In 1974 the world saw the final moment in the ongoing Watergate saga as Richard Nixon resigned from the presidency, a seismic moment for democracy and the rule of law and as the oil crisis put the world into jeopardy there were other huge political moments taking place. Haile Selassie was deposed in Ethiopia by a military junta that then ruled the country for the next seventeen years and a military coup in Portugal called the Carnation Revolution led to the overthrow of the Estado Novo regime.

The Three-Day Week in the UK was introduced to conserve what had become scarce electricity resource following a series of strikes. The year would see a hung parliament followed by a Labour victory deposing the then Conservative government. The mainland saw increased activity by the IRA as they stepped up their bombing campaign. As a very young child the world seemed lost and scary.

Music, however, felt positive and hopeful. The sounds of funk, soul and disco were everywhere and rock music was glamorous and energetic. ABBA famously won the Eurovision song contest with the brilliant Waterloo and Bowie’s Diamond Dogs and Genesis’ The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway pushed intelligent art rock into popularity.

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The top twenty-five

25: Kiss - Strutter

Off the back of their debut album Kiss released this sparkling glam rock track, an example of just how good they were in the very early years. Strutter shines above their later hard rock nonsense, full of crunching guitars and featuring a superb solo by Ace Frehley. A simple but delightfully catchy rock track.

24: Labelle - Lady Marmalade

With the fantastic funk band The Meters as backing musicians Labelle pulled off a funky soul classic with Lady Marmalade, full of outer space funk sounds and near perfect vocals, it drips with confidence and sass. The vocalists, Patti LaBelle, Nona Hendryx and Sarah Dash sing with style, creating a funky space jam that digs into your body and never lets go.

23: Status Quo - Down Down

An incredibly mesmeric rock track, built from jangling guitars and morphing into a relentless 12-bar boogie. Whilst it is easy to joke about Status Quo writing the same song over and over (or again and again, I should say) in fact they wrote some excellent rock and roll throughout the 70s.

22: Marc Bolan and T. Rex - Teenage Dream

Marc Bolan gives us a theatrical take on 50s pop with the four chord melodrama of Teenage Dream. That classic pattern: G - Em - C - D is combined with Bolan’s opaque imagery, lyrics mainly chosen for their rhyme rather than any reason

The curfew comes at the, crack of night
The sad old wino aches to dissipate the fright
The jet junk jiver speeds past in his machine
Whatever happened to the Teenage Dream?

This was the first track to be released as Marc Bolan and T. Rex as Marc took even more of a centre stage. I’ve always felt he ran out of steam over the next few years, but I love the magic drama of this track.

21: Suzi Quatro - Devil Gate Drive

Quatro’s second moment of brilliance after last year’s Can the Can, and her second UK number one, Devil Gate Drive is powered by its glam rock chorus. Much of glam rock took its inspiration from the rock and roll of the 50s and this is no different, built around a three chord rock groove for the most part. The chorus, however, is filled with drama and excitement. This drama is lost by a somewhat comic TV performance from Top of the Pops where the band do a clumsy dance, but the song is three minutes of glam rock magic.

20: The Jackson 5 - Dancing Machine

The disco band were returned to the height of their power with this smash hit. It is a slick and smart funky groove, and it uses the overlapping voices of the band to great effect. It burst into life almost straight away and then slips into a great funk beat, Michael Jackson sings the lead with support from big brother Jermaine while the other brothers add backing vocals. It’s made by a superb horn break that is genuinely exciting and was used by Michael to promote his new “robot” dancing. It’s a cool groove and one of the band’s best singles.

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19: David Essex - Gonna Make You a Star

Essex continued to produce great pop music during the middle of the 70s. He wrote this one, which is built around a wonderful synthesiser riff that sounds otherworldly and strange. Essex sings with a lazy cool and the track leapt to the top of the UK charts, although it only made 105 in the US. It straddles the world of glam rock and pop music, catchy and full of hypnotic energy.

The b-side is something else completely. Window is a creepy song, possibly about a peeping tom, and it ends with a terrifying child’s voice, full of fear and dread. It makes the single even more complete.

18: Funkadelic - Standing on the Verge of Getting it On

Even as George Clinton was reviving the funkier pop of Parliament, he powered on with the quirky rock sounds of Funkadelic. The track is driven by the twin guitars of Eddie Hazel - Funkadelic’s greatest guitarist - and Roy Bykowski. Only Funkadelic could really produce a hard rock funk track like this, built around an amazing descending opening riff (once you’ve got through Clinton’s weird vocal opening).

It feels like the whole band is singing and that adds to the track, almost like a live performance. It is totally different from the warm disco sounds of the period, but equally designed to make you dance. Just fabulous. The music is designed to do no harm.

