The Trey J’s

Side A - I Found It All In You

Side B - We Got A Thing (Going On)

Posted in: Release Listings

Release Date: Monday February 17th 2014

The Trey J’s: In the late 1960’s James Binford originally from Indianapolis, Indiana and Joseph Smith from Detroit, Michigan who had both by then migrated south to Atlanta, Georgia, formed a vocal duet known as the Trey J’s.

The groups name the Trey J’s is an Americanization “Trey” derived from the French word for the number three “Tres” and the first initial of James and Joseph and their late manager Johnny Glover’s christian names, hence Three J’s.

By the early 1970’s The Trey J’s had become regular performers at Atlanta’s most infamous Black night club ‘The Pink Pussy Cat’. It was while performing at the Pink Pussy Cat that the Trey J’s came into contact with a local record producer by the name of Thomas Fletcher Davis more commonly known as Tee Fletcher. Tee a successful recording artist in his own right with a string of recording for several labels such as Josie, Shurfine, and Tragar had begun his own production company Tee Gem Records.

James Binford had previously written the basic lyrics for a songs entitled “We Got A Thing Going On” and one day while at the Pink Pussy Cat with Tee Fletcher accompanying him at the piano he began to recite the lyric’s. Together they composed this and a further song entitled “I Found It All In You” which would gain a release on Tee’s Tee Gem label (PS-4044).

Although the Trey J’s only ever had the one 45 release, they continued to performed live shows on both the college and Chitlin circuit as the Trey J’s Review which also featured some of the members of a later Atlanta ensemble by the name of Brick. Brick went on to enjoy a successful recording career from the mid 70’s through to the mid 80’s scoring a number 1 R&B/pop hit in 1976 with the song “Dazz”. The Trey J’s also once featured on a tour that also included such Chicago recording artists, as The Chi-lites and Ruby Andrews. This came about due to the marriage of James Binford’s first wife’s cousin to Ruby Andrews. The end of the road for the Trey J’s came with imprisonment of James Binford in 1992 where he has since remained although he is due for parole sometime during 2014. Joseph Smith later became a school teacher but sadly passed away during 2012.

The Trey J’s “I Found It All In You” is currently enjoying a current reactivation due to it’s dramatic funky edge guitar and horn rifts fitting perfectly into the current funky soul genre. While it’s haunting deep soul ballad flip “We Got A Thing (Going On)” is a must for any real soul collector.