T-Neck Records
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T-Neck Records was a record label founded by The Isley Brothers in 1964. It's notable for having the Isleys (O'Kelly, Rudolph and Ronald) becoming the first R&B band to form a record label, a rarity in black music. During the label's early years, the Isleys issued the records "Testify" and "Move Over And Let Me Dance", which showcased a young Jimi Hendrix on guitar. After those songs failed to chart, the Isleys ended up temporarily folding the label to sign with Motown Records. After that brief tenure, the Isleys reactivated the label in 1968 and kept churning albums and singles under the name well into the early-1980s finding success in the process. The label was allowed to be distributed first by Buddah Records between 1969 and 1972 and then by Epic Records between 1973 and 1983. Named after the Isleys' Teaneck, New Jersey home base, the label was mostly a showcase for their later work as a top-selling group of the 1970s and 1980s. Outside acts signed to the label included Judy White, Baby Cortez, Privilege, the Five Stairsteps, the Sweet Cherries, the Young Tempts (which featured future Temptations member Damon Harris as the group's lead singer) and Bloodstone, whose 1982 soul ballad, "We Go a Long Way Back", was produced by the Isleys. The label folded after 1983's Between The Sheets but continue to show up on the back covers of later Isley Brothers records such as 1996's Mission to Please and 2003's Body Kiss. T-Neck's back catalog (pre-1983), in the meanwhile, are currently controlled by SonyBMG via Epic Records/Legacy Recordings. The name comes from Teaneck, New Jersey, where Rudy Isley lived in the late 1960's.
