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David Clayton-Thomas | |
|---|---|
 Clayton-Thomas performing at Gulfstream Park in Hallandale, Florida | |
| Background information | |
| Born | David Henry Thomsett (1941-09-13)13 September 1941 (age 84) Kingston upon Thames,Surrey, England |
| Genres | R&B, rock,funk, pop, jazz |
| Occupations | Singer, musician, songwriter, record producer |
| Instruments | Vocals, guitar |
| Years active | Early 1960s–present |
| Website | davidclaytonthomas |
David Clayton-Thomas (bornDavid Henry Thomsett, 13 September 1941) is a Canadian musician, singer, and songwriter, best known as the lead vocalist of the American bandBlood, Sweat & Tears.
Clayton-Thomas began his music career in the early 1960s, working the clubs onToronto's Yonge Street, where he discovered his love of singing and playing the blues. Before moving toNew York City in 1967, Clayton-Thomas fronted a couple of local bands, first The Shays and then The Bossmen, one of the earliest rock bands with significant jazz influences. His main success came only a few difficult years later when he joinedBlood, Sweat & Tears, with whom he won a Grammy award.
Clayton-Thomas has been inducted into theCanadian Music Hall of Fame and in 2007 his jazz/rock composition "Spinning Wheel" was enshrined in theCanadian Songwriter's Hall of Fame. In 2010, Clayton-Thomas received his star onCanada's Walk of Fame.
Clayton-Thomas was born inKingston upon Thames,Surrey, England, the son of Fred Thomsett, a decorated Canadian soldier ofWorld War II. Clayton-Thomas's mother, Freda May (née Smith), played the piano and met Thomsett when she came to entertain the troops at aLondon hospital. After the war, the family settled inWillowdale, Toronto. From the beginning, Clayton-Thomas and his father had a troubled relationship. By the time Clayton-Thomas was fourteen, he had left home and was sleeping in parked cars and abandoned buildings and stealing food and clothing to survive. He was arrested several times for vagrancy, petty theft, and street brawls and spent his teen years bouncing in and out of various jails and reformatories, including theBurwash Industrial Farm.[1]
He inherited a love for music from his mother, and when an old guitar came into his possession, left behind by an outgoing inmate, he began to teach himself to play. Upon his release from detention in 1962, he gravitated to theYonge Street "strip" in Toronto.Rhythm & blues migrating up fromDetroit andChicago was the music of choice on the strip, and Arkansasrockabilly pioneerRonnie Hawkins recognized the formidable talent of the young 'Sonny' Thomas and took him under his wing. It wasn't long before he was fronting his own bands. The first was called David Clayton Thomas and The Fabulous Shays. By this time, he had changed his surname to put some distance between his new life and his troubled teenage years.
In 1964, Clayton-Thomas and The Shays recorded a rendition ofJohn Lee Hooker's "Boom Boom". This led to a New York engagement for the Shays onNBC-TV'sHullabaloo at the invitation of its host, fellow CanadianPaul Anka. Abandoning the bars on the strip, Clayton-Thomas began performing inYorkville Village's coffeehouses. He immersed himself in the local jazz and blues scene dominated by the likes ofJohn Lee Hooker,Joe Williams,Sonny Terry,Brownie McGhee,Lenny Breau,Oscar Peterson, andMoe Koffman. The albumDavid Clayton Thomas and the Shays à Go-Go was recorded forRoman Records in 1965, and was followed byDavid Clayton Thomas Sings Like It Is! for the same label in 1966. Clayton-Thomas made his mark more forcibly with his next band, The Bossmen, one of the first rock bands anywhere to include jazz musicians. In 1966, he wrote and performed the R&B-driven anti-war song "Brainwashed", which became a major Canadian hit, peaking at No. 11 on the national RPM chart.
One night in 1966, after "sitting in" with blues singer John Lee Hooker in Yorkville, Clayton-Thomas left with him for New York. They played aGreenwich Village club for a couple of weeks; Hooker then left for Europe and Clayton-Thomas stayed on in New York City. He survived by playing "basket houses", where performers were given a few minutes of stage time and then passed the basket.
Folk singerJudy Collins heard Clayton-Thomas one night at a club uptown and told her friend, drummerBobby Colomby, about him. Bobby's band, Blood Sweat & Tears, had broken up four months after releasing its debut Columbia album,Child Is Father to the Man. Colomby was impressed with Clayton-Thomas's vocal talent and he invited him to join the band. They took the reformed group into theCafe Au Go-Go in the Village.
