Carol Douglas (born April 7, 1948)
is an American singer whose hit "
Doctor's Orders" (1974) was a pioneering track in the
disco
Disco is a music genre, genre of dance music and a subculture that emerged in the late 1960s from the United States' urban nightclub, nightlife, particularly in African Americans, African-American, Italian-Americans, Italian-American, LGBTQ ...
genre.
Early life and acting career
Carol Douglas was born in
Bedford–Stuyvesant, Brooklyn,
New York City
New York, often called New York City (NYC), is the most populous city in the United States, located at the southern tip of New York State on one of the world's largest natural harbors. The city comprises five boroughs, each coextensive w ...
, United States.
She is the daughter of Minnie Newsome, a jazz performer who has been cited as the inspiration for the
Cab Calloway
Cabell "Cab" Calloway III (December 25, 1907 – November 18, 1994) was an American jazz singer and bandleader. He was a regular performer at the Cotton Club in Harlem, where he became a popular vocalist of the Swing music, swing era. His niche ...
classic "
Minnie the Moocher"; her father was a mortician.
Sam Cooke
Samuel Cooke (; January 22, 1931 – December 11, 1964) was an American singer and songwriter. Considered one of the most influential soul music, soul artists of all time, Cooke is commonly referred to as the "King of Soul" for his distin ...
was her cousin. At 10, Douglas was a contestant and winner on the game show ''
Name That Tune'' and says "''
Ebony'' followed my career for the next three years."
She attended the Willard May School for professional children and afterwards the Quintanos High School for young professionals alongside
Gregory Hines,
Bernadette Peters,
Carol Lynley, and
Patty Duke. While in high school Douglas sang in a female trio named April May & June, who were signed as a management client by
Little Anthony and the Imperials. She made a one-off recording in 1965 for
RCA Victor, cutting the single "I Don't Mind (Being Your Fool)" under the name Carolyn Cooke: becoming pregnant with her first son at age 15 ended RCA's interest in promoting her.
Douglas also cut several jingles for TV commercials – "
used to do voiceovers for
Ideal Toys and
General Mills
General Mills, Inc. is an American multinational corporation, multinational manufacturer and marketer of branded ultra-processed consumer foods sold through retail stores. Founded on the banks of the Mississippi River at Saint Anthony Falls in ...
with Bernadette Peters" – but recalls: "I never thought I would be a singer," and for most of the 1960s Douglas pursued an acting career, appearing in an episode of ''
The Patty Duke Show'' but mostly acting in theatrical productions beginning with ''One Tuesday Morning'' starring
Clarice Taylor. Later Douglas understudied Jonelle Allen in the
off-Broadway
An off-Broadway theatre is any professional theatre venue in New York City with a seating capacity between 100 and 499, inclusive. These theatres are smaller than Broadway theatres, but larger than off-off-Broadway theatres, which seat fewer tha ...
production of ''The Life of Mary McLeod Bethune'' and co-starred with
James Earl Jones and
Cicely Tyson in the play ''
Moon on a Rainbow Shawl''.
She married "high school sweetheart" Ken Douglas in the mid-1960s and resumed her musical career in the early 1970s, touring nationally on the oldies circuit in a line-up of
the Chantels,
featuring original frontwoman Arlene Smith: with these Chantels, Douglas cut the single "Some Tears Fall Dry" for Capitol.
Music career
In 1974, Douglas was recruited by
Midland International Records via an ad in ''Showbiz'' magazine: label vice president/record producer Eddie O'Loughlin had heard the UK hit single "Doctor's Orders" by
Sunny and was seeking a female vocalist to cut the track for the U.S. market. Douglas's audition led to a five-year contract and her version of "Doctor's Orders" became a hit, reaching No. 2 on ''
the Billboard''
disco chart, No. 9 R&B, and No. 11 on the
Hot 100;
the single also reached No. 4 in
France
France, officially the French Republic, is a country located primarily in Western Europe. Overseas France, Its overseas regions and territories include French Guiana in South America, Saint Pierre and Miquelon in the Atlantic Ocean#North Atlan ...
.
Although O'Loughlin was credited as "Doctor's Orders" producer, the production had been by
Meco Monardo, who was also responsible for
Gloria Gaynor's "Never Can Say Goodbye" which had ascended the pop chart at around the same time as "Doctor's Orders"; claims have been made for each single to be the hit that broke disco into the top 40. She made her album debut in 1975 with ''The Carol Douglas Album'', followed in 1976 by ''Midnight Love Affair'' and in 1977 by ''Full Bloom''. Monardo's special expertise was missing in the production of her post-"Doctor's Orders" tracks which maintained her as a popular club presence with negligible mainstream popularity; the follow-up single to "Doctor's Orders", "A Hurricane Is Coming Tonite", became her only other Hot 100 entry,
peaking at No. 81 in April 1975. Douglas hit No. 1 on the disco chart with "
Midnight Love Affair"; the song did appear on the top 100 chart in ''
Cash Box
''Cashbox'', also known as ''Cash Box'', is an American music industry trade magazine, originally published weekly from July 1942 to November 1996. Ten years after its dissolution, it was revived and continues as ''Cashbox Magazine'', an online ...
'' magazine, but only via a cover by
Tony Orlando and Dawn, which reached No. 94. (In France, Douglas's version reached No. 82.)
Douglas's other recordings included "Headline News", written by "Doctor's Orders" co-writer
Roger Greenaway and remade by the latter track's originator Sunny – and in the tradition of "Doctor's Orders" Douglas cut discofied covers of several songs which were current or recent hits in the UK including
ABBA
ABBA ( ) were a Swedish pop group formed in Stockholm in 1972 by Agnetha Fältskog, Björn Ulvaeus, Benny Andersson, and Anni-Frid Lyngstad. They are one of the most popular and successful musical groups of all time, and are one of the List ...
