So I am in New York City for the week. Black Shag and I DJ'd in Montreal last weekend to a very enthusiastic crowd and our biggest observation about Canadians was their overall laid back attitudes and lack of pretension. In general American scenesters just seem to be a bit too jaded. That said, from what I am told New Yorkers are the most unpretentious, accepting group of people on the planet and I look forward to seeing them prove it. Tonite I DJ in Brooklyn for the east coast debut of SF's Donuts party and in honor of the occasion I am posting one of my deepest boogie cuts from Castro Valley, California, just south of Oakland.
Squirmin Herman put out two 12 inch singles on their own To The Top Productions label. I have them both but the second and more rare Move and Shake your Body is the superior release. Move and Shake is from 1988, a late period boogie number with some modern elements but I imagine it might have sounded a bit dated upon its release. Either way, its a heavy record. This is one of my secret weapons and I am sharing it with you because that's how we roll in a post modern un-jaded America. Squirmin Herman - Move And Shake Your Body (Club Version) Squirmin Herman - Move And Shake Your Body (Instrumental)
My recording rig, nice turntable, phono pre and other toys, are all distributed across the floor whilst I re-decorate the lab, and as such I can't rip any vinyl. But then vinyl isn't the only rippable substance on the face the planet, you can also rip CD's...wait.. hey .. don't judge me, there are such things as rare, super deep CD's you know. The prices of CD's can exceed their vinyl counterparts and the markets are subject to the same rules and forces, especially now they are gradually going out of print. Anyway, I don't have to justify myself, I'm putting up a rip from a CD.
In the late eighties and early nineties, between 1989 and 1994 I think, Prelude gradually had it's back catalogue re-released on vinyl reissue, at the same time the 12" singles were remastered and put on CD compilations direct from the original master tapes. These are now a little pricey and hard to find, but there is a store in SF that had a bunch of these deadstock that I picked up still in shrink wrap. They sound great, although are not fully normalized so there is a couple of db headroom on these (such were the civilized standards of the time). Some hard to find numbers here, including the much haggled for Groove It To Your Body by Michael Wilson:
This is an interesting self produced house record from 1989 on Diamond records. It was cut in the times of acid and jack house but sounds more like gentleman's techno. Three of the four tracks on this EP have a similar sound with one acid track to close. Lil Louis owned a club in Chicago club in the late 70's and was famous for his tape edits. He collaborated with Marshall Jefferson through the 80's. He even cut two records for Epic. Lil Louis - French Kiss
The one and only Roy Ayers obviously needs little introduction, but his indie Uno Melodic label still holds a bit of mystique as it was formed in the early 80's as a juxtaposition with his more pop oriented releases on Polydor and Columbia. Released in 1982, Fast Money was Ayers vibraphone laced stab at the boogie-funk sound and a successful one at that. All told the Uno Melodic label put out a handful of recordings, many of them essential. Most certainly we will cover a few more releases down the line.
So anyways Black Shag and I are pulling an all-niter before we catch a very early flight to Montreal to spin some records for the Luxe party at Velvet. Montreal friends, we hope to see you tonite in a haze of sleazy funk and sleep deprivation.
Margie Joseph was a popular soul singer from the American South, people often comparing her tone to a honey dipped Aretha Franklin. Her most praised body of work ranging from the early to mid seventies, but she had the misfortune of recording with a couple of labels in the late seventies and early eighties that went under, stifling her during that period. Apparently there is a set of master tapes out there of some sessions she did with Dexter Wansel that have never seen light of day(!), but fortunately HCRC managed to get her album 'Knockout' pressed, as well as a single 'Move To The Groove' before going belly up. Great punchy synths on these, classy production and vocals, lots of uptempo dancefloor winners, all the good things I like.
