Gladys Knight and the pips a true veteran band of the sixties and seventies,Gladys with the voice to die for should have held the crown and title Diva of soul held for so long by Aretha Franklin, Held on to long After Aretha had stopped working and Gladys was still putting out hits,

To most people Gladys and the pips will always be thought of as a Motown band even though they had hits long before joining ,this is Something they carried on doing with Motown and long after with Buddah.Very few ever did this with the same success and only one Other comes to mind and that is the Isley Brothers. Could be the fact that they came up with material and worked with others on songs,

While most of the Motown artists relied on the Motown sound for their Success Gladys Knight and the Pips only seemed to use it to improve The distinctive sound  they had. 

Gladys started very young in her career as a singer, At the age of eight she entered and won first prize on the Ted Mack amateur hour TV show in New York ,This was the start of something big and shortly after Returning home to Atlanta The Pips were born,Gladys formed the band with her brother Merald Knight and her cousins William and Eleanor Guest  with other cousin James Woods becoming manager,James nick Name being “Pip” no prizes for knowing where the group got their name. 

After working the clubs for a while and Eleanor leaving to be replaced By yet another cousin Edward Patten they had their first release “Ching Chong” on Brunswick this was in 1958 and this was a flop,Not put off by this they were soon at it again and put out a cover Of Johnny Otis’s “Every beat of my heart” this time on the Hunton Label, showing sales after a very slow start this was picked up by the Vee Jay label  

So now the Pips had had their first taste of success,The band had previously signed to Fury in New York Shortly after the release on Hunton, Fury issued another Version of  “Every beat of my heart” and made the top 40 At the same time the Vee Jay version got into the top ten In june 1961 !!!!

Their next release on Fury in 1962 “A letter full of tears”Got into and stayed in the top 20 for three months,Soon leaving Fury to join the Maxx label the band had more Minor hits most of the written by Van Mc Coy , however By 1965 things looked bleak and the end of the road was Around the corner for the Pips After more than a year doing nothing the band got a break They got a guest slot on a Motown tour in 1966

They had a very successful tour and soon were offered A contract with gordy,The rest is well known and the Pips Went from strength to strength and had many well known hits With Motown,After leaving Gladys went to Buddah and thePips to Casablanca…..both with more success