Curtom Records was a record label founded by

Curtis Mayfield Curtis Lee Mayfield (June 3, 1942 – December 26, 1999) was an American singer-songwriter, guitarist, and record producer. Dubbed the " Gentle Genius", he is considered one of the most influential musicians of soul and socially conscious Afric ...

and Eddie Thomas in March 1968 as an independently distributed music label. It was located at 8541 South Stony Island Boulevard. The name of the label came from a hybrid of the names "Curtis" and "Thomas". Prior to Curtom, Mayfield had started two other labels: Windy C and Mayfield which both had closed down. The company's motto was "We're a Winner", taken from one the hit songs from Mayfield's group

The Impressions The Impressions were an American music group originally formed in 1958. Their repertoire includes gospel, R&B, doo-wop, and soul. The group was founded as the Roosters by Chattanooga, Tennessee natives Sam Gooden, Richard Brooks and Arthu ...

released by

ABC Records ABC Records was an American record label founded in New York City in 1955. It originated as the main popular music label operated by the Am-Par Record Corporation. Am-Par also created the Impulse! jazz label in 1960. It acquired many labels bef ...

. At the inception, Mayfield was the company principal producer and A&R person. Other staff included

Johnny Pate John William Pate (born December 5, 1923) is an American former musician, a jazz bassist who became a producer, arranger, and leading figure in Chicago soul, pop, and rhythm and blues. He learned piano and tuba as a child and later picked up th ...

and

Donny Hathaway Donny Edward Hathaway (October 1, 1945 – January 13, 1979) was an American soul singer, keyboardist, songwriter, backing vocalist, and arranger who ''Rolling Stone'' described as a "soul legend". His most popular songs include " The Ghetto" ...

. Pate left in 1972. Most of the artists on Curtom did not write their own music, which lead to the studio producers such as

LeRoy Hutson Leroy Hutson (born June 4, 1945) is an American soul and R&B singer, songwriter, arranger, producer and instrumentalist, best known as former lead singer of R&B vocal group The Impressions. His music concerns 1970s soul, as noted in the June ...

, Lowrell Simon, Ed Townsend,

Gil Askey Gilbert Askey (March 9, 1925 – April 9, 2014) was an American jazz trumpeter, composer, producer and musical director who was born in Austin, Texas, and emigrated to Australia in 1988. Early and personal life Askey was born in Austin, Texas, ...

and Marvin Yanch and Chuck Jackson to produce and write music. The first release on Curtom was '' This Is My Country'' released in 1968. Mayfield was not involved on the business aspects of the label, and instead had manager Marv Stuart focus on those things. Stuart took over direction of the company from Eddie Thomas in 1970, and formally took charge in May 1971. Mayfield said he taught the music business to Stuart and that Stuart "through his own know-how and his own go-getting-ness, he learned. He was able to find weak spots in Curtom and he turned them around." In June 1968, distribution of the label was assumed by the New York-based label

Buddah Records Buddah Records (later known as Buddha Records) was an American record label founded in 1967 in New York City. The label was born out of Kama Sutra Records, an MGM Records-distributed label, which remained a key imprint following Buddah's foundin ...

. Curtom grew enough to take over RCA Studio in 1973. In 1975, Curtom moved to

Warner Brothers Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc. (WBEI), commonly known as Warner Bros. (WB), is an American filmed entertainment studio headquartered at the Warner Bros. Studios complex in Burbank, California and the main namesake subsidiary of Warner Bro ...

for distribution. By 1976, company had gross sales ranging between nine and 10 million dollars. Robert Pruter, author of the book ''Chicago Soul'' stated that two factors led to the demise of Curtom in the late 1970s: the rise of

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 ...

and the collapse of the black film market. In 1976, the company felt prosperous enough to invest in the film '' Short Eyes''. Pruter noted that by the late 70s the label was "mostly releasing second-rate disco" and that the soundtrack to ''Short Eyes'' did poorly following the collapse of the black movies losing their audience. Curtom switched from Warner Brothers to RSO for distribution by 1979, ad this time, the company was more of a logo and dropped most of its more famous acts. In 1980, Curtom was disbanded. At this point, the only artists attached to the label were

Linda Clifford Linda Clifford (born June 14, 1948) is an American Contemporary R&B, R&B, disco and house music singer who scored hits from the 1970s to the 1980s, most notably "If My Friends Could See Me Now", "Bridge over Troubled Water (song), Bridge over ...

, Mayfield and Today, Tomorrow, Forever.

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{{Authority control Curtis Mayfield American record labels Record labels established in 1968 Record labels disestablished in 1980 Soul music record labels Rhythm and blues record labels 1968 establishments in the United States Record labels based in Illinois

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