DeBarge, Motown & Me
Greg Williams says music has always been a part of life.
Williams, a Grand Rapids native, began playing the trumpet at age seven and the piano in his early teens. To add to list of talents, he sang and acted in several plays.
"All through my teens I played in local bands in Grand Rapids. I am the co - founder of a group called The Patterns. My uncle Sylvester Williams, my cousin David Jennings and my dear friend Nate Thomas were teenagers when there were acts like the TMG's, Family Brown, The Topics, The People's Choice and a few other folks, so I grew up playing in those bands."
After graduating from Ottawa Hills High School in 1972, Greg Williams decided to attend Grand Valley State University. A friend of his, Darnell Warwick had left the city a couple of years earlier and joined a group called TNT Flashes out of Ohio. The group had a relationship with Barry White, and was almost about to sign a deal with Barry White and RCA Records, but it took too long, so some of the musicians quit the group.
"They needed a trumpet player, so Darnell called me and asked me if I would be interested in joining the band. I told him that I would, if he would also take my then comrade as well, Bobby Debarge," Williams said yesterday in an interview with the Grand Rapids Times.
"Bobby wasn't in the bands that I had been in, but we would still hang and do music. So in February 1973, I moved to Phoenix, Arizona with the band TNT Flashes. Six months later we moved to Los Angeles and became White Heat and signed with Barry White and RCA Records. We had one record out on RCA Records in 1975."
Unfortunately, the band was dropped from the label in 1975, shortly after the record was released and then the group broke up. That was a turning point for Williams.
"That is when I decided that after being with 6 other bands, it was time to put my own band together," Williams said. "I had worked with Bobby Debarge for years. His younger brother Tommy was an Incredible bass player and I had met other guys from different bands."
I hand - picked six of the guys, including Melvin Clark on guitar who is also from Grand Rapids, and the group became known as Switch. We cut a demo and I had been in L.A. for two weeks and ran into Jermaine Jackson, who took us to Motown. We found out that there was already a group named First Class so we had to find another name.
Like me, I wanted guys who could sing lead and play different instruments, so during the showcase with Motown executives and talent scouts, we all displayed our vocal talents and that we were talented musicians who played more than one instrument. After the showcase, Suzanne De Passe said that she had never seen so much switching in her life and thus the name Switch stuck with us."
The group did five albums on Motown Records and one album with half of the group Switch in 1985, things turned.
The group disbanded.
Greg went on to sign with Sugar Hill Records as a producer. He then started a production and management company, working with groups like GQ and also worked as a writer for Right On magazine.
He later managed the careers of El Debarge, Chico Debarge, SWV and quite a few other acts under GWM Productions.
Switch would make a comeback.
"In 2003, I decided to put Switch back together with four of the original members of the group and one new singer since Bobby Debarge had passed away," he said. "I found a guy whose vocals are close enough to Bobby's to make the audiences love us again."
After 16 years, Switch is still holding on and will return to Western Michigan next week.
"We also just released a new single on May 1st of this year and I have also written a book entitled Switch, Debarge, Motown and Me, which is my biography, which was also released on May 1st, 2019."
Next week Don't miss Switch performing live in concert, at Muskegon Heights Rowan Park on Saturday, June 15, 2019.
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