Margie had further success later on with a return in 1988, and produced a few more r'n'b charting hits before finally moving out of mainstream popular music to concentrate on her career and family (she had already quit for a while earlier in the seventies to attend college and take a job teaching). I think she still makes gospel and records religious music down in Mississippi:
This groovy track has a lot going on. It is pure synth boogie mixed with proto garage flavor. It came out on Salsoul records in 1984 and it was produced by Randy Muller from Brass Construction and Skyy. I like that this vocal version has starts out giving you the woman's perspective in a deva-esque delivery and then the man gives his rebuttal in a well executed rap. Funk Deluxe - This Time
Guitarist/Vocalist Michael McGloiry released a pair of overlooked dollar bin disco jams in 1979 and 1980 respectively. I transcribed Michael's bio directly from the 12" label of his second release Won't You Let Me Be The One on Airwave Records:
Michael McGloiry is one of the busiest men on the music scene. He has been session guitarist for Switch, Leon Haywood, Jermaine Jackson, Ramsey Lewis and dozens of other acts. He has toured as lead guitarist for Lenny Williams and DJ Rogers. He has produced several records for Jermaine Jackson.
Born in Oakland California under the sign of Aries, Michael makes his home in Hollywood. After achieving some success as a solo artist with another label, Michael McGloiry's newest release on Airwave Records is destined to be a smash hit.
If you feel inclined to dig a bit deeper, Michael also has a few more classic images up on his facebook page.
Kim Tolliver is a storied and much loved and respected icon of the Northern Soul scene, and as such, Party Lights, the hard hitting electro boogie B side of her last ever 12" single is regarded by soul purists as an anomaly to be ignored and forgotten, tarnishing what is a highly regarded soul back catalogue. This a favorite quote taken from a Kim Tolliver fan site:
"Her final disc, in contrast, was a rather weak recut of “Let Them Talk”. It was coupled with the dreadful uptempo “Party Lights”, without doubt the worst song she ever recorded and totally out of character.
This was a rather sad way to conclude such a distinguished recording career."
Well, what can I say other than to each his own, as this is the only Kim Tolliver record I play, and little perhaps do some of these soul beards realize, but Kim Tolliver walked in to a new genre at the tail end of her career and laid down possibly the most punchy, sexually charged track that the modern boogie sound ever produced. It slams. Kim Tolliver faded into obscurity, never producing a hit, but going on to run a successful real estate business, eventually passing away in 2007. Party Lights lives on.
This is one of my favorite roller rink ready italo boogie jamz. In fact, it reminds me that I need to get some fresh bladez and shadez for the roller disco at Mezzanine at the end of the month. Digital Emotion was a Dutch italo group and this record came out on Break Records in 1983. This track is also called Get Up Action. Digital Emotion - Get Up, Do You Wanna Funk
I managed to drag myself out of bed this morning and ride my bike over to the other side of golden gate park for the KUSF record swap benefit. The sun was out and I had a little bread to spend, so I thought I would head over and scope it out, its all for a good cause and helps keep KUSF on the air, which in turn helps me mentally as when your stuck in the city with only an FM radio for entertainment there is only really whatever the nerd uni students are playing on KUSF or if your lucky the 'club classics' DJ might be spinning on meth head energy 92 whatever FM (but usually he isn't spinning, its some meth amphetamine abusing trance DJ). But anyway..
As per usual the popular myth of the deep pocketed black music record collector was blown away by their little known, less sexy counterpart, the aging, now middle aged and super wealthy, punk 45 collector. These guys spend serious scrilla on those angry sounding little records, without even a second thought or briefest attempt at negotiation. It was something to behold. I on the other hand, struck out for the most part, stupidly beguiled by the Achilles heal of many a disco hoarder, the 'still sealed' 'private press' 12" single. I have to remind myself sometimes that the reason that nobody has heard of some of these independent releases, and the reason they are still sealed, is not because of their rarity, its more often than not because they are shit.
I did pick up a few good ones though, and here are my favorites from today's stack. A proto house jam from Brian & Zan on sounds of new york records, a sick French disco funk classic from the strangely named Crystal Grass, and the instrumental flip of the Skyy hit Bad Boy.
