R.I.P.: Brenton Wood, 60s Hitmaker

(1939-2025)

In 1967, Brenton Wood looked as if he was on the cusp of mainstream success.

The Los Angles singer’s single “The Oogum Boogum Song” became a hit and ranked 34th and 19th on the Billboard’s Hot 100 and Top Selling R&B Singles charts, respectively. A few months later, Wood debuted his second hit, “Gimme Little Sign,” which peaked at No. 9 on Billboard’s Hot 100.

Wood, who was born Alfred Jesse Smith, died Friday of natural causes at his home in Moreno Valley, his manager and assistant Manny Gallegos confirmed to Variety. He was 83, according to The LATimes.

Wood’s slinky and upbeat tunes are infectious. His seductive and affable manner of describing the essence of a budding romance in layman’s terms is inviting. Whether solo or with a partner, it’s easy to groove to the beat.

Wood continued releasing tracks but none ever garnered similar success. Frustrated with the music industry, he quit for a couple of years, then inched back onto the club circuit. There, he found an audience that would sustain him for decades: Latinos.

He would play major California cities, then travel through Mexico and into Arizona before returning home. As his audience aged, Wood began to perform on themed cruises and at festivals with Chicano musical luminaries including Los Lobos, Thee Midniters and Ozomatli. Wood’s romantic oldies resonated with a new generation of lovebirds, becoming a soundtrack of Southern California life — literally, as Wood found a third career as a performer at weddings, quinceañeras and anniversary parties.

Wood’s lyrics captured the cat-and-mouse chase of a first love, the kind of infatuation that makes people act a fool. He encapsulated that all-too-familiar yearning to whisk away a lover to bask in their honeymoon paradise. But he also wrote about heartache — and the triumphant moment when the pain wears off.

“Latinos like to dedicate songs, and his songs are good for that,” radio veteran Art Laboe told The Times in 1992. “It’s not the big hits they like. It’s songs like ‘Take a Chance,’ ‘I Think You’ve Got Your Fools Mixed Up’ — if a girl’s having trouble with her boyfriend, she’ll dedicate that to him.”

The songwriter was born July 26, 1941, in Shreveport, La., and moved west to San Pedro when he was 3. He moved throughout L.A.’s inner cities, selling papers and fish and shining shoes until he created a career in the music industry.