Sister Sledge Songs - Mama Never Told Me Lyrics

Sister Sledge - Mama Never Told Me

Sister Sledge - Mama Never Told Me Lyrics and Youtube Music Videos

Album: The Very Best of Sister Sledge
Released: 1973

Mama Never Told Me Lyrics

Mama Never Told Me

The third single from Sister Sledge, this funky little number is a delicious piece of Philadelphia Soul written and produced by Phil Hurtt ("I'll Be Around
") and Tony Bell ("I'm Stone In Love With You"). Hurtt and Bell got the group a deal with Atlantic Records after they signed to the label's publishing division in the early '70s. In our interview with Phil Hurtt , he told us how this song came together:

"Thommy Bell had a hit on the Spinners called 'One of a Kind.' Tony [Thommy's brother] was playing guitar. He started playing the riff that reminded me of that: 'One of a kind...' I started humming the melody to it, and I started thinking about a story. The mom is Flo with these five daughters [one daughter did not perform with the group]. And there had to be some instruction to her daughters, had to be some communication about life. I started thinking about that, and 'Mama Never Told Me' popped off. So basically it was just imagining a mother's conversation to her daughter, then I had to flip the script, because her mama couldn't tell her too much, because she fell for the same thing: a quiet man."

This was recorded at Sigma Sound Studios in Philadelphia, with members of the studio house band (known as MFSB) providing the instrumentation.

The "Shooby dooby dooby doo bop bop" vocal was a playful touch that songwriter Phil Hurtt worked into the song, as he thought it would get people singing along to the song. It was also a cute and appropriate bit for Kathy Sledge to sing, as she was just 14 years old at the time.