In his 1974 autobiography,Clive: Inside the Record Business,Clive Davis, then president ofColumbia Records, described his initial impression of Clayton-Thomas singing at the Café Au Go-Go:
He was staggering... a powerfully built singer who exuded an enormous earthy confidence. He jumped right out at you. I went with a small group of people, and we were electrified. He seemed so genuine, so in command of the lyric... a perfect combination of fire and emotion to go with the band’s somewhat cerebral appeal. I knew he would be a strong, strong figure.[citation needed]
Clayton-Thomas's first album with the band,Blood, Sweat & Tears (which was released in December 1968) – despite being self-titled, it was actually the band's second album – sold ten million copies worldwide. The record topped the Billboard album chart for seven weeks and charted for 109 weeks. It won fiveGrammy Awards, including Album of the Year and Best Performance by a Male Vocalist. It featured three hit singles, "You've Made Me So Very Happy", "Spinning Wheel", and "And When I Die" (on the Hot 100, each peaked at No. 2 and lasted 13 weeks) as well as a rendition ofBillie Holiday's "God Bless The Child".[2] (Seeking to capitalize on the newfound fame of the singer, in 1969Decca Records purchased the master tapes of the blues-oriented Roman Records material, dubbed in horns to make it sound more like Blood, Sweat & Tears, and released the albumDavid Clayton-Thomas![3])
With Clayton-Thomas fronting the band, Blood, Sweat & Tears continued with a string of hit albums, includingBlood, Sweat & Tears 3 which featuredCarole King's "Hi-De-Ho" and Clayton-Thomas's "Lucretia MacEvil", andBlood, Sweat & Tears 4, which yielded another Clayton-Thomas-penned hit single, "Go Down Gamblin'" and "Lisa Listen to Me".Blood Sweat & Tears' Greatest Hits album has to date reportedly chalked up over seven million copies in worldwide sales.[citation needed]
Blood, Sweat & Tears headlined at major venues around the world: theRoyal Albert Hall, theMetropolitan Opera House, theHollywood Bowl,Madison Square Garden, andCaesars Palace, as well as theNewport Jazz Festival andWoodstock. It was the first rock band to break through the Iron Curtain with its historicUnited States Department of State–sponsored tour of Eastern Europe in June–July 1970. A documentary about the tour was released in 2023 titledWhat the Hell Happened to Blood, Sweat & Tears? including interviews with Clayton-Thomas. The documentary's premise was the Iron Curtain tour caused the band to lose much of its counterculture fanbase now that the band was seen to be working directly with the government.[4]
In the early years Clayton-Thomas lived on the road, travelling all over Europe, Australia, Asia, South America, the US, and Canada with Blood, Sweat & Tears. The constant touring began to take its toll. Clayton-Thomas left the band in 1972, exhausted by life on the road.Variety later described Clayton-Thomas's decision to leave as ruining the band who "needed every bit of his sweat and swagger."[5] By the mid-1970s, the founding members began to drift away to start families and pursue their own musical ambitions.
In 1972, Thomas released his first Columbia solo album after Blood, Sweat & Tears, simply titledDavid Clayton Thomas. In 1973 the second solo albumTequila Sunrise was issued by Columbia. In 1974, he issued theHarmony Junction album on RCA. In 1975, Thomas returned to front Blood, Sweat & Tears again on the Columbia albumsNew City and, in 1976,More Than Ever. In 1977, they releasedBrand New Day on the ABC label. In 1978, Thomas issued another solo album on ABC, titled simplyClayton. In 1980, Blood, Sweat & Tears issued the MCA albumNuclear Blues, which also included Thomas. Later in the decade Columbia issued the double live Blood, Sweat & Tears albumLive And Improvised again with Thomas.[citation needed]
It was reported in the 30 May 1992 issue ofCash Box that Clayton-Thomas was one of the artists on theSedona Recording Company roster.[6]
In 2004, Clayton-Thomas left New York for Toronto and launched an All-Star 10-piece band. Since then, he has toured and recorded almost a dozen albums under his own name.[citation needed]
| Year | Album title | US Peak Position [7] | Record label |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1965 | David Clayton Thomas and the Shays à Go-Go | — | Roman |
| 1966 | David Clayton Thomas Sings Like It Is! | — | |
| 1969 | David Clayton-Thomas! | 159 | Decca |
| 1972 | David Clayton-Thomas | 184 | Columbia |
| Tequila Sunrise | — | ||
| 1973 | David Clayton-Thomas (Harmony Junction) | — | RCA |
| 1977 | Clayton | — | ABC Music |
| 1996 | Blue Plate Special | — | DCT |
| 1999 | Bloodlines | — | |
| 2001 | The Christmas Album | — | Fontana North / Maplecore |
| 2005 | Aurora | — | Justin Time |
| 2006 | In Concert: A Musical Biography | — | |
| 2008 | The Evergreens | — | Fontana North / Maplecore |
| 2009 | Spectrum | ||
| 2010 | Soul Ballads | — | Fuel |
| 2013 | A Blues for the New World | — | Antoinette |
| 2015 | Combo | — | Audio & Video Labs, Inc. |
| 2016 | Canadiana | — | Antoinette / Ils / Universal |
| 2018 | Mobius | — | Ils |
| 2019 | Say Somethin' | — | Antoinette |
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