APB were an early eighties post punk band from rural Scotland, from near the town of Ellon, so we are talking castles, lochs, monsters etc. Rural. A far cry from the New York club scene where APB's first independent, Aberdeen produced singles became sought after staples, unbeknown to the band until their eventual visit to the US east coast in 83/84 where they recorded an EP.
If you think their sound holds similarities to the media darling acts of circa '03, then no coincidence, they were really the unheralded fathers of modern 'indie dance' 'punk funk' (urgh, christ, I wrote that) or whatever else its called. More timeless in their sound I think than some of the other names that get put around.
This is one of my favorite italo pop tunes. It came out on Hole Records in 1983 and was produced by Den Harrow producers Turatti and Chieregato. The group also had another minor hit Miss You. True to the genre, the song has incomprehensible lyrics because the author just knew 15 words in English and used them all. Anyone care to try to figure them out for us? Styloo - Pretty Face
It's been a long couple of weeks, I am much too burnt out to formulate a cohesive thought but duty calls and a much overdue tribute to my favorite boogie-funk reissue label is in order. People's Potential Unlimited is the brainchild of Washington DC based record digger Andrew Morgan. Andrew is a top authority on the boogie-funk sound, his specialty is tracking down the original artists behind the very obscure records he sources out. Every release on this label just slays, check out some of the highlights posted below. In order to not piss off any of the artists I had to keep these rips low quality, but that's ok, they are all on wax and pretty damn cheap to purchase directly from PPU.
I tried long and hard (about 15 minutes) to find a good disco track for you to listen to while you celebrate 4/20 but I quickly came to the conclusion that the genres of rock, rap, and reggae will probably have you better covered. Listen to Cypress Hill tonight and listen to this track tomorrow. You don't want to see Beat Electricians on the pot, they can't handle it. I don't know much about this cut; I don't even know how to pronounce the artist. I do know that is came out on Partytime records in 1983, it was written and produced by a couple of nobodys and mixed by Jimmy Simpson, who also mixed a couple of GQ 12"s. I did a slight edit to this track. Nhytjar - All In Fun (Instrumental Edit)
It's Los Angeles, the year is 1984 and the city is hosting the olympic games, but outside of the many media spot lights constantly being shone upon LA county, residents and key members of the west coast electro movement, Andre Manuel (The Unknown DJ) and Louis (Three D) King, are forming Technohop records. Launch pad for artists such as Ice T, and a label that would blur the lines between old school west coast hip hop, early techno and house. It all resulted in me having lots of cool tracks and lots of stock photos of people in awesome looking running gear to choose from for the post. Here is a selection from 1987's 'Best Of Technohop' plus some bonuses:
(The technohop copyright holders asked us to take these mp3 links down. They are now selling their re-releases through juno.co.uk)
I am not quite sure why the members of Young & Co. released a couple of 12"s under the Joy alias, but that seemed the fashion for the loose coalition of artists that formed the groups Aurra, Slave, Steve Arrington's Hall of Fame and the aforementioned Company formed in 1979 by the Young brothers. This 1982 release on the bands own Eastern Records is one of my all time favorite boogie joints, period. It certainly didn't hurt that the powerhouse Young & Co. team featured one of the heaviest bass players in the history of soul music, Buddy Hankerson. Now feel free lose your shit to the below video:
Young & Co. still tour to this day and Buddy also has his own project The Buddy Hank band. I am particularly fond of their blown out 1990's 1.0 web page. Also thrown in for good measure is Sending My Love by Pleasure because either it was collecting dust in my rips folder or maybe it is the perfect response to I Need Your Love's call.
This 1979 disco tune by the female power trio Stargard came out on Warner Brothers in 1979. The track was co-produced by Verdine White of Earth Wind & Fire. I have always loved the stomp and the yacht cruising feel of this cut but have never liked the guitar solo. So here is an edit without that nonsense. I plan on editing the vocal version in the future. Stargard - Wear It Out - Instrumental (LeBaron Edit)
Lyrically disco funk wasn't all about 'good times' and escapist hedonism. In practice it was I would assume, these tracks were for the dancefloor, but those acts that were born out of the urban funk and r'n'b scenes carried over some of the subject matter in their song writing that was pertinent to the young people in inner city dancing to and making this music at the time. Here are two upbeat, disco funk dancers that convey the struggle of making it day to day in the turn of the eighties.
