He returned to Nola for 1964's great Every Day Every Hour, credited to Warren (Lee) Taylor, then resumed his traditional stage sobriquet for the following year's underground favorite Star Revue, the first of his efforts for producer Allen Toussaint's Deesu label. Name-checking soul greats from Wilson Pickett to Otis Redding to Solomon Burke -- with "the Mighty King Lee" giving himself a shout-out -- Star Revue was later covered by soul shouter Arthur Conley, whose immortal Sweet Soul Music follows the same thematic formula. With 1966's Climb the Ladder Lee unsuccessfully attempted to jump-start a dance craze, and with the following year's Underdog Backstreet he moved to Toussaint's Tou Sea label, scoring his biggest regional hit in the process -- the single was so successful that it even earned a U.K. release on the Pama label, but wasn't a national hit on either side of the Atlantic.
In 1968 Lee unleashed the scorching Wand label single Funky Belly -- produced by Toussaint and featuring the legendary Meters on backup, the single is much coveted by today's deep funk collectors, but made little impact on its original release. The 1969 Deesu release Mama Said We Can't Get Married paid homage to James Brown, and marked Lee's final collaboration with Toussaint; he resurfaced on vinyl one final time with the 1974 Choctaw single Direct from the Ghetto. In 1977 Lee suffered a massive stroke -- he survived, but abandoned his music career in favor of devoting his life to Christianity. ~ Jason Ankeny, Rovi