PAUL DAVISPaul Davis, who died on 22 April, 2008, a day after turning 60, was an American pop singer best known for his top ten hits I Go Crazy (1977) and '65 Love Affair (1981).
He recorded seven LPs during a 12-year solo career but he had also been a member of a '60s soul group and later a writer and producer for several record companies.
His work straddled several genre boundaries, primarily country and soul, but he was most successful on the easy listening market with a string of successful singles.
Paul Lavon Davis was born on 21 April, 1948, in Meridian, Mississippi. He discovered rock 'n' roll at an early age, an experience he later described as "magical and inspirational … the songs were simple. They weren't real complicated. All of them didn't deal in real heavy thoughts either. It was just fun back then and much simpler, easier to understand."
By 1966, still in his teens, he was a member of the local group, the Six Soul Survivors with whom he wrote and then released the single I Gotta Find A Way / It's Over My Head. The Six Soul Survivors became Endless Chain then The Livin' End and released an EP of instrumentals later that year.
In 1968 he was hired as a songwriter to the Malaco soul label based in Jackson, Mississippi andthen Bang records signed him as a performer with his first single, Mississippi River, coming out in 1969.
His 1971 single A Little Bit of Soap marked his first appearance on the Billboard top 100 and he charted consistently with releases from his first four albums, A Little Bit of Paul Davis (1970), Paul Davis (1972), Ride 'Em Cowboy (1974) and Southern Tracks & Fantasies (1976). The country singer Juice Newton would later have a hit with a cover of the single Ride 'Em Cowboy.
Sentimental soul ballad I Go Crazy, taken from the album Singer of Songs - Teller of Tales, provided his biggest hit to date, charting at number seven and spending a record-breaking 40 weeks in the top 100. The B-side was Davis' first foray into the world of reggae.
Over the following years he reached the top twenty with Sweet Life (1978) and Cool Night (1981). Uptempo rocker '65 Love Affair (originally called '55 Love Affair but updated to appeal to a generation beginning to reminisce about their childhood) saw him reach number six on the pop charts, his highest position to date, but proved to be his last hit.
Mr Davis was a modest man who preferred being back at home in Meridian to touring. He also found the song writing process laborious and time-consuming. This led to him going into semi-retirement shortly after the release of Love or Let Me Be Lonely (1982).
For the remainder of his career he wrote occasional songs for the artists of Arista Records and produced records for the likes of Nigel Olsson. He also scored two number one singles on the US country charts in 1987, singing with Marie Osmond on You're Still New To Me and Tanya Tucker and Paul Overstreet on I Won't Take Less Than Your Love.
He spent his entire life living in Meridian where he died at Rush Foundation Hospital after a heart attack on his birthday. A few weeks earlier he had returned to the studio to record two new songs, You Ain't Sweet Enough and Today.
His friend and former local DJ Art Matthews said: "He was very much a homebody. A nocturnal person who enjoyed people and his music … Paul lived his life to the fullest each and every day."
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