Denny Greene's 'The Great Escape' is a real favorite of mine, it has all the hall marks of an expensive, highly collectible record. Its an indie pressing on the small Lenox Ave. records print, with it's two tone picture sleeve, hard boogie down backing percussion and moog lead breakdowns. Yet for some reason 'The Great Escape', Denny's only solo 12" that I know of, and his solo LP, go for a buck or two whenever I come across them. There is no justice. Especially considering one half of the album is great, slightly dusted indie disco and the other well written soulful reggae, I thought people were all over that. The Great Escape's powerful vocals hit hard and do justice to the instrumental... people dying, all the time, to skag and blow and pils and wine.. I have no idea what happened to Denny Greene despite trying to track him down. If anyone knows please leave a comment.
Next is the more known and sought after bboy historian favorite Prince Charles & The City Beat Band with 'In The Streets' on Greyhound Record Productions. This one is quirky, even to the point that it has it's labels on back to front so I ended up having to record both sides having accidental recorded the instrumental instead of the vocal. Double bonus for you:
This is a great 1983 track that came out on Mango records in 1983. It has a proto garage sound with a dark synth bass and cosmic synth sounds. It also has a really long janky keyboard solo up front that I love. Sorry my copy(s) are so jacked, I tried my best to remove the pops. Affinity - Don't Go Away (Runaway Dub)
So Black Shag already plugged the upcoming House Arrest event in his excellent Z Factor post on Monday. I will let you read the listing below if you want more details about San Francisco's first epic house music party of 1989.
It seems we only post tracks from modern artists maybe once a year at BE and in my opinion this duo is well deserving of that slot. Azari & III's fresh update on the early Chicago House and Detroit Techno sounds has struck a large chord with us over here. Expect many more deep synth stabs from these wizards in the not so distant future. Azari & III - She's An Illusion Azari & III - Hungry For The Power
There is a mainstream revival of the classic 909 driven Chicago house sound at the moment, which most of you probably are more aware of than me, but some of the popular stuff that has crossed over recently doesn't sound so much inspired by mid to late eighties Chicago house so much as is mid to late eighties Chicago house in higher fidelity, and that's fine by me.
As such we are hosting Azari & III this Friday at Mezzanine in San Francisco, and I will be spinning alongside Jeno, Solar, Conor, Ken Vulsion and Derrick Love, it'll be a blast. If your not a San Francisco local or Euro holiday maker passing through, simply came here for the mp3's and don't give a shit about our party or the local hero line up (myself humbly excluded) then no apologies are given, as you are still better off for it, because it inspired me to record my beaten copy of Z Factor's Fast Cars for this post. Argued by academics to be the first ever house record made available to the public.
Z Factor included Vincent Lawrence and Jesse Saunders, two names that are well documented in the music history books and there are great interviews and accounts of that time in 1982/83/84 and what they achieved. Both would have been in their late teens when Jesse Saunders joined the new wave synth punk band Z Factor in Vince's father's studio, the owner of Mitchball records, the label that put out the promo I have, at the time a small soul and Chicago blues print. Some say 'On and On', Z Factor's follow up record is the first true house recording, a tape edit of some rhythms that Jesse Saunders would loop in the south side clubs during his sets at the time, but you can certainly hear the foundation for what was coming here in this rare 1983 release:
I had initially conceptualized this post as a means to reveal that both Black Shag and myself must be Ray Caviano's illegitimate children due to our shared reputations as scoundrel's. Now of course we draw the line long before ripping anyone off least of all Jimmy Ross. Leaving Jimmy stranded and broke in New York City only to be deported seems just a little extreme. Oddly enough the many negative comments about Caviano accrued on the last Beat Electric RFC post have now mysteriously disappeared leaving his scoundrel status somewhat dubious. Still it seems hard to deny, enough old schoolers in the know reached out to us and explained in detail what a crooked bastard this guy was.
