‘Love Is Wonderful’: The only northern soul anthem that was actually recorded in England
If you were to ask your average American, the chances are that they would have never heard of places like Wigan, Stoke, or even Blackpool. Yet, when the northern soul scene took hold of those northern towns and cities, the sounds of American soul were never too far away.
Soul was, after all, a quintessentially American soundscape, taking its inspiration from the age-old gospel and R&B sounds that black America had been perfecting for decades. What’s more, it was the industrial surroundings of American cities like Detroit, Chicago, and Philadelphia that gave those old soul records, which English DJs coveted, their optimistic, uptempo spirit. Northern soul might have been a pretty niche scene in England, but its soundtrack was irrefutably American in every sense of the word.
A core part of the scene’s appeal, in fact, was how elusive and exotic those artist names were. The likes of Edwin Starr, Sandi Sheldon, and Tobi Legend evoked a sense of escapism that a lot of soulies growing up in the perpetual greyness of industrial England clung on to. A record like Lou Pride’s ‘I’m Com’un Home In The Morn’un’ simply wouldn’t have had the same appeal if the home that the performer was singing about was in Wakefield rather than Chicago, Illinois.
Nevertheless, there were one or two British-born artists who inexplicably found themselves adored by the northern soul scene. After all, by the mid-point of the 1960s, British artists like Dusty Springfield had begun adopting the sonic style of American soul, even if the hugely successful recordings of the peroxide blonde, blue-eyed soul master could never truly be considered northern soul – no matter how quickly ‘Live It Up’ fills a dancefloor.
Arguably, then, the only true northern soul track to arise from this sceptred isle is the admittedly slushy ‘Love Is Wonderful’ by Paula Parfitt, released back in 1969. Although Parfitt was born in London, you perhaps wouldn’t guess that from her voice, which was clearly trained on the female soul stars emerging from the other side of the Atlantic Ocean.
‘Love Is Wonderful’ was the B-side of a 20-year-old Parfitt’s debut single, released via Milton Samuel’s Beacon Records, but neither the song nor its A-side reached the heights of pop stardom that Parfitt might have been aiming for. Nor, in fact, did her UpFront-released follow-up ‘Peace Of Mind’ the following year. As such, the budding young vocalist largely abandoned the music industry during the 1970s.
During the same time that she abandoned her dreams of musical stardom, though, a new generation of northern soul obsessives rediscovered ‘Love Is Wonderful’, and it soon became an iconic track of the northern soul scene.
It is probable, in fact, that when those original soul DJs discovered the Beacon obscurity, they would have assumed that Parfitt was an American artist, given the soulful nature of her voice and the completely unknown nature of her name. Even the fact that it was released on a British label was no guarantee, given that PP Arnold released her greatest works via London’s Immediate Records.
Perhaps ‘Love Is Wonderful’ would have been a hit had Beacon promoted it as the A-side over the clearly inferior ‘I’m Gonna Give You Back Your Ring’. Ultimately, we will never know. Had it been a hit, though, the chances of it taking root in the northern soul scene, where it has filled dancefloors for upwards of five decades at this point, would have been greatly diminished.