17: Dion - New York City Song

Working with Phil Spector, Dion recorded an album that he ended up hating, calling it “funeral music”. That album, Born to be With You is magnificent and essential, and this single is equally brilliant. It is what intelligent adult oriented rock should sound like, wonderful chiming acoustic guitar ringing behind Dion’s voice as he warns of the dangers of the city and looks back with sadness - “That’s the year my dream died in New York City”. This track was not produced by Spector but fits in with the sound of the whole record. A warm and catchy chorus full of tenderness.

16: Smokey Robinson - Just My Soul Responding

An amazing soul single written as a response to the challenges received by the Civil Rights movement but a song that works on its own as a piece of remarkable music. It’s cleverly built around a Native American sound which adds a remarkable drama to the track, but it swings and sways with soul. Smokey sings about the Vietnam war,

I had a lot to live, said I had a lot to give
Till a man comes to hand me a gun
And though that war he sent me to
Didn't claim me
If I'm bitter don't blame me
It's just my soul responding
Don't you try to tell me I'm unpatriotic
I deserve an explanation

and the disappearing rights of the Native American population,

This land once belonged to my father
And to his father before him too
Let me tell you now, I'm on a reservation
Living in a state of degradation

and does it with a luscious soul sound that is wonderful.

15: Hall & Oates - She’s Gone

Gentle and cool blue-eyed soul from Daryl Hall and John Oates. The chorus is magnificent, their voices locking together, the song swirling and spinning. It is quite exquisite in the way it builds, a gently beautiful song coming from their second album, Abandoned Luncheonette, which is equally brilliant.

14: Sly & The Family Stone - Loose Booty

Sly takes James Brown’s concept of funk to its logical conclusion on Loose Booty, the track becoming a minimalist funk masterpiece, incessant and moving like clockwork. The whole family sing lines and play to perfection, especially Rusty Allen’s bouncing bass. After two minutes the track settles into a fabulous dance groove, Sly repeating the words “Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego” over and over. They were the three men saved from Nebuchadnezzar’s fire in the Book of Daniel and as Sly himself wrote, “Music could help you resist everyday problems. Music could keep you out of the fire.”

13: The Rolling Stones - It’s Only Rock’n’Roll (But I Like It)

The Stones delved into traditional rock and roll sound with this great track which features Ron Wood on acoustic guitar before he’d officially joined the band and has Keith Richards playing some delicious slide guitar. The chorus is wonderfully catchy, and if you listen carefully you can hear David Bowie singing backing vocals. Kenny Jones plays drums instead of Charlie Watts as it was put together one evening at Wood’s house. Jagger sings about the pressure of being in the band and the standard they were being held to at the time - was anything good enough for the press?

If I could stick my pen in my heart, And spill it all over the stage;
Would it satisfy ya, would it slide on by ya, Would you think the boy is strange?

12: Richard and Linda Thompson - I Want to See the Bright Lights Tonight

Husband and wife team Richard and Linda created a snappy electric folk track here which is the centrepiece of the brilliant album of the same name. It features some incredible vocals from Linda as Richard’s guitar snakes around in the background. The horns are a jolly counterposition to the dark guitar sounds and they propel the song even further. It is a delightful piece of modern English folk music.

11: Stevie Wonder - You Haven’t Done Nothin’

The track opens with the cascading keyboard sounds that rain down incessantly before we snap into a snake-hipped funk groove and Stevie sings directly at Richard Nixon, full of anger and disgust. The song is a funk groove, the clavinet squawking and yelping as Stevie sings. The Jackson Five sing “do-do-wap” backing vocals, introduced with cool style by Stevie: “Jackson 5, join along with me - say”. The horns weave and yell throughout giving a perfect accompaniment to Stevie’s music.

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The top ten

10: Rufus & Chaka Khan - Tell Me Something Good

Stevie Wonder wrote this song too, and once you know you can feel him all over it. Rufus were a Chicago funk band and they worked with the marvellous Chaka Khan on this top 5 US hit. It prowls and stomps, full of strange funky asides, and has a cool singalong chorus that follows a moment of respite, as the band seem to breathe and groan, moving into a bouncy funk groove. I would love to hear Stevie’s version.

9: Roxy Music - All I Want is You

Three minutes of perfect glam pop, the track opens with Phil Manzanera’s ringing guitars before bursting into a double time rocker. The track barrels along, almost unstoppable, Paul Thompson’s drums driving the track. It steps back for the bridge before kicking back in on each verse. The middle section rocks hard allowing Manzanera to solo brilliantly, and the whole track has a sharp pop feel whilst still pointing toward the punk sounds that were to come in the next few years.

8: Commodores - Machine Gun

One of the coolest and funkiest instrumental ever, I can’t get enough of the deep funk keyboard and guitars on this. It explodes and you need to dance when you listen to it. The opening groove is uplifting and joyous, swinging from side to side as the spacey sounds burst in, but what makes it is the more laid back funk groove that lies underneath. Every now and then the song strips back to just that bit, a head-nodding masterpiece. I love the moment after about one and a half minutes when you clearly hear the section sampled by The Beastie Boys for Hey Ladies, the song a strutting, joyful groove.