That said, Caviano had a pretty good ear for talent. Here are a few key tracks from the partnership of RFC and Toronto based Quality Records. I now ask each of you to find it in your hearts to send A Number of Names a paypal donation or drop Monica Thornton a modest check in the mailas it seems clear Ray Caviano wasn't much into making good on his artists royalty payments.
Beat Electric is all about these Italo versions of yacht rock classics. Here we have our favorite rendition of a Chicago classic with a sultry sexy treatment that almost makes the listener want to commit suicide. Next is probably the first mash up ever. What happens when you mix Michael Jackson with Steely Dan? Tough question, but we are sure you will clown fools when you play it in the club tonight.
We have put up some early eighties offerings from New Orleans disco funk outfit Chocolate Milk before, but I flipped over their 12" 'Who's Getting It Now' this afternoon and was reminded of how funky the instrumental is. A great long running hi hat driven intro for the DJ's amongst us. I heard these guys reformed and played some shows around Louisiana a couple of years back, I wonder if they ever make it out of their home state.
As an added weekend bonus here are some 1980 cosmic disco sound library joints from Gianni Safred, Django Reinhardt's keyboard player (?).
The one theme of continuity between the two tracks that I'am posting today are that firstly, they were both in front of me as I had recently listened to them, and secondly they are both high energy dancers but from opposite disco epochs, 1977 for Bionic Boogie's 'Boogie Boo' and..well, I don't know when the DJ Peebo did his JDC released "U.S Remix" of German new wave pop band Boytronic'sBryllyant as it's not on the label, I'm guessing 1987. Maybe I'm clutching at straws for a thin connection between the two simply because I wanted to post more than one records and didn't want to think hard about it. Oh, wait, they both have lots of B's in their names and titles. That's good enough for me.
A really sick 7 inch featured here from Pittsburgh, PA unit The Assignment. Released in '87, Jammin' to the Beat was the groups first release and quite notable as it so nicely bridged the gap between lo fi boogie and late 80's electric funk. The band released a few more singles and experienced regional notoriety but never quite broke through on the national stage. If you want to dig a little deeper on The Assignment, I found a pretty sweet bio page with some lo-res scans of the band (featuring members Chill Bill, Fly Ty and Cookie) in full Prince-esque splendor. The Assignment - Jammin' To The Beat The Assignment - Keep Jammin' To The Beat
I am leaving for vacation France on Thursday and thought it would be a good time to post this edit of a 1968 Serge Gainsbourg song. This cut was written for the soundtrack of the classic film La Pacha. I have no idea what he is saying, but apparently it is a funeral speech at the burial of an asshole and there are no holds barred. Let me know if there if something fun going on in Nice this weekend! Serge Gainsbourg - Requiem Pour Un C... (LeBaron Edit)
Sunfire is probably the least heralded and hardest to come by project of Reggie Lucas, former Miles Davis band member and production partner of percussionist Mtume, whom he met whilst they both played for Davis. his best known work probably being Madonna's 1983 debut album. Both these tracks were taken from Sunfire's self titled and only album. There is a 12" of Shake Your Body out there (somewhere) which is well worth tracking down. I love the beautiful synth work on the album, its like a perfect balance between newer electronic sounds that were coming in and more traditional funk live sound that was already well established.
Reggie Lucas founded Quantum studios in New Jersey, which now famously is used for all the big selling lovely new jersey scene screamo core punk emo goth whatever that comes out of that part of the world, and teaches at the music department in Montclair University. (source - the internets)
My original intent for this post was to be the third part of my Mastermix series, this time featuring the Prelude Vol. II Tony Humphries mixes. Well my thrift store copy is fucked and beaten to death, I was only able to salvage the two least essential tracks off the comp. Not to worry, I will track down a new copy and post them up sometime down the road. In an attempt to make up for the lack of killer content here I am throwing in a pretty smooth track from the second Wynd Chymes LP entitled Festival. For more on Wynd Chymes, read the comments by the bands former lead singer on our post from a couple of years back.
