What was Wilson's first band?
Steven Wilson
One of Wilson's earliest musical projects was the psychedelic duo Altamont (featuring a 15-year-old Wilson working with synth/electronics player Simon Vockings). Their one and only cassette album, Prayer for the Soul, featured lyrics by English psychedelic scenester Alan Duffy, whose work Wilson would later use for two Porcupine Tree songs: "This Long Silence" and "It Will Rain for a Million Years". Around the same time that Wilson was part of Altamont, he was also in a progressive rock band called Karma, which played live around Hertfordshire and recorded two cassette albums, The Joke's On You (1983) and The Last Man To Laugh (1985). These contained early versions of "Small Fish", "Nine Cats" and "The Joke's On You", which were subsequently resurrected as Porcupine Tree songs.
Jackie Wilson
Shortly after Jackie Wilson signed a solo contract with Brunswick, Green suddenly died. Green's business partner Nat Tarnopol took over as Wilson's manager (and ultimately rose to president of Brunswick). Wilson's first single was released, "Reet Petite" (from his first album "He's So Fine"), which became a modest R&B success (many years later, an international smash hit). "Reet Petite" was written by Berry Gordy Jr. (another former boxer who was a native son of Detroit), in which co-wrote "Reet Petite" with partner Roquel "Billy" Davis (often referred to as the pseudonym Tyran Carlo) and Gordy's sister Gwendolyn. The trio composed and produced six additional singles for Wilson, in which were: "To Be Loved", "I'm Wanderin'", "We Have Love", "That's Why (I Love You So)", "I'll Be Satisfied" and Wilson's late-1958 signature song, "Lonely Teardrops", which peaked at No. 7 on the pop charts, ranked No. 1 on the R&B charts in the U.S., and established Wilson as an R&B superstar known for his extraordinary, operatic multi-octave vocal range. Wilson's "Lonely Teardrops" sold over one million copies, and was awarded a gold disc by the RIAA.