7: ABBA - Waterloo

A pop masterpiece from a band I really didn’t like as a child. I’m not sure why. Perhaps they were too clean, too neat, for my childish ears. Obviously, I was wrong. This is that rare thing, a Eurovision winner that is truly brilliant. It has a great rock and roll chorus and so feels in sync with the glam rock of the time, but it shimmers with pop as Agnetha and Anni-Frid sing with joy. It has a wonderful 50s feel like so much of the best glam rock of the time, and was one of the catchiest songs of the year.

6: David Bowie - Rebel Rebel

Opening with that dirty and magnificent riff that cycles around the D and E chord this shows Bowie foreshadowing the metallic sound of punk rock and clearly moving on from the glam rock music of the age. I particularly love Herbie Flowers’ wonderful bass lines that leap in and out from time to time. The song is repetitive and hypnotic, an incessant groove, melodic but simple, and stripped down, no guitar solo, just a near-endless groove, Bowie dolled up like a punk pirate.

5: Parliament - Up for the Down Stroke

A lithe and stunning funk track that heralded the rebirth of Parliament, Clinton aiming to give his band a wider range of options for their many vocalists. It is a superb funky chant sung by Clinton, Fuzzy Haskins and Eddie Hazel. This is not disco, with an amazing time signature twist during the middle section. The magnificent Bernie Worrell adds his typical keyboard noises throughout, and the horns throw out a wonderful riff. It is a stunning example of the great music this band would produce over the next five years.

I don’t care about the cold, baby
Cause when you’re hot, you’re too much
Cause when you’re hot, you’re hot
Look at what you’ve got

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4: James Brown - The Payback, Part I

The Payback is James Brown’s greatest 70s album, and he pulled and cut down the title track for this deeply slinky and stunning single. Charles Sherrell lays down a deep and solid bass line as JB yells his words of revenge and crime over the top

I can do wheelin', I can do dealin'
But I don't do no damn squealin'

It was originally planned to be part of a soundtrack to the sequel to Black Caesar but was rejected as being too long. The single version has this wonderful moment when Hank Spann suddenly says, “"This is for Atlanta!” and other big US cities. I don’t know why, but it’s cool.

The top three

3: Roxy Music - The Thrill of it All

Dark and mysterious, this is a stunning piece of music. It builds tension in the first 20 seconds before the drums thunder in and it becomes a hard rocking pop song. Ferry sings with precision and cool and Phil Manzanera adds some superb guitar lines over the top. It is a relentless piece of art-rock, with a middle section that slows and wanders and verses that are unstoppable. I think it is a magnificent song.

2: Wings - Band on the Run

I don’t know how many people would put Band on the Run in their top 3 but I love the way the three sections of the song fit together to create a wonderfully satisfying whole. It opens with ringing, almost folk, guitar sounds accompanied by a weaving and dancing synthesiser. Paul McCartney s playing most instruments here, with support from Denny Laine on guitar and Linda McCartney on keyboards. Their vocals mesh and blend beautifully. Suddenly the song steps into a funk-rock groove built around a great little riff and a fantastic synth noise. And just as quick the song transforms into a symphonic country rocker, acoustic guitar ringing out and Paul’s vocals soaring with joy. It gallops to its end full of energy and makes for a delightful listen.

1: Big Star - September Gurls

What a band! The ultimate example of power pop and a song that should have been a huge hit and should be known by everyone. It opens with some fantastic ringing open chords that move down the fretboard before the strings ring out and Alex Chilton starts to sing. The verses are joyous and dramatic and they take us to the magnificent chorus. But it’s the chords that make it: they clang and ring throughout filling me with pure delight. After a minute and a half we get to a simple but absolutely perfect guitar solo that rings out without ever trying to be flashy. Chilton is the “December boy” of the chorus and he wrote the song about three women he knew who all had September birthdays. This is what power pop should sound like.

Agree or disagree? Leave a comment!

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About me

I have a radio show, Single Minded, on Radio Alty, every week on Wednesday at 8pm (UK). Listen here:

https://www.radioalty.co.uk/

Older shows can be found here:

I have also written a book about the great singles of the 1960s which can be found on Amazon:

• The Greatest Singles of the Sixties: A personal journey through music [UK]

• The Greatest Singles of the Sixties: A personal journey through music [USA]

• The Greatest Singles of the Sixties: A personal journey through music [CAN and beyond!]

Forty years ago today Run DMC released one of the most important and influential rap albums of all time. I had it on cassette, and listened on my little Alba cassette player whenever I could. I can remember every sound even 40 years on.

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Their third album, it was the first Platinum and multi-Platinum rap record and it signalled a sea change in rap music, blowing away everything that came before it. It forged a remarkable crossover with rock music, bringing in guitars to join with Jam Master Jay’s incredible DJ work and the stunning drum machine beats and it influenced a plethora of rap artists over the next few years.

