“Up, funky and happening!”

PP Arnold’s great lost album with Barry Gibb and Eric Clapton finally gets a release

“I became an Ikette, and that got me out of an abusive teen marriage” PP ARNOLD

WHEN Uncut calls PP Arnold at her home in Spain, the veteran soul singer is frantically firefighting a spot of bother regarding an error in the credits of her new album The Turning Tide. Featuring songs recorded with Barry Gibbs and Eric Clapton between 1968 and 1970, the album has been sitting on record company shelves for more than 40 years until Arnold finally arranged its release.

“I’ve been doing 50,000 things at a time, I didn’t even think about the credits,” she says between fielding calls from printers, managers and designers. “But this whole project is so blessed that I’m sure everything is going to be all right.”

Arnold’s positivity is impressive; she could be excused for feeling cursed, having struggled so long to get the album released. The Turning Tide was originally recorded when Arnold was looking for a label following the closure of Immediate. She teamed up with Barry Gibb, and the pair recorded 10 tracks, eight of which feature on The Turning Tide. When Gibb returned to The Bee Gees with the album unmixed and incomplete, the project was taken up by Eric Clapton, who Arnold had supported on tour. “I went into the studio with Eric and the Delaney band,” she says. “Those were the first sessions they did with Eric before they became Derek & The Dominos. We covered some of the hot tunes of the day, this fusion of gospel, rock and r&B. With Barry, we worked together for months on these beautiful, sad ballads, but the Clapton tracks were up, funky and happening. We just went in the studio and recorded them in two days when everybody was hot.” She also taped a handful of tracks with Caleb Quaye, two of which appear on the album.

But the album was never released and all involved soon moved on. For Arnold, these were busy, exciting times. “I’d never planned to be in the industry – I just became an Ikette, and that got me out of an abusive teen marriage and was a way to support the kids,” she says. “I was in the right place at the right time. People liked me, I don’t know why. I was so shy and introverted.” After arriving in London in the mid-’60s with Ike and Tina, Arnold recorded with the Small Faces and The rolling Stones, and hung out with Jimi Hendrix. “For Jim and I, being part of the UK rock revolution, having come out of the civil rights revolution in the US, that was incredible,” she says.

The Gibb-Clapton sessions were an expansion on what she had been doing with Immediate. “I was an American soul singer with a British producer and that’s why I sound different,” she says. “It was great to hear these tracks again. I didn’t realise I was singing like that at such a young age.” Arnold will be taking The Turning Tide on tour in the UK in october – her first solo tour after 10 years working with roger Waters – and will also release a memoir, The First Cut Is The Deepest. “I wanted them to come out at the same time, because the book talks about the music,” she says. “I feel it’s a real blessing I’ve got the music out just at the right time.” The Turning Tide is out October 6 on Kundalini Music. For tour dates, see www.pparnold.com