The Jones Girls may have come from Detroit but their sweet harmonies made them synonymous with the Philly Sound. And their big breakthrough came after almost a decade when they teamed up with Philly Soul titans Gamble and Huff.
With sibling harmonies to compare with The Pointer Sisters, The Emotions and Sister Sledge, the Joneses enjoyed a strong of hits in the late 1970s and early ’80s for Gamble & Huff’s Philadelphia International label.
Daughters of a gospel singer, Shirley, Valorie and Brenda Jones were born and raised in Detroit. They made their recorded debut as the Jones Girls in 1970 with My Own Special Way and worked for the next five years with legendary Motown songwriters Brian Holland, Lamont Dozier and Leroy Hutson.
Their harmonies were much in demand as session and live background vocalists, the sisters supporting fellow Detroiters Diana Ross and Aretha Franklin, Lou Rawls and Teddy Pendergrass.
Their breakthrough came at the tail-end of the ’70s when they signed under their own name – The Jones Girls – with Philadelphia International. They made three albums for the label: The Jones Girls (1979), At Peace with Woman (1980) and Get as Much Love as You Can (1981).
The three LPs yielded six charting singles, including You Gonna Make Me Love Somebody Else, Dance Turned Into a Romance, I Just Love the Man, (I Found) That Man of Mine and the “quiet storm” ballad Nights Over Egypt – later covered by Incognito.
During the same period they were featured on frequent studio partner Dexter Wansel’s disco classic I’ll Never Forget (My Favourite Disco).
In the ’80s they moved to RCA where they had their final two hit singles, the floor fillers On Target and 2 Win U Back, before Shirley launched a solo career.
Although the sisters kept busy with session work, they didn’t make another album until the early ’90s, produced by Soul II Soul’s Jazzie B. Valorie died in 2001 and Brenda died after she was run down and killed while crossing the street in 2017.
Keeping the family connection alive, eldest sister Shirley, the sole survivor, has continued performing Jones Girls songs into the 2020s backed by two of her nieces and a nephew.