ニュー・バース (New Birth)

New Birth
New Birth is an American funk and R&B band formed in Louisville, Kentucky by former Motown songwriters and producers Vernon Bullock and Harvey Fuqua and music industry veteran Tony Churchill. The group is most notable for the hits "I Can Understand It", "It's Been a Long Time", "Wildflower" and "Dream Merchant" and most notable for featuring the Wilson brothers Melvin and Leslie, who sung lead on the group's most famed material.

In 1969, Vernon Bullock had thought of creating an ensemble of groups for a touring company and Harvey Fuqua and Tony Churchill soon took an interest forming auditions in Louisville, Kentucky and finding three groups in the process bringing them together to become New Birth. The band came together in 1970 with their self-titled debut on RCA. Their second album, Ain't No Big Thing, But It's Growing, yielded a minor hit with the Perry Como cover of "It's Impossible", in 1971.

Later that year, Bullock discovered a group from Detroit, Michigan called Love, Peace & Happiness featuring former Marvelettes singer Ann Bogan and brothers Leslie and Melvin Wilson. Assigning them with the original members of New Birth, in 1972, the group hit the R&B top ten with their cover of Bobby Womack's "I Can Understand It", which paved the way for the band's future success.

In 1974, the group issued their hit album, It's Been a Long Time, which spawned the hits including the title track and their cover of the psychedelic single "Wild Flower", which became a top ten hit in the UK singles chart. After the release of their sixth RCA album, Comin' From All Ends, the group split from RCA, Fuqua and their management company and signed with Buddah.

New Birth's Buddah debut, Blind Baby, featured the group's only number-one R&B single, a cover of the Jerry Butler classic, "Dream Merchant". After the release of the 1977 album, Behold The Mighty Army, the Wilson brothers split from the group following in-fighting and growing tensions in the group.

The group returned in 1979 with Platinum City and in 1982 with the I'm Back album, but neither album failed to generate any success after the Wilson brothers disbanded from them. The group split up shortly afterwards.

In 2004, the group was revamped by Melvin and Leslie Wilson and they issued the album, Lifetime the following year.

Since the group's initial split, their songs have been covered from the likes of Jamie Foxx, who sampled their cover of "Wildflower" for his 2005 hit, "Unpredictable". R&B group Something for the People sampled their "It's Been a Long Time" for their 1996 hit, "My Love is the Shhh"...
(Wikipedia: New Birth (band))