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Message: <blockquote data-quote="James from London" data-source="post: 191011" data-attributes="member: 22">Just made the exciting discovery that Farrah Fawcett, via Whitney Houston's mother, was responsible for Gladys Knight and the Pips' biggest hit:“Midnight Train To Georgia,” Knight and the Pips’ second single on Buddah, was another song from [Jim] Weatherly, that ex-quarterback. Weatherly played rec-league flag football with Lee Majors, the Six Million Dollar Man star, and the two got to be friends. One night, Weatherly called Majors, and he ended up making conversation with Farrah Fawcett, Majors’ girlfriend. Fawcett mentioned that she was packing; she had to catch a “midnight plane to Houston.” The phrase stuck in Weatherly’s head, and he wrote the song in about half an hour, using Majors and Fawcett — or hypothetical unsuccessful versions of Majors and Fawcett — as the song’s characters. When he recorded his own take on “Midnight Plane To Houston,” it was basically a country song. He put the song on Weatherly, the solo album he released in 1972.[MEDIA=youtube]J3_JQr6RqWs[/MEDIA]Shortly thereafter, Cissy Houston, a gospel singer who’d found some level of fame singing backup for Aretha Franklin, recorded a countrified R&B version of “Midnight Plane To Houston.” Cissy Houston’s version of the song made some crucial changes. It flipped the genders around, and it changed both the song’s destination and its mode of transportation. It seemed confusing to have a singer named Houston singing about flying to Houston, so “Midnight Plane To Houston” became “Midnight Train To Georgia.” (A train from Los Angeles to Georgia would take fucking forever, but never mind.)[MEDIA=youtube]XtzyxoX0To0[/MEDIA]When Knight and the Pips got ahold of the song, they kept the changes from the Cissy Houston version. Working with the producer Tony Camillo, they gave it a sweltering slow-burn soul arrangement. This was one of those cases where everyone in the studio must’ve been feeling some kind of divine inspiration. Everything about that arrangement is perfect: The opening drum-cracks, the immaculately-timed horn stabs, the churchy organ, the glowing Fender Rhodes, the burbling bass, the flighty strings. Knight belts in a hard, gospel-derived rasp, putting on a real command performance. And then, of course, there are Pips, chiming in with those little ripostes — “I know you will” — that undercut Knight even as they build her up.[MEDIA=youtube]s4KZs0mLJiQ[/MEDIA]<a href="https://www.stereogum.com/2040859/the-number-ones-gladys-knight-the-pips-midnight-train-to-georgia/franchises/the-number-ones/" target="_blank">https://www.stereogum.com/2040859/the-number-ones-gladys-knight-the-pips-midnight-train-to-georgia/franchises/the-number-ones/</a></blockquote>

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