Nicky Siano was one of the first DJs to mix records and owned the legendary club The Gallery in Manhattan which he opened in 1972. He was the most proficient DJ of the era and mentored both Frankie Knuckles and Larry Levan. His sound system, which was a scaled up version of the one at the loft is thought by many to be the best sounding club system ever. Nicky had isolators and crossovers set to tweak the sound in his live sets which he mixed on three turntables. The club set the standard and predated the legendary clubs Zanzibar, Studio 54, and The Paradise Garage.
Nicky set another benchmark when he became the first DJ to produce a record. Arthur Russeland Nicky released Kiss Me Again by Dinosaur in 1978 on Sire Records. Guitar work is done by David Byrne. Nicky put a couple of records out under his own and this one from 1986 has a strange Ultravox meets pop disco sound.
I think this tune was written to be the perfect car chase or karate fight scene song for a late 70's cop show. It came out on Shady Brook Records in 1977 by a group known as S.S.O. or The S.S.O. Orchestra. Their name is an abbreviation The Soul Sensation Orchestra, so the later name is redundant. I like the blaxploitation feel and the jazz funk sound that is going on. Vocals are executed by The Sugar Sisters. The track was produced by Roland Kruger, who also produced Que Tal America and other tunes by by Two Man Sound.
Broccoli Rabe Records is still in business to this day, although now I believe the co-founder, Brian Drago, runs it as a post production and film scoring facility in it's home of Fairfield, New Jersey. Yet for a period in the early 80's Broccoli Rabe turned out some now much sought after east coast style synth funk and proto rap records.
I have seen L'Amour's Let's Make Love Tonight turn up elsewhere on the internet recently, but the vocal side that has been posted around is a little campy for my tastes, and I tend to play the 'remix version' on the flip, which is more of a dub with just extracts of the chorus. Hope you enjoy:
I recently came to the realization that we haven't explicitly covered the band Slave here in the several years since BE's inception. Now our omission can be justifiable to a point. Slave is a rather obvious group from the era, but a damn important one at that. Hailing from Dayton Ohio circa 1975, Slave were one of a handful of 70's artists that set the foundation for the Boogie-Funk sound as we know it. A common record no doubt but thanks in large part to Steve Arrington's vocals and the bands top notch arrangement, Feel My Love delivers in a big way. As Slave continued to hit new peaks in the early 80's their "Fearless Leader" Steve Washington left the band to form the equally killer group, Aurra. By request I also am posting Baby Love a prime Aurra track from 1983 with a b-side Mastermix by Shep Pettibone to boot.
This jam by The Bang Gang came out on Sugarscoop in 1981. It is an early track produced by the most prolific dance music producer of the 80s and 90s; Bobby Orlando. This track has a much more black and boogie oriented feel than the Hi NRG sound for which he is known. His most notable release was Passion by the Flirts. Bobby O has an interesting story. It turns out he was a religious, raging homophobe, but made the gayest music known to man. Being a short, sober man of epic self confidence, he set up lots of labels and produced lots of music just for the payday. I stumbled upon this amazing quote by the narcissist that was originally printed in music magazine The Face in 1987: "I regard each record I make as worthless and useless just like anybody else’s"..."Anybody who thinks that their music is something special is worshiping a false doctrine. There is nothing that any artist can say that is really of any importance because anything other than God’s word is laced with the evil and has to regarded as sin tainted." Click HERE for the article. The Bang Gang - Street Music The Bang Gang - Street Music (Instrumental)
I finally unpacked my records, but managed to put each and every individual cable I needed to get the home rig set up in a separate box, as if I was, at the time of packing, playing a stupid joke on myself. It was quite funny, costing me a day of my stupid life. Look what I found though in the back of a an old microwave box marked as containing kitchen utensils, another New York scene synth classic.
