General Norman Johnson (May 23, 1943, Norfolk, Virginia – October 13, 2010 in Atlanta, Georgia) had a hit as the lead singer of The Showmen in the early 1960s, with the New Orleans rock and roll anthem "It Will Stand" and Carolina Beach classic "39-21-46".
When Holland/Dozier/Holland left Motown in 1967 to establish their own Invictus/Hot Wax group of record labels, they teamed Johnson up with Eddie Custis, Danny Woods and Canadian born Harrison Kennedy as the new company's flagship act, under the appropriate name "Chairmen of the Board". Custis left the group after their second album.
Though they all had a turn at lead vocals, it was Johnson's quirky hiccup-laden style and his songwriting which became increasingly showcased, with the group selling a million plus copies of their single, "Give Me Just a Little More Time". The disc was released in December 1969, reached #3 on the Billboard Hot 100, with one million sales confirmed in May 1970, when the group were presented with a gold record by the R.I.A.A.
Chairmen of the Board also scored with "You've Got Me Dangling On A String", "Pay To the Piper", "Everything's Tuesday", "Working On A Building Of Love", "Elmo James", "Finders Keepers", and the original version of "Patches", a Grammy Award winning ballad when later covered with success by Clarence Carter.