The Jimmy Castor Bunch

The Jimmy Castor Bunch is a soul music group led by James Walter Castor, born on January 23, 1940, in Manhattan, New York. Castor began his career with the group Jimmy and the Juniors, who recorded "I Promise to Remember" in 1956. Later, he joined The Teenagers before forming The Jimmy Castor Bunch (TJCB) in the late 1960s. As a solo artist and leader of TJCB, Castor released several successful albums and singles throughout the 1970s. Their album It's Just Begun, released in 1972, featured two hit singles: the title track "It's Just Begun" and "Troglodyte (Cave Man)" The latter became quite popular in the US, hitting number 6 on the Billboard Hot 100. In 1973, Castor recorded a soprano saxophone instrumental cover of "A Whiter Shade of Pale" inspired by J.S.Bach's Orchestral Suite No. 3 BWV1068. Later popular songs included "Bertha Butt Boogie", "Potential", and "King Kong". The Jimmy Castor Bunch included keyboardist/trumpeter Gerry Thomas, bassist Douglas Gibson, guitarist Harry Jensen, guitarist/sitarist Jeffrey Grimes, conga and triangle player Lenny Fridie Jr., and drummers Elwood Henderson Jr. and Bobby Manigault. Castor died of heart failure on January 16, 2012, in Henderson, Nevada. Many of the group's tunes have been heavily sampled in films and hip-hop, notably the saxophone hook and groove from "It's Just Begun" and the spoken word intro and groove from "Troglodyte (Cave Man)".