It's Heavy! is the dub instrumental on the flip of Barbara Norris's Heavy Hitter, the vocal side of which I saw bootlegged in the UK or Belgium a couple of years ago, but the campy hi-nrg vocals don't do justice to the synth funk instrumental. I have no idea why the first couple of bars of my copy of the record sound so crackly and beaten, I remember it being pristine when I found it. Its probably just an indicator of how many times I have dropped this in a set, spilt beer on it, put an overweighted, thrashed club needle on it and enjoyed listening to it since first having the fortune of pulling it out of a crate in San Mateo:
Jocelyn Brown is a bad ass. The beginning of this song is just stunning and rarely has a song about two timing love been so upbeat. "Somebody Elses Guy" was released in 1984 and peaked at #2 on the US R&B charts. It's not exactly a difficult record to find, I found it in a dollar bin, but it's a song that has that sound, that hook and instrumentation that sticks with you and I can't help but clap and sing along "OoohhhhI can't get off my high horse aaand I can't let go. You aaare the one who makes me feeel soo reeal." The break down really takes the song into a cool groove that just makes it even more danceable, the kind where one closes their eyes and enjoys a few minutes in a zone on the floor.
Just when I thought I was out of high caliber boogie records to post I went digging through my crates tonite and found this jam on Prism subsidiary Snowflake Records. Another one off track by the husband and wife team of Curtis and Laurice Hudson, Feel My Love apparently got a good amount of airplay on Kiss FM in NYC during the hottest summer for music on record, 1982.
I moved into a new apartment this week, so all my crappy records are still in boxes, unmarked boxes with mixed and bizarre content, 7"s getting destroyed by free moving kitchen equipment and cookware. I messed up and didn't pack until the morning the movers were set to arrive. This made it hard finding something to post today, and to compound the problem I also have a gig tonight at the Mezz and so far have only managed to unpack a few boxes of classical music and weirdy jazz.
Fortunately though I did come across Passion's 'Don't Stop My Love' retrospective LP whilst looking for my toothbrush (true), as well as the 12" instrumental version of the title track.
Recorded in Miami by Ray Martinez, Passion had the pleasure of including amongst it's members fruit loop cult leader, and Beat Electric favorite, Dr. York! as always, go check out his wikipedia entry.
After hearing the disturbing news that several mp3 blogs were decimated last night by our friends at Skynet, I am stepping out of my cave this evening to mourn and wallow with some oblivious party toddlers. Therefore I ask forgiveness for the brevity.
So Different is a modern soul stepper on Sound of New York Records from Kevin Bassett aka Kinky Foxx. Complete with a "Sure Shot Mix" by Tony Humphries, this was Foxx's only known release. I suppose if you are going to cut only one single in your career, might as well make it a winner.
Addendum:
Our friend Matt from Montreal shared an email he received about the band from a gentleman that worked at the club where Kinky Foxx kept a residency in the early 80's. Here goes:
I worked at Checkers from '81-'87, and the Kinky Foxx effect took hold maybe in '82. Their big heyday was maybe for the 2/3 years following, though they kept showing up as long as I worked there.
When they first came up, Johnny Kemp was the lead vox but he left 'em when they more or less moved up here, and was replaced by Vincent Lilly (who sings on So Different.) Personally, I liked 'em more with Johnny, as Vincent was a bit of an MJ clone, but they were still a fierce live band (and I mean live: trap drums, percussions, slap bass, Jimmy Nolen-style rhythm guit & Ernie Isley/Eddie Hazel wailing lead, keys...) Rhythm guit Kevin Clarence Basset (who wrote So Diff) sang great lead on a few, which were the highlights for me: Champagne's Try Again, Rick James' Ghetto Life etc.
As a live band they were every bit as good as Cameo, or whoever you might name from that era, but they never got the break to get out of the bars. They worked a fuck of a lot in bars, though. One night I turned 'em all onto 'shrooms, which (to my surprise) they'd never encountered in NYC: half of them loved it, and the other half wanted to kill me!