's "
Dancing Queen", "I Wanna Stay with You" by
Gallagher and Lyle, and "So You Win Again" by
Hot Chocolate
Hot Chocolate are a British soul band formed by Errol Brown and Tony Wilson. The group had at least one hit song every year on the UK Singles Chart from 1970 to 1984.
Their hits include " You Sexy Thing", a UK number two which also made ...
. In 1977 she recorded the single "You Make Me Feel the Music" for the soundtrack to the film ''Haunted''.
"So You Win Again" was arranged by
Michael Zager whose presence on her 1978 album release ''Burnin' '' resulted in a critical (if not commercial) upswing. ''Burnin' '' also featured Douglas's version of the
Bee Gees
The Bee Gees
were a musical group formed in 1958 by brothers Barry Gibb, Barry, Robin Gibb, Robin, and Maurice Gibb. The trio was especially successful in popular music in the late 1960s and early 1970s, and later as prominent performers in ...
' "Night Fever" – not a Zager arrangement – which became Douglas's only entry in the
UK Singles Chart at #66.
Douglas's 1979 album ''Come into My Life'' was an obvious bid to recharge her club popularity; it was only six tracks long with production by Greg Carmichael who had enjoyed several disco hits with studio groups, but the single "I Got the Answer" was a mild club success. Although she did not appear in the disco-themed movie
Saturday Night Fever, she was enough of a disco star that her name appears on the marquee of the disco featured in the movie.
(A snippet of "Midnight Love Affair" can be heard playing when Tony Manero, played by
John Travolta
John Joseph Travolta (born February 18, 1954) is an American actor. He began acting in television before transitioning into a leading man in films. List of awards and nominations received by John Travolta, His accolades include a Primetime Em ...
and his friends are at the club).
In 1981, her cover of
the Three Degrees' "My Simple Heart" was released on 20th Century Records as by then the Midland International (aka Midsong) was defunct. "My Simple Heart" was also her debut on
Carrere Records based in Paris where she lived for a time: in the early 1980s Carrère handled her European releases while in the US she was signed to O'Loughlin's Next Plateau label. Her last album to date 'I Got Your Body', renamed 'Love Zone' in the US and Canada, was released in 1983 and included her last four 12" singles from 1981 to 1983: "My Simple Heart", "You're Not So Hot", "I Got Your Body", and "Got Ya Where I Want Ya"; "You're Not So Hot" reached #71 in France (1982).
Career resurgence
The retro-boom of the 1990s put Douglas back on the road touring and making personal appearances at a number of special events including the ''Martin Luther King Concert Series'', ''Beatstock '97'', ''Saturday Night Fever 20th Anniversary Reunion'', and the
Dance Music Hall of Fame ceremony. In 2003, she returned to the recording studio when she was invited to sing backing vocals on
Wanda Dee's ''Goddess Is Here!'' CD. During this period, she also re-recorded a number of her hits.
Douglas is not to be confused with (and is not related to)
Carl Douglas, a fellow pop
one-hit wonder
A one-hit wonder is any entity that achieves mainstream popularity, often for only one piece of work, and becomes known among the general public solely for that momentary success. The term is most commonly used in regard to music performers with ...
whose famous No. 1 single, "
Kung Fu Fighting", was in the ''Billboard'' Hot 100 at about the same time as "Doctor's Orders".
''The People's Court''
Douglas made an appearance on ''
The People's Court
''The People's Court'' is an American Court show#Arbitration-based reality court show, arbitration-based reality court show, featuring an arbitrator handling small claims court, small claims disputes in a simulation, simulated courtroom set. W ...
'' (with Judge
Marilyn Milian) in 2003 as the plaintiff in a case involving herself and fellow disco diva
Sharon Brown. After the ruling, Brown stated that Douglas's decision to take her to court was a publicity stunt, to get some free TV air time. In addition to awarding Douglas some (not all) of the money she was requesting, Milian had Douglas sing a brief snippet of "Doctor's Orders", as well as having Brown sing a snippet of her 1982 song "
I Specialize in Love
"I Specialize in Love" is a song written by Lotti Golden and Richard Scher. Mixing engineer, Mixed by Tee Scott, the song was a club hit in the early 1980s when recorded by American singer Sharon Brown (singer), Sharon Brown, the niece of songwrite ...
".
Discography
Studio albums
Compilation albums
*''The Best of Carol Douglas'' (1980,
Midsong Int'l)
*''Satin and Smoke: The Best of Carol Douglas'' (1981, Stack-O-Hits)
*''Greatest Hits'' (1989,
Unidisc)
*''Doctor's Orders: The Best of Carol Douglas'' (1995, Hot Productions)
*''Disco Queen - Carol Douglas: Greatest Hits'' (1999, Classic World Productions)
*''Hits Anthology'' (2011, Essential Media Group)
Singles
See also
*
List of Billboard number-one dance club songs
*
List of artists who reached number one on the U.S. Dance Club Songs chart
References
External links
*
{{DEFAULTSORT:Douglas, Carol
1948 births
Living people
American dance musicians
American disco musicians
American rhythm and blues musicians
Singers from Brooklyn
Musicians from Brooklyn
People from Bedford–Stuyvesant, Brooklyn
20th-century African-American women singers
20th-century American women singers
20th-century American singers
African-American actresses
Actresses from Brooklyn
21st-century African-American musicians
21st-century African-American women singers