An Unusual Musical Happening

Harry “Cupcake” Coleman was 29 years old and staring down a 50-year sentence at thePowhatan Correctional Center, the Virginia penitentiary farm just 30 miles west of Richmond. Cupcake was a star vocalist in the prison’s soul ensemble, Edge of Daybreak. On Sept. 14, 1979, she and her bandmates rose to an incredible challenge: they recorded an eight-song LP called Eyes of Love, live from the prison visiting room, in only five hours. Decades later, music and culture writer Jamie Pietras tracks down Cupcake and her former bandmates, the guitarist Neal Cade and drummer Jamal Jaha Nubi, to find out how they recorded one of the most coveted soul albums of their era under such extraordinary circumstances. Out of prison and in their seventies, the former bandmates feel like they still have something to prove - and they want Jamie’s help.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Om Podcasten

A+E's Soul Incarcerated podcast is the story of Edge of Daybreak, the best ‘70s soul band you’ve probably never heard about. They recorded their lone masterpiece, Eyes of Love, when they were locked up at a rural Virginia penitentiary at the height of America’s prison boom. Journalist Jamie Pietras traces the story of young musicians who grow up under segregation, face convictions for armed robbery, and find each other through a prison music program. Pietras puts the group’s music into context and helps navigate their attempt at a comeback more than 40 years later.