It was intense times to be around for sure, but just think: if you'd been there then, you'd be old (or dead) now! I still have some pretty much equally intense times, but obviously everything's that much larger than life when you're 20 than when you're more'n twice that. I wish I'd taped a few KF shows: I still remember them really vividly, but I can't make you a dub of that! Kinky Foxx - So Different (Tony Humphries Sure Shot Mix)
This is a heavy cosmic disco track that is almost guaranteed to get you laid this Valentine's Day. Demis has had a long and storied career of swooning schmaltzy tunes but he put out a couple of great disco records. You can find another one of his tracks in the tags section. Also here is a slow jam to help you seal the deal. Demis Roussos - L.O.V.E Got A Hold Of Me Zapp - Computer Love
With its anthemic backing track and trippy sped up vocals, Lady Bug is considered by many to be a definitive disco banger. I have always been somewhat dubious of the chipmunk style vocals but Patrick Adams and Greg Carmichael's incredible production work definitely breaks through. There were many 12" versions pressed upon its release in 1978, including the original on Greg Carmichael's Red Greg and a later RCA pressing featuring remix work from two of New York City's hottest DJ's at the time: John Morales and Larry Levan. These were both very early remix gigs for Morales and Levan and in my humble opinion Morales's hypnotic dancefloor mix shines brighter than Levan's more sparse version. UK label BBE recently issued a stellar comp featuring classic Morales remixes and a bunch of unreleased M&M session mixes from the era.
Legendary dance music label Mirage Records was formed in 1980 by brother Bob and Jerry Greenberg, Bob holding down the West coast and Jerry setting up office in the East. Jerry had previously been the youngest ever major record company executive, moving to the top position at Atlantic Records at age 32, and both brothers had storied careers in the music and entertainment industry that continues to this day. They have restaurants in Vegas and Jerry was involved in Michael Jackson's music rights holding company, sitting as chairman for Michael throughout the 90's.
Mirage was famous for producing underground electro funk and freestyle records that successfully crossed over to the mainstream. A couple of years ago John Morales remastered a selection of Mirage releases from the original tapes for the small indie re-release label FTG (Funky Town Grooves) records, which released them as an under the radar CD compilation series in the UK. They look like low quality bootlegs from the photoshopped, cheaply printed covers, but they are legit. Please seek these out and buy all 3 volumes so I don't feel so bad about posting a few of these great remasters.
These tracks may be a bit too smooth for some of you, but Valentines Day is coming up so all you foos better get with the program. Cecil and Linda Womack make up the husband and wife duo Womack & Womack. Linda Womack is the late Sam Cooke's daughter and Cecil's brother Bobby Womack is a well known R&B artist. There are quite a few scandals that surround the family and as it turns out, Linda is Cecil's niece through marriage.
Womack & Womack have a very unique sound that seems to blend modern soul, country, and pop seamlessly. There is a lot of Sam Cook influence in there as well. I first heard Conscience of My Conscience in the Henrik Schwarz DJ Kicks and it remains one of my favorite jamz. I picked up the Strange and Funny 12" a while back and I love its country soul vibe. Teardrops is a dancefloor ready tune that was recently covered (and surprisingly, not in an "ironic" indie way) by the xx.
Using a picture of a tricked out, synthesizer laden studio from 1987 is a little misrepresentative of a orchestral disco track from 1977, but I like pictures of machines and the artist behind the track in question, Mike Theodore, doesn't have many redeeming mug shots laying around the internet. I did find one from Soul And Blues Magazine, but it makes him look like a cheerful college professor and doesn't give him the druggy, edgy, party genius sheen that we like to impose on our borrowed remembrance of every figure form this era. The photo was all in focus and he was smiling.
The Bull is from Cosmic Wind, The Mike Theodore Orchestra's debut LP. It was used as the entry music for an NFL player of the time, also nicknamed The Bull, and would play whenever he ran onto the field, the vocals were sung by a local belly dancer the guys in the band had met at the Playboy Club whilst on a night out shortly before recording.