Describing the recording process DMC said, “We did that album in like three months. It was so quick because every rhyme was written on the road and had been practiced and polished. We knew what we wanted to do. Rick was all music and instruments. Jay was music and DJing. And me and Run was lyrics. We definitely had a game plan”.

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This record proved that rap could be an “albums” genre and forty years on it is as remarkable and as exciting as it was when I listened to it in my bedroom on that tiny cassette player.

The cover

Even the cover is cool. A purple tinted photo of Run and DMC, hands in pockets, hats on heads, slightly blurred and slightly angled. They just look like the coolest guys in the world, and it was even cooler to have them in their strange hats and DMC proudly wearing his glasses. I soon had two new heroes.

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Side one

The side explodes into life with their cool take on the nursery rhymes of their youth with Peter Piper. The vocal interplay between Run and DMC is magnificent as they rap of Jam Master Jay’s talents with his decks. Jay slips in a cool sample from Take Me To The Mardi Gras by Bob James. Jay twists and turns the turntables with perfect cool as Run DMC rap over the top, spitting out words relentlessly.

Taking the guitar from The Knack’s My Sharona and creating a strange twist on Tosi Basil’s Mickey gives us It’s Tricky, a bouncing, funky rap track full of blistering energy and endless fun. The Knack ended up suing Run DMC for the sample which is a shame because this song shows how to use a short portion of a track to create new art.

They follow this up with the even more stark My Adidas, with Run and DMC yelling their words, celebrating their footwear over an utterly fabulous, stuttering drum machine beat. Jay scratches and bends time with his decks as the songs grooves. It’s glorious fun, full of neat rhymes

And I walk down the street, and bop to the beat
With Lee on my legs and Adidas on my feet

The beat rolls on at the end before it morphs almost imperceptibly into Walk This Way. This crossover track with the then almost forgotten Aerosmith is quite incredible and one of the most important tracks of its time. It brought rap into everyone’s home, it reminded everyone that Aerosmith existed and they would go on to have huge success again after this. I certainly bought Permanent Vacation the next year because of this. It hit the top 5 in the US and the top ten in the UK, becoming a trailblazing rap track. Mixing their drum machine beats and decks with live guitars made it sound like nothing else, and everyone plays their part to perfection. Joe Perry adds some scintillating guitar lines and Steven Tyler screams to his maximum as Run and DMC spit out the words. Perfection.

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On Is It Live the band have great fun using a stylish groove for their rap, a cool beat clanging in the background. They sing of their talents but it never sounds big headed or annoying, it’s delightful fun and delightfully daft:

And I’m the wizard of words, the ruler of rap
Not soft, not a sucka’, could never be a sap

Although it is somewhat spoiled by lines of misogyny at the end.

The side ends with some solid straightforward rapping by Run and DMC about DMC’s Perfectionist streak with some utterly great lines that shouldn’t work but do:

I got prescription glasses and my eyes are correct
Two times every year I go to have them checked

The beat is relentless and hard, just bouncing along, ready to dance to, and full of funk.

Side two

This side opens with an echoing, yelling voice from DMC as Hit It Run explodes. It is an absolute energy blast, DMC just blowing his words out with incredible force and Run throws out a cool beat box groove after each verse. JMJ is solid behind the decks, throwing out a sample from Rocket in the Pocket by Cerrone. The whole track leaves you breathless, and leaves you wondering why DMC isn’t breathless at the end of it as he hammers out the words. It ends with a yelled “Run-D.M.C. and Jam Master Jay” before Rick Rubin’s guitar (allegedly) cranks up and we move into the title track.

Raising Hell is a superb track, full of anger cranked up by the rock guitar that blasts through it. Like Walk This Way it was another example of rap and rock crossing over and creating a new sound, one that would be borrowed and stolen by thousands of other bands. It’s metal rap, and it rocks so hard. Can you imagine going to listen to someone like the Red Hot Chili Peppers after hearing this?

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The band’s third single was with deliciously fun You Be Illin’. It is a great slice of silliness as the band rap about mixing up football and basketball, accidentally eating dog food and having bad breath. It funks over a cool piano line accompanied by some great horns. It’s clear the band are having great fun here, adn Jay throws out some incredible beats, especially in the middle.

A song called Dumb Girl is clearly of its time and it’s also the weakest musically as well as being stuffed with clumsy imagery and nasty ideas. I could try and come up with a clever defence of it but I won’t, it’s clumsy and nasty.

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It is followed by the short and brilliant Son of Byford, 30 seconds of DMC rapping about himself as Run throws out his beat box.

I was born son of Byford, brother of Al
Bannah’s my mama and Run’s my pal
It’s McDaniels, not McDonald’s
These rhymes are Darryl’s, those burgers are Ronald’s

Short, sweet and brilliant.

