Key Significant Benchmarks in the African American Black Music industry (Part 2).

Vicki Mack Lataillade:

Vicki Mack Lataillade 

In 1993, the group, now known as “Kirk Franklin & The Family,” released their debut album, Kirk Franklin & The Family. It spent almost two years on the Gospel music charts and charted on the R&B charts, eventually earning platinum sales status. It remained at number one  on the Billboard Top Gospel Albums Chart for 42 weeks. It was the first gospel music album to sell over a million units since Aretha Franklin's "Amazing Grace"  live album. Two years later, after releasing a 1995 Christmas album entitled Kirk Franklin & the Family Christmas, the group released “Whatcha Lookin’ 4” in 1996. The album was certified 2x platinum and earned Franklin his first Grammy Award for “Best Contemporary Soul Gospel Album”.

1997 brought another album, with collaboration with the vocal ensemble God’s Property, aptly named God’s Property from Kirk Franklin’s Nu Nation. The lead single, “Stomp”, featuring Cheryl “Salt” James (of Salt-N-Pepa), was a big hit, enjoying heavy rotation on MTV and other music channels, and making it into the Top 40. God’s Property from Kirk Franklin’s Nu Nation charting at number one on the Billboard R&B/Hip Hop Singles Airplay chart for two weeks, even was number one on the Billboard R&B /Hip Hop Albums Chart for five weeks, also number three on the Billboard 200 Albums Pop Charts, and would eventually go on to be certified 3x platinum in America.  It also brought Franklin another Grammy for “Best Contemporary Soul Gospel Album”, as well as three Grammy nominations.

In 1996, Franklin’s song “Joy” was recorded by Whitney Houston and the Georgia Mass Choir. With production by Houston and Mervyn Warren, the composition was included on the best-selling soundtrack to the movie “The Preacher’s Wife”.

In addition to Gospo Centric, Mack Lataillade’s projects and companies in the music industry have resulted in sales of more than 100 million records sold! Vicki Mack Lataillade started in the music business in the mid 1970’s as the first African American woman in the RCA Music Internship program.

She was recruited by the then owned Random House Publishing company while attending UCLA. Her influence soon reached far and wide. Revolutionizing the genre from the moment she stepped onto the Faith-based platform, she cut her teeth by breaking then unknown artists like The Winans, Hawkins, Commissioned (Fred Hammond), Richard Smallwood, Tramaine Hawkins, The Clark Sisters, Andrae Crouch and Vicki Winans just to name a few, all still cornerstones of the gospel industry today. During her time at both Light and Sparrow Records she created revolutionary marketing concepts never used before in this genre.

The Lillie Mack catalogue is comprised of more than 800 songs written by some of Gospel music’s premier artists and writers, including Kirk Franklin, Byron Cage, Dorinda Clark-Cole, Hezekiah Walker, Myron Butler, Kurt Carr and Trin-i-tee 5:7. 

                                   Researched and compiled by               
                                   Mr K Tomlin Music Historian                   
                                  ©RCM Music/Signaturesoundsonline2013-2014