Eric Mercury

Eric Alexander Mercury (28 June 1944 – 14 March 2022) was a Canadian singer who was a member of the soul group The Soul Searchers during the 1960s.

The two groups he performed in during the 1960s were The Pharaohs and later The Soul Searchers.

It was considered by many in the music industry as a recording milestone in the 1960s.

Mercury left his original Avco Embassy label and signed a deal with Enterprise Records, an imprint of Stax Records.

In 1966, Eric Mercury had a single, "I Wondered Why" / "Softly", released on Clip 1122.

The group that backed him was The Silhouettes.

Diane Brooks and Steve Kennedy were members of the group.

According to William D. Smith's book, A Stroke of Luck, Smith and Kennedy had the idea of putting together a group to play behind Brooks, whom Kennedy was romantically involved with.

The name of the group was The Soul Searchers.

However, the real name was Diane Brooks, Eric Mercury, and The Soul Searchers.

This all came together in April 1966.

The instrumental part of the group was made up of Eric "Mouse" Johnson on drums and vocals, Steve Kennedy on tenor, baritone sax and background vocals, Terry Logan on guitar and vocals, and William "Smitty" Smith on Hammond B3 organ and vocals.

Their first gig was at Memory Lane in Toronto.

While things were progressing, Brooks got an offer to record for herself.

Due to the band supposedly not being up to the task and lacking in experience, they did not get to play on the recording.

At some stage, while having played in Canada and the US, the Soul Searchers were still an unsigned group.

However, they had attracted the attention of a young producer, C. Nash.

He had been coming along to their performances, and he wanted to record them.

A session was set up in the middle of the night in Detroit, where the group had been playing at the time.

The recording session took place in a small, basic studio.

The song "Lonely Girl", which was written by William "Mickey" Stevenson and Ivy Jo Hunter, had been rejected by Motown.

It was learned, rehearsed, and arranged in a few hours, then recorded.

Ten copies of the record were given to the group.

Following this, he moved to New York in 1968 to perform by himself.

He later made waves in 1969 with his Electric Black Man album.

His debut solo album, Electric Black Man, was released on Avco Embassy in 1969.

His follow-up solo albums were Funky Sounds Nurtured in the Fertile Soil of Memphis That Smell of Rock (1971), Love Is Taking Over (1973), Eric Mercury (1975), and Gimme A Call Sometime (1981).

Mercury moved to Los Angeles from 1971 until Christmas 1978, when he relocated to New York.

Eventually returning to Toronto, he worked in a management and production role for the band Age of Reason.

He had two hits: the first on the Canadian charts in 1972 with "I Can Smell That Funky Music", and the second in the United States in 1983, singing a duet with Roberta Flack with "Our Love Will Stop the World".

He also co-wrote the song "Down the Backstairs of My Life".

Born into a musical family and the youngest of seven children, he was raised in Toronto, Ontario.

His father, Methodist minister George Luther Mercury, was from Saint Vincent and the Grenadines.

His mother, Gladys Viola Mercury (née Smith), came from Jamaica.

They were community leaders who worked just west of the core of Toronto, out of the British Methodist Episcopal Church.

The band failed to attract any interest from major record labels, and Mercury went to Chicago until 1997, when he again returned to Toronto.

He wrote material for other artists such as Roberta Flack and Donny Hathaway, for whom he also produced.

Mercury's other contributions include vocals to Michael Jordan's "Be Like Mike" advertising jingle for Gatorade.

He had a few acting roles, appearing in the stage production of Jesus Christ Superstar.

He also had a role in the film The Fish that Saved Pittsburgh as Rudy, the league commissioner, and as Tyrone Blackwood in American Hot Wax.