And then the record ends with the incendiary Proud to be Black. This track is incessant and relentless but rarely angry. It celebrates the power of Black Pride pulling on history and personal anecdotes from the band. The beat flies, just wonderful, and the energy is all thrown out to the listener. The song is amazing and an incredible way to end the record, Jay scratching with perfect rhythm, adding a cool groove to the beat. It ends with a clear clarion cry:

What’s wrong with ya, man? How can you be so dumb?
Like Dr. King said, “We shall overcome”

After 40 years perhaps only those clumsy moments of misogyny hold the record back. Otherwise it is a relentless, powerful, revolutionary and influential record.

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About me

I have a radio show, Single Minded, on Radio Alty, every week on Wednesday at 8pm (UK). Listen here:

https://www.radioalty.co.uk/

The most recent show can be heard by clicking here:

I have also written a book about the great singles of the 1960s which can be found on Amazon:

• The Greatest Singles of the Sixties: A personal journey through music [UK]

• The Greatest Singles of the Sixties: A personal journey through music [USA]

• The Greatest Singles of the Sixties: A personal journey through music [CAN and beyond!]

I don't usually write about the gigs I go to, but on Wednesday Florry rocked up such a storm in Manchester I had to let my readers know.

Florry are a wonderfully cool five piece rock band from Philadelphia, full of the Southern influenced sound of people like early 70s Neil Young. The guitars crunch, but at the same time the fiddle sings and the pedal steel weeps with sorrowful beauty.

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The YES Basement in Manchester is a snug and intimate venue, and the band filled the hall with their brilliant sound.

The show opened with local folk artist Dee Rae. I loved how the band had found a Manchester artist to open for them, and Dee Rae played delicate and plaintive folk music with talent and charm, filling the gaps with sweet humour. It was a warm and delightful start. Her fingerpicking style was graceful, her voice calm and strong, and she was a delight to hear, warming us up well.

Florry are a different breed, and they know how to fill a stage. I only discovered their alternative country sounds last year, but it was wonderful to get caught up in their smiling, infectious groove.

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Lead singer Francie Medosch grabs you by the shoulders and brings you in. She is filled with the music, which clangs and rocks. The band are immense. I particularly loved John Murray’s neat noodling on the guitar, his rock god groove a surprise against his delicately nerdy look, his custom Telecaster featuring a nice Bigsby whammy bar.

The band burst onto stage and into Pretty Eyes Lorraine, superb fiddle from the multi-talented Will Henriksen crying out as the songs dipped and weaved. There was some fantastic guitar from Murray the punctuate Medosch’s broken voice. Soon the band moved into the wonderful country of Dip Myself in Like an Ice Cream. Medosch demonstrates the music through her face as she reaches each cracking and breaking note.

The group brought tonnes of energy to the gig, and tonnes of sweet humour as they joked about visiting Affleck’s Palace to find a jacket for Jon Cox as he played his pedal steel. Although he'd not found one by the end of the gig he was wrapped in jacket gifts from the band. They’d celebrated his birthday for the past week and looked like they were going to celebrate it again this evening.

Say Your Prayers Rock bounced like an outtake from American Stars’n’Bars, the guitar strings clanging with brittle cool before they moved into Waiting Around to Provide. One of their best songs, their voices locked together as the song danced onwards, Medosch’s harmonica crying with painful joy.

The band also ran through a number of new songs over the evening. The signs are good for the next record because they were all fantastic. Two were broken, bluesy country numbers about beer: Rain and Beer and Two Beers but the most joy from the new material came from the fantastic Always You.

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Take My Heart was a barroom swing, Collin Dennen punching out a deep bass line as Joey Sullivan roamed around his drum kit and this was followed by the dirty country rock of Truck Flipped Over ‘19, loud and greasy, guitars crunching through half-chords and the whole band jamming with insane magic.

There was a joyful cover of NRBQ’s Do the Bump, with Francie giving the song the energy it deserved, pointing left, right and forward when the song demanded. It was a rock n roll masterclass flooding the audience with smiles.

The band demonstrated their country chops, giving us full hoedown grooves at times over a few more new tracks before hitting us with a joyous version of Hey Baby and then building to the incredible First It Was a Movie, Then It Was a Book, dragging the crowd to a scintillating high.

They finished on a ramshackle high, crunching out Drunk and High from their excellent second album.

This great band took a step up tonight as they demonstrated just how tight and cool they are. Country rock as it should be played.

Find a venue and catch them.

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About me

I have a radio show, Single Minded, on Radio Alty, every week on Wednesday at 8pm (UK). Listen here:

https://www.radioalty.co.uk/

The latest show can be found here:

I have also written a book about the great singles of the 1960s which can be found on Amazon:

• The Greatest Singles of the Sixties: A personal journey through music [UK]

• The Greatest Singles of the Sixties: A personal journey through music [USA]

• The Greatest Singles of the Sixties: A personal journey through music [CAN and beyond!]

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I saw him in concert promoting this first album and the show was brilliant, a small club in Manchester allowed him to fill the room with positivity and love. Even as he cranked up the guitars on the second album I saw him live at Manchester Apollo and he was excellent.

I’m going to look at his first album here and will look at the second in a follow up article.

