiboe) provided the male vocals. While Liz Mitchell is generally considered the lead singer of Boney M. due to an overall larger number of lead vocals, Marcia Barrett sang on all of the group's hits and also shared the lead vocals with Mitchell on such hits as "Ma Baker", "Rasputin" and "Gotta Go Home". She was also featured as a lead singer on a couple of tracks on each of the group's studio albums up to Christmas Album (1981) including the title track of the first album Take the Heat Off Me and "Lovin' or Leavin'" (both previously recorded in German by Gilla). These tracks were also released as a Marcia Barrett solo single in 1977. From the second album Love for Sale, Marcia's song "Belfast" from her solo years became the second single off the album and a German #1 and a European Top 10 hit. On that album, she also performed "Silent Lover" which was later covered by American disco group El Coco.
On Nightflight to Venus, Marcia sings a cover of "King of the Road" and the original "Never Change Lovers in the Middle of the Night" which became a standard during the group's live performances over the years. The latter was also covered by American singer Millie Jackson and became an R&B hit. While also singing the acapella intros of Boney M.'s enormeous Christmas hit 1978, "Mary's Boy Child/Oh My Lord", and "Ribbons of Blue", she was the lead singer of "No Time to Lose" on the group's 1979 album Oceans of Fantasy and also had a solo part on the opening track "Let It All Be Music".
After an unsuccessful solo single "You" late 1980, produced by John Edmed and Kelvin James, she put her solo project on hold. Farian took one of the songs penned for her, "Breakaway", and used it on Boney M.'s next album Boonoonoonoos - with his own vocals on the verses. Marcia, however, became the lead singer of single "We Kill the World (Don't Kill the World)" in 1981. Although only a modest hit in the UK (#39), it topped the charts in Spain and South-Africa and is often considered the final big hit single of the group whose popularity cooled off considerably from 1982 onwards when dancer Bobby Farrell was fired and replaced by Reggie Tsiboe.
During the recording sessions of 1982-83, Marcia felt more and more overlooked by Farian as she was offered no new lead vocals. In 1983, her future husband Marcus James got her introduced to Eddy Grant who produced several demos with her for CBS. The recordings never saw the light of day since Farian came across and reminded her she was still contractually committed to Boney M. On their seventh album Ten Thousand Lightyears, apart from a short solo part on "Wild Planet", she is only occasionally heard on backing vocals. On their final album Eye Dance, she can barely be heard on other tracks than "Got Cha Loco", and on the group's reunion remix album, Greatest Hits of All Times - Remix '88, her vocals were toned down on most tracks.
After the departure of Liz Mitchell during the group's 1989 tour, singer Madeleine Davis joined the group. When Farian announced he wouldn't be making any new recordings, the group went to France to record the single "Everybody Wants to Dance Like Josephine Baker" with producer Barry Blue. Marcia did all lead- and backing vocals on the A-side, but the single was withdrawn by Farian who was furious with the group using the name Boney M. It led to a sour court case in 1990 after which the group members went their separate ways.
[edit] Life after Boney M.
"Life after Boney M. - my dear, I've been through hell and back," Marcia said in a radio interview, November 2001. After the group split up 1990, Marcia began recording some rock tracks in Munich when it was discovered that she was struck by cancer in her ovaries. During the next years, she suffered a second attack and was unable to work. Finally by 1997, she was back on feet again and began working with producer Scott Christina on a series of dance tracks. Getting a new record deal for the product didn't prove so easy, but the resulting album, appropriately entitled Survival finally appeared in November 1999. Two new tracks, a solo recording of Boney M.'s #1 hit Rivers of Babylon and a new track called "Seasons" were premiered on a Dutch radio show but neither was eventually released. In 2003, a benefit EP No War! Peace and Love was released as a protest against the US military invention in Iraq and generated $295 to the War Child charity organization.
[edit] Marcia Barrett today
The singer released her second album Come Into My Life in 2005 which saw her move into rock territory with a cover of Hey Joe (the single), a new version of "Belfast" as well as several original recordings co-penned by herself and her husband Marcus, and a cover of Fleetwood Mac's instrumental "Albatross" for which Marcia had been allowed to add her own lyrics by its composer Peter Green. She is currently touring with her own Boney M. line-up but reunited with her former colleagues Liz Mitchell and Frank Farian at the London and Berlin premieres of the Daddy Cool musical, based on Boney M.'s hit catalogue, although she wasn't given the dignity of an invitation to sing on the new recording "A Moment of Love", added to the group's most recent compilation The Magic of Boney M..
In October 2007, Marcia Barrett turned down an offer to record a new song for the album Disco 2008, a various artist project by UK hit producer Ian Levine. On October 13th, the singer and her Boney M. line-up made headlines when they were invited by president Mikhail Saakashvili to perform in South Ossetia in Georgia. "We hope that we'll lure out people from their trenches, force them to drop [their] Kalashnikovs, come here and dance with the others and understand that nothing is as nice as peace, nothing is as nice as reconciliation," Mr Saakashvili said.
