Merry Clayton

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Merry Clayton

Merry Clayton (born December 25, 1948 in New Orleans , Louisiana ) is an African American R&B singer who celebrated her greatest successes in the 1970s and 1980s.

biography

Clayton became famous among other things for their vocal participation in the Rolling Stones song Gimme Shelter from the 1969 album Let It Bleed . The piece has received several awards as an outstanding composition. So who wrote Rolling Stone writer Greil Marcus about the song, "The Stones have never done something better," and in her article the "100 best Rolling Stones song" listed the magazine Gimme Shelter in the first place. Clayton also recorded the piece solo and named her debut album after it. With the following albums Merry Clayton (1971) and Keep Your Eye on the Sparrow (1975) she was able to place in the American LP charts. In 1980 she devoted herself to disco music for a short time on Emotion .

Her biggest single success and perhaps best-known solo recording is the pop song Yes from the soundtrack to the movie Dirty Dancing . In 1988 the title reached number 45 on the US charts. Between 1970 and 1988 she had a total of five singles in the charts of her home country.

Clayton has also been a very popular background singer since the late 1960s: she can be heard on albums by Neil Young , Joe Cocker , Linda Ronstadt , Carole King , Billy Preston and Ringo Starr , among others . Some of these artists reciprocated by working on Clayton's albums. The fact that Clayton was in great demand as a background singer, similar to her colleagues Darlene Love , Judith Hill or Lisa Fischer , but she never rose to become a big star, is the subject of the award-winning documentary 20 Feet from Stardom , which was released in 2013 came. The film won an Oscar in the category “ Best Documentary ” at the 2014 Academy Awards .

Every now and then, Clayton also tried his hand at acting. For example, she was seen as "Verna Dee Jordan" for several episodes in the series Cagney & Lacey from 1987-88 .

In June 2014, both legs had to be amputated from the knees after a serious car accident. She spent almost half a year in the hospital.

Discography

Studio albums

year title Top ranking, total weeks, awardChart placementsChart placements
(Year, title, rankings, weeks, awards, notes) 		Remarks
US US R&B R&B
1971 Merry Clayton US180 (11 weeks)
US 		R&B36 (9 weeks)
R&B
Ode
1975 Keep Your Eye on the Sparrow US146 (8 weeks)
US 		R&B50 (5 weeks)
R&B
Ode

More albums

  • 1970: Gimme Shelter (Ode)
  • 1980: Emotion (MCA)
  • 1994: Miracles (Chicago Gospel International)

Compilations

year title Top ranking, total weeks, awardChart placementsChart placements
(Year, title, rankings, weeks, awards, notes) 		Remarks
US US R&B R&B
2013 The Best of Merry Clayton - R&B61 (1 week)
R&B
Ode

Singles

year Title
album 		Top ranking, total weeks, awardChart placementsChart placements
(Year, title, album , rankings, weeks, awards, notes) 		Remarks
UK UK US US R&B R&B
1970 Gimme Shelter
Gimme Shelter 		- US73 (7 weeks)
US 		-
1972 After All This Time
Merry Clayton 		- US71 (7 weeks)
US 		R&B42 (5 weeks)
R&B
1973 Oh no not my baby
 - US72 (6 weeks)
US 		R&B30 (8 weeks)
R&B
1975 Keep Your Eye on the Sparrow
Keep Your Eye on the Sparrow 		- US45 (9 weeks)
US 		R&B42 (8 weeks)
R&B
1980 Emotion
emotion 		- - R&B53 (8 weeks)
R&B
1988 Yes
Dirty Dancing OST 		UK70 (1 week)
UK 		US45 (11 weeks)
US 		R&B79 (5 weeks)
R&B

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Let It Bleed Record Review , Rolling Stone, accessed March 26, 2014
  2. ↑ 100 Greatest Rolling Stone Songs , Rolling Stone, accessed March 26, 2014
  3. ↑ Joe Coscarelli: Keith Richards Honors Merry Clayton After Car Crash . In: The New York Times . October 20, 2015, ISSN  0362-4331 ( nytimes.com [accessed February 8, 2020]).
  4. ↑ a b c Chart sources: UK US
personal data
SURNAME Clayton, Merry
BRIEF DESCRIPTION American R&B singer
DATE OF BIRTH December 25, 1948
PLACE OF BIRTH New Orleans , Louisiana