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Let Love Rule (1989)

Side one

It opens with an acoustic guitar playing some simple chords as Kravitz starts to sing, his voice breaking at one point. On Sitting On Top of the World the band - virtually all Kravitz himself - come in and we get a funky acoustic rock track. I particularly like the squirting bass line that pings around. It’s a great opener, catchy and soulful, full of optimism as much of the album is.

The title track, Let Love Rule, is a cool rock number, starting straight into the vocals, cycling between E and G chords. It builds with drama and the chorus explodes and then steps back, really cool, Hammond organ quiet in the background but stylish and slick. The lyrics are nothing clever, but they are full of positivity:

Love transcends all space and time
And love can make a little child smile

The song is made by that great chorus, rising chords a nod towards Sgt. Pepper. Karl Denson adds a jazzy sax solo, and it’s these touches that really add to this work, and show what was missing in his later work. I love how the track seems to step back at the end after the instruments had been swirling around, the bass snapping out a final groove, as Kravitz scats and improvises.

Freedom Train is a short interlude built around a crunchy guitar line that buzzes and fizzes. It’s a mantra-like groove, cool and minimalistic, a nice funky interlude before we get his first soul ballad. My Precious Love is clearly Kravitz writing a gospel soul classic. It kinds works, and is gentle and sweet. His voice just about carries it, and Denson’s sax and Henry Hirsch’s organ add real flavour.

I Build This Garden for Us was an early single - I bought this on 7” but have no idea where it is now - and it drips with the 60s sound he was trying to emulate. His multi-tracked voice is drone-like, and it is supported by some excellent cello from Nancy Ives. It is part of that late-80s psychedelic revival (See also Sowing the Seeds of Love by Tears for Fears). Again, the lyrics are simplistic, but the song is so full of cool energy it is a delight.

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Side two

Kravitz wrote side opener Fear with his then wife Lisa Bonet - she wrote the lyrics. It’s a funky procession built around a deeply cool bass line. Lenny’s voice and the words are the weak point, but the song has enough cool to beat through that. The chorus is great, a rising Prince-like guitar sound supporting him yawp, “I’m living in fear!”

On Does Anybody Out There Even Care we get another ballad, Kravitz singing up close to the microphone. It’s another song made by a great chorus with a powerful message:

Does anybody know how many lives we’ve lost
Can anybody ever pay the cost?
What will it take for us to join in peace my friends?
Does anybody out there even care?

The track features some of his best singing on the album.

There’s a cool rock and roll sound on Mr Cab Driver, a Velvet Underground style rocker about racism with a fantastic bassline. It was a live favourite, giving the crowd the opportunity to yell, “Fuck you! I’m a survivor” over a blasting car horn.The song ends with a great rock guitar solo. A foretaste of what was to come.

Rosemary is his 60s folk ballad, and it is built around some cool acoustic chords. Bonet co-wrote this one and Lee Jaffe adds a soulful harmonica line to it. The chorus is hopeful and uplifting, full of Kravitz’s Christian message. The music builds over the course of the song as instruments join in. I am not religious in any way, but I really like how he puts this track together.

The album ends with Be, a hypnotic piano ballad, dark and introspective, his double-tracked vocals giving him the opportunity to reflect on what he is or what he could be:

Lord, what's the matter? Am I insane?
This life's an illusion, that's all it remains
Are you listening? Are you, boss?
Am I going to make it up top on that cross?

It’s quite an interesting way to end the album, a mature soul track with a slinky bass line and full of emotion.

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The album is good fun and I loved it in 1989. I think much of his later work is much weaker but I will always have a special place for this early work.

This Spotify link is to the expanded CD release with a couple of bonus tracks:

Like what you read? Buy me a coffee!

About me

I have a radio show, Single Minded, on Radio Alty, every week on Wednesday at 8pm (UK). Listen here:

https://www.radioalty.co.uk/

Older shows can be found here:

I have also written a book about the great singles of the 1960s which can be found on Amazon:

• The Greatest Singles of the Sixties: A personal journey through music [UK]

• The Greatest Singles of the Sixties: A personal journey through music [USA]

• The Greatest Singles of the Sixties: A personal journey through music [CAN and beyond!]

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Like much of the world’s greatest art, this song communicates on two levels. It is a swirling, woozy, 80s ska track, full of echoing grooves that are easy to dance to. But at the same time it is a challenge to the political system, a cry of honesty about the state of the country.

The band were from Coventry, a small city in the Midlands, and there was a huge impact on the manufacturing industry of that city in the late 70s and early 80s as Thatcherism destroyed the country. The band would have seen this first hand, on a daily basis. There’s an old saying in England: if someone is “Sent to Coventry” it means that are ostracised and ignored. In the early 80s that would have been the least of someone’s worries if sent to Coventry.

The cover is powerful, two skeletons, empty of existence in the local pub, barren and lost. It’s black and white, reflecting both the powerful imagery of the Two Tone label and also the lost vibrancy of life at that time.

