💔 Broken Royalties, Lost Dreams & Final Redemption: The SHOCKING Story of Leroy Burgess & Black Ivory 😢📉

Black Ivory began like many musical fairytales do: a group of high school friends from Harlem with dreams of stardom.

Originally known as The Mellow Souls, they were just kids in the summer of 1969 when they made a daring phone audition to producer Patrick Adams.

That call changed everything.

Impressed by their raw talent, Adams took them under his wing, streamlined the lineup, and helped them rebrand as Black Ivory.

With Adams’ mentorship and a new focus on sweet, romantic soul ballads, the group rose fast, even opening for Kool & the Gang before they’d released a single.

Their debut track, “Don’t Turn Around,” recorded at the iconic Sigma Sound Studios in Philadelphia, became a breakout hit—landing them firmly on the Billboard R&B charts and in the hearts of fans nationwide.

At the forefront was Leroy Burgess, a prodigious singer and songwriter whose silky voice carried the group through hits like “You and I,” “The Loneliest Man in Town,” and “Time Is Love.

” Yet success quickly turned sour.

As Black Ivory struggled to evolve musically, they were boxed in by industry expectations.

Record labels wanted slow jams only—no upbeat funk, no experimentation.

The creative straitjacket wore on Leroy, who described feeling “stuck and stifled.

” In 1977, he made the painful decision to leave the group that launched his career.

What followed was a seismic shift—not just for Black Ivory, but for the entire genre of funk and boogie music.

Burgess dove headfirst into a new sound—funkier, bouncier, and designed to get people dancing.

With collaborators like James Calloway and Sonny Davenport, he pioneered a sound that would later be dubbed boogie.

Tracks like “Weekend” and “Hooked on Your Love” redefined the post-disco era, while “Barely Breaking Even” and “Over Like a Fat Rat” became underground classics that DJs still spin to this day.

Behind the scenes, Burgess was not only writing and arranging, but also producing and performing on hits for everyone from Fonda Rae to Rick James and even members of the Wu-Tang Clan.

Yet despite this success, the wounds from his Black Ivory days never fully healed.

Back in the original group, things weren’t going well.

After Leroy’s exit, Black Ivory struggled to maintain momentum.

Despite continued efforts from remaining members Russell Patterson and Stuart Bascombe—including a few modest chart hits and even a brief foray into disco with songs like “Mainline”—their commercial peak

had passed.

Even worse, a storm of legal and financial mismanagement was brewing.

Their label, Today Perception Records, began playing games with royalty payments.

According to Bascombe, the label “kept messing with our royalties,” delaying payments and allegedly withholding tens of thousands of dollars.

One infamous moment involved a label executive telling them that the cost of producing their next album exceeded the royalties they were due.

In essence: “We owe you money, but we’re not going to pay it.”

This financial betrayal broke the group’s spirit.

Creativity dried up, recording slowed, and the once-promising band began slipping into obscurity.

They were forced to watch as their songs faded from the airwaves and new genres—disco, hip-hop, and later R&B-pop—dominated the charts.

Making things worse, two of their most iconic songs, “Mainline” and “Don’t Need No Rehab,” faced backlash for using drug-related metaphors to describe love and desire.

Though the lyrics were meant to be artistic and symbolic, critics misunderstood them as glamorizing drug use.

The controversy added to their growing list of industry headaches.

While the band retreated from the spotlight, Leroy Burgess flourished behind the scenes.

He became known as the “patron saint of boogie,” contributing to countless hits and shaping the underground sound of funk, soul, and electronic fusion.

From working with jazz legend Herbie Mann to producing for Eddie Kendricks of The Temptations, Burgess built an enviable resume.

He even found a second life in electronic music with French group Cassius and wrote for hip-hop artists like Raekwon of Wu-Tang Clan.

But even as his influence spread across genres, the legacy of Black Ivory haunted him.

Patterson and Bascombe didn’t give up either.

Patterson released solo work, ventured into acting, and landed a role in the Kevin Bacon series The Following.

He later appeared on the cover of Variety and even released new house music collaborations into the 2010s.

Bascombe made an unexpected splash in children’s television, starring in Emmy-winning shows and later contributing to Q-Tip’s The Renaissance, which earned a Grammy nomination.

Then, in 2011, something remarkable happened: the original members of Black Ivory reunited after nearly three decades apart.

Their comeback album, Continuum, was more than a nostalgic gesture—it was a testament to survival.

The smooth vocal harmonies were still there, as was the unmistakable emotional weight in their music.

Fans old and new embraced the reunion, and the group even performed at London’s iconic Jazz Café in 2019, earning 50th anniversary honors and a glowing 13-page tribute in The Soul Survivors magazine.

Leroy Burgess, now running his own label, Burgess Entertainment Recordings, continues to create and release music—including “Jesus Children of America,” “Barely Breaking Even” (2019 reissue), and “Dance

Till You Can’t.

” His 2021 single “Somewhere” promises to be part of an album titled These Days, cementing his place as a voice that refuses to be silenced.

What began as a fairy tale for three Harlem teenagers turned into a cautionary tale of artistic confinement, industry betrayal, and delayed justice.

Yet, at its core, the story of Leroy Burgess and Black Ivory is also one of perseverance, reinvention, and triumph over adversity.

They may have been broken by the business, but they were never defeated by it.

Their music—timeless, heartfelt, and soul-stirring—still echoes through speakers around the world, a reminder of what happens when talent refuses to fade.