Ric-Tic Records was a

record label "Big Three" music labels A record label or record company is a brand or trademark of Sound recording and reproduction, music recordings and music videos, or the company that owns it. Sometimes, a record label is also a Music publisher, ...

set up in the 1960s in

Detroit Detroit ( , ) is the List of municipalities in Michigan, most populous city in the U.S. state of Michigan. It is situated on the bank of the Detroit River across from Windsor, Ontario. It had a population of 639,111 at the 2020 United State ...

Michigan Michigan ( ) is a peninsular U.S. state, state in the Great Lakes region, Great Lakes region of the Upper Midwest, Upper Midwestern United States. It shares water and land boundaries with Minnesota to the northwest, Wisconsin to the west, ...

, United States by Joanne Bratton and Eddie Wingate. Twinned with the Golden World label, Ric-Tic featured many

soul music Soul music is a popular music genre that originated in African-American culture, African-American African-American neighborhood, communities throughout the United States in the late 1950s and early 1960s. Catchy rhythms, stressed by handclaps ...

artists and was seen as an early competitor for fellow Detroit label

Motown Motown is an American record label owned by the Universal Music Group. Founded by Berry Gordy, Berry Gordy Jr. as Tamla Records on January 12, 1959, it was incorporated as Motown Record Corporation on April 14, 1960. Its name, a portmanteau ...

. Motown's owner,

Berry Gordy Berry Gordy III (born November 28, 1929), also known as Berry Gordy Jr., is an American retired record executive, record producer, songwriter, film producer and television producer. He is best known as the founder of the Motown record label and i ...

was unhappy with the success of Ric-Tic and in 1968 paid $1 million for the signature of many of the label's artists. In 2003, it was established that Ric-Tic was named for the deceased son of co-founder Bratton and her then husband, boxer Johnny Bratton. The boy, named Derek and known to his family as Ricky, Ric, or Ric-Tic, died at the age of 11 in 1962.Motown Encyclopedia: Golden World Records
by Graham Betts

Recording artists

Many early recordings on the Ric-Tic label by artists such as

Freddie Gorman Freddie Gorman (born Frederick Cortez Gorman, April 11, 1939 – June 13, 2006) was an American musician and record producer, most famous as a singer, songwriter for the Motown Records, Motown label in the late 1960s and mid 1970s. He was a n ...

Edwin Starr Charles Edwin Hatcher (January 21, 1942 – April 2, 2003), known by his stage name Edwin Starr, was an American singer and songwriter. He is best remembered for his Norman Whitfield-produced Motown singles of the 1970s, most notably the num ...

, and J. J. Barnes were re-released in the 1970s by Motown to coincide with the popularity of the

Northern soul Northern soul is a music and dance movement that emerged in Northern England and the Midlands in the early 1970s. It developed from the British Mod (subculture), mod scene, based on a particular style of African American music, Black American ...

music scene in the UK. The group

The Fantastic Four The Fantastic Four, often abbreviated as FF, is a superhero team appearing in American comic books published by Marvel Comics. The team debuted in '' The Fantastic Four'' #1 (cover-dated November 1961), helping usher in a new level of realism in ...

were also signed to the Ric-Tic, and became the label's best-selling act, outselling Edwin Starr in the United States. Much like Starr, they continued to record under Motown when Ric-Tic was absorbed by the record company.

The Detroit Emeralds The Detroit Emeralds are an American Rhythm and blues, R&B/soul vocal group, best known in the early 1970s. They enjoyed a run of successful records in the decade including their 1973 transatlantic hit single, "Feel the Need in Me". Career "The ...

(having just moved to Detroit and added the word "Detroit" to their group name) recorded briefly for Ric-Tic, achieving their first R&B Chart (#22) success with "Show Time", released in 1967. They then joined

Westbound Records Westbound Records was a Detroit-based record label founded by Armen Boladian in 1968. It had a distribution deal with Janus Records from 1970 to 1975, but then it switched distribution to 20th Century Records during 1975 and 1976, but again switch ...

in 1970.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Ric-Tic Records American record labels Pop record labels Record labels established in 1962