The song breathes into life, a wind blowing coldly through the city before a cool beat and that woozy fairground organ slides in. Suddenly we are in a moody and dark ska groove, with some fantastic horns throwing out their great lines. Jerry Dammers’ keyboards cry out a melody, with a flute weeping alongside.

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The first verse is powerful, sung between Neville Staple, Terry Hall and Lynval Golding over Horace Panter’s sparse bass, Roddy Radiation’s chopping guitar and John Bradbury’s hissing drums. Staple takes the lead in this section:

This town, is coming like a ghost town
All the clubs have been closed down
This place, is coming like a ghost town
Bands won’t play no more
Too much fighting on the dance floor

Wailing, crying voices call out, “Yah, ya-ya-ya yah!” creating a deeply spooky fairground ride before the song moves into an uplifting carnival.

Do you remember the good old days before the ghost town?
We danced and sang, and the music played in any boomtown

It feels positive, but soon the ska groove is back, the music captivating and encompassing, the message even more stark as Lynval Golding adds his commentary to the track

This town, is coming like a ghost town
(Why must the youth fight against themselves? Government leaving the youth on the shelf)
This place, is coming like a ghost town
(No job to be found in this country)
Can’t go on no more
(The people getting angry)

The music is incredible, I have no doubts as to why this hit number one, a powerful message backed by some stunning ska. The message is echoed over and over until the whistling wind returns.

Jerry Dammers had a vision for the song and he certainly achieved that:

The band split not long after, and came and went in different forms over the years. Sadly, the wonderful Terry Hall died of pancreatic cancer in 2022. Let’s remember him and this magnificent band with one of the greatest singles ever released.

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About me

I have a radio show, Single Minded, on Radio Alty, every week on Wednesday at 8pm (UK). Listen here:

https://www.radioalty.co.uk/

Older shows can be found here:

I have also written a book about the great singles of the 1960s which can be found on Amazon:

• The Greatest Singles of the Sixties: A personal journey through music [UK]

• The Greatest Singles of the Sixties: A personal journey through music [USA]

• The Greatest Singles of the Sixties: A personal journey through music [CAN and beyond!]

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In 1976 Parliament released the magnificent album The Clones of Dr. Funkenstein featuring some of the best funk musicians of the time, including Bernie Worrell, Bootsy Collins and Fred Wesley and the Horny Horns, having recently left James Brown’s band.

The Cover

Clinton is in full Dr Funkenstein garb giving life to one of his many clones, as delightfully deranged as it can be, full of vibrant colour, the electric bolt of the band’s name blazoned across the top. I want to know more about what’s going on here…

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Side one

Prelude gives us a blast of church organ and some spooky backwards voices soon become a deep narrative on how funk was originally buried beneath the pyramids. Soon the clones are ready to be released and we get the sharp funk of Gamin’ On Ya, jazzy horn lines and slick bass thumping. It jumps into the chorus and becomes a head-bobbing groove. I love how it nods to the early P-Funk single Come In Out of the Rain as it fades.

People keep waiting on a change
They ain’t got sense enough
To come in out of the rain

We then get the dirty twin funk guitars of Dr Funkenstein. Clinton is on fire here, rapping with style. The chorus is fantastic, chanted over a slinky beat. The claps come in and the funk builds as the doctor sets out his mission (“Preoccupied and dedicated to the preservation of the motion of hips…”) and the funk rolls on. It’s magnificent and cool. His clones are the Children of Production, which is another slice of slick funk, vocals shared by the band over a laid back funk bass. It’s pure P-Funk, wonderfully theatrical - We’re gonna blow the cobwebs out your mind - and so much deeper than the disco hits of the day.

Gettin’ to Know You has an incessant Funkadelic groove with Garry Shider singing on a bouncy number. He sings with soulful style, and the guitar is slick and smart. I love the cool “Baby, baby I love you…” and Michael Brecker’s cool sax solo.

Side two

The side opens with Do That Stuff, which bursts into life with a great drum beat before sliding into a funky, overlapping, layered bop. It was the obvious choice for a single, full of sunshine, and it’s a funky band at the top of their game. The guitar riff is deeply cool, slipping and sliding up and down the frets. It funks hard.

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Everything is on the One sets out a funk mission:

Everything is on the one today y’all, that’s where it’s at

The track is full of delightful energy as well as Bernie Worrell’s typically strange squirting keyboard sounds. It is wonderfully catchy and swings from the first beat.

On I’ve Been Watching You (Move Your Sexy Body) we have a cool quasi-prog rock guitar opening the track before it morphs into a cool slow dance, Glenn Goins singing with passion. I love the drums on this track, not flashy but full of style. The song is lithe and sinuous in the way it twists and turns, slick and sweaty. Beautiful.

The album ends with more of the remarkable Glenn Goins’ singing. Funkin’ for Fun slips into life, funky guitar riff and expansive horns. It slides into a cool beat quickly and becomes a head-bopping funk groove. A perfect ending, that cool sax near the end is pure joy.

