Wax of Stax – Veda Brown was born Mildred Pulliam Whitehorn. Like yesterday's act Ollie & the Nightingales she started off singing gospel but was lured into the tender trap of secular music when she signed her Stax contract. According to
Sir Shambling's Deep Soul Heaven, a website to which I devote an inordinate amount of my staring budget, the name "Veda" was selected for her after some sort of naming sweepstakes amongst the Stax secretarial staff. "Brown" was her mother's maiden name. She allegedly recorded the original version of the '70s R&B standard "
If Loving You Is Wrong (I Don't Want to Be Right)" on a demo, before Luther Ingram took it for his own. "Short Stopping" was her moment, although it was a close decision to feature that or her desperately passionate "
Don't Start Loving Me" today. Brown returned to her gospel roots and led a gigantic choir that won a BET contest. She was also a cosmetologist. And I believe she's back to being Mildred Whitehorn again but that's her business.
