Tuesday, 26 October 2021

Tony DeWayne [2021] - Midnight Soul [DGRP Bay Sound Records] (Full Album)


A superb jazz flavoured album "Midnight Soul" by Tony DeWayne. The publishing date states 2016 but it was released digitally on 4 Jul 2021.

It's a bit of a mystery as from the sleeve photo I would guess his attire is from the 90s. There is an entry on Discogs for a Tony DeWayne aka Anthony Crosley / Diamond Crosley. He is credited as one of the musicians on Paul Tillman Smith's "A Beautiful Heart" album from 2017 but there are also credits for writing "Lovestruck 1980" on Con Funk Shun's "Spirit Of Love" album in 1980.

I also found the full album posted on YouTube by Ben Kova on 20 Jan 2020 who posted this:
"I found several hundred brand new/sealed CD's of this entire record from a storage unit in Vallejo, CA that I won from a storage unit auction website.  The unit was clearly Tony's (Dewayne Anthony Lee Johnson) as it had many of his personal items, awards/accolades, musical equipment, letters, photos, etc. The findings were very neat along with this great music he made.  I decided to upload this entire record for the rest of the world to enjoy. This album is called Midnight Soul from Mo Soul Records, not sure what year this record was produced and/or released. I imagine this was made in the early 90's.  If you happen to know any information about this record, or of Tony himself, feel free to reach out.

I have his birth certificate as well from the Vallejo, CA General Hospital that reads his birth given is Dewayne Anthony Lee Johnson and he was born to De Lois Harvey on January 20, 1972.!"

I had a little dig around BMI and it appears he used different writing aliases as "Lovestruck 1980" is credited to T. Crossley and Michael Cooper. There are three songs credited to Anthony Dewayne Crossley, two of them also written with Con Funk Shun's Michael Cooper who was also born in Vallejo, CA, (Bay Area) so I assume they must have been friends and therefore also not surprising that he has been involved with Paul Tillman Smith.

Wow .. I just discovered this .. surely it can't be a 'coincidence', same name, same age, same location? He won a $289 million dollar lawsuit against Monsanto Co.(manufacturers of Roundup) in 2018 after  being diagnosed as terminally ill with non-Hodgkin lymphoma blamed on the use of chemical herbicides. There is also another report by The Guardian. The award has been appealed three times and has been reduced. There is plenty of other information about the case on the net.

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Details
Rating: 8.6
Genre/Style: Soul Jazz
Format: Album
Media: Digital
Label: DGRP Bay Sound Records
Cat No: None
Date: 04/07/2021
Value: £7.99

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