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Parliament at this time were becoming - without them realising it - one of the most influential bands of all time, their funk sound embedded into the hip-hop of the 90s and beyond, their beats everywhere. Whilst he is still with us George Clinton needs to be celebrated of as a visionary musician.

This amazing funk vision would continue over the next few albums and I will write more of his work soon.

Like what you read? Buy me a coffee!

About me

I have a radio show, Single Minded, on Radio Alty, every week on Wednesday at 8pm (UK). Listen here:

https://www.radioalty.co.uk/

Older shows can be found here:

I have also written a book about the great singles of the 1960s which can be found on Amazon:

• The Greatest Singles of the Sixties: A personal journey through music [UK]

• The Greatest Singles of the Sixties: A personal journey through music [USA]

• The Greatest Singles of the Sixties: A personal journey through music [CAN and beyond!]

Subscribe now

Heaven 17 took that emerging electronic sound and began to blend it with disco, funk and even punk grooves. The outcome was their stunning debut album Penthouse and Pavement, rele…

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1973 had two moments that would be in the middle of huge historical change in decades to come. In April in the US, the World Trade Centre opened, and the Twin Towers stood as an emblem of New York City until they were destroyed in the devastating attack of 2001. This attack triggered the “War on Terror” and profoundly altered America’s relationship with the Middle East, intensifying long-standing tensions and reshaping global geopolitics for a generation.

On January 1st 1973 the UK joined the European Economic Community, which over time became the EU. The country enjoyed the benefits of close working ties with the countries of Europe until the Brexit vote to leave the EU in 2016, officially leaving in 2020. The ramifications of this are still being felt in the …

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“I asked Prince what he planned to do. He told me, ‘I’m going to look for the ladder.’ So I asked him what that meant. All he said was, ‘Sometimes it snows in April.’” Steve Fargnoli, Prince’s manager.

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I was in a bar one night on Hollywood Boulevard near Vine Street, and this lady came in with a dead animal over her arm, looking like she'd obviously been sleeping outdoors. She walked up to the bartender and said, "I'm gonna have a heart attack," and he says, "Yeah, right, you can have it outside." I thought that was pretty chilly. So I re-named Hollywood Blvd. "heart attack."

Following 1978’s Blue Valentine, which drips with rainy backstreet melancholy, Tom Waits started to hint at the direction he would take on Swordfishtrombones with this fascinating, guitar heavy, blues album from 1980.

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Heartattack and Vine was Waits’ final album on Asylum, and in many ways it is a finale. A goodbye to some of the boho themes he’d played with over the previous seven years, to the jazziest elements of his work, and it contains some of his best work.

He stares out from the newspaper cover, sweaty and mysterious, described as a “South Central Los Angeles man” who had been seen in a “burst sienna Chrysl…

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Just over a year after their first, magnificent, album, The B-52’s headed back to Compass Point Studios in the Bahamas to record their second. In many ways, Wild Planet is a simple continuation of the styles and ideas of that first record, and it is as equally essential.

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While I like much of their later work, at least until Ricky Wilson passed away in 1985, it is the first two albums that really demonstrate the band at their quirky best, full of strange interjections and Ricky Wilson’s amazing and singular guitar tunings.

It starts with the cover, a continuation of the futuristic but ‘50s concept of the first. Lynn Goldsmith’s photo captures the band at their coolest. Fred Schneider looks louche and suave on that little chair, Ricky Wilson leaning in. Keith Strickland appears almost impassive and icy at the back, like an interloper at a strange party. And, of course, Cindy Wilson and Kate Pierson just look stunningly cool. Kate’s beehive could not be bigger as she leans back, full of style, and Cindy stares back at you, a mane of hair flowing down, mascara circling her eyes. They are backed by a deep blood-red, ready for fun, ready for action.

Side one

The record opens with a building beat, a crunchy chord and a yell of “Surprise!” from Schneider, as they crash the Party Out Of Bounds. Playing an odd BADXG#C# tuning, Ricky Wilson cranks out a mean little riff as the band groove. The song is made by Kate Pierson’s interjections here, crazy little hoots as the song twists and moves. It’s an electric piece of rock and roll, full of post-punk energy and galloping grooves and it builds to a nice singalong section for Cindy and Kate.

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It is followed by Dirty Back Road, an angular piece of new wave, a stabbing little riff, Kate and Cindy singing together over little bursts of Kate’s organ. It bounces and shimmies, a simple but nagging beat, and it’s sung with a laid-back joy, keeping a cool metronomic beat throughout the three minutes.

On Runnin’ Around the band explodes with post-punk energy, words overlapping each other, yelled and yawped as Ricky cranks out some cool chords using a CFxxFF tuning. The song builds to a delightful punky chorus, an angular take on ‘50s cool, twisting itself into knots as it stops for a brief second before kicking on again.

We get to some of the band’s greatest tracks now. Give Me Back My Man is pure joy. