Colonel Abrams

Colonel Abrams (May 25, 1949 – November 24, 2016) was an American musician, singer, songwriter, dancer and actor.

Early life

From an early age, Abrams began playing the guitar and piano. He was in several early bands; among them Heavy Impact - in which he played both guitar and keyboards alongside Joe Wells (guitar), Lemar Washington (guitar), Marston "Buffy" Freeman (bass guitar), Ronald Simmons (drums), Harry Jones (trumpet), and Barbara Mills (saxophone). In 1976, he formed Conservative Manor, 94 East (the band featuring Prince on lead guitar).

In 1985, he signed to Steven Machat's label and production company, AMI. Machat, who was collaborating and working with a British producer, Richard James Burgess, hired Burgess to produce Abrams' self-titled debut album. Machat then arranged for MCA Records to sign Abrams for worldwide releases. Burgess produced the songs "Trapped", "I'm Not Gonna Let You", and "Table for Two".

"I'm Not Gonna Let" also spent a week at number one in the dance chart, in 1986. The album peaked at number 75 on the US Billboard Top 200 and Number 13 on the US Top R&B/Hip-Hop Albums chart. Although Abrams had no American pop hits during his career, he had a number of entries on the US Hot Dance Club Play chart in the 1980s and 1990s, including four entries that hit number one. In 1987, he had his fourth number-one US dance hit with "How Soon We Forget", the same year that he released his second album, You and Me Equals Us.

Recent work

In August 2011, he performed at the '80s Reunion'.

Later life and illness

As most of you may or may not know, a lot of recording artists don’t have medical coverage or benefits ... Those of us who have listened to his awesome music and know of his plight, have banded together to try to help him through this rough patch.

Death

On June 25, 2019, The New York Times Magazine listed Colonel Abrams among hundreds of artists whose material was reportedly destroyed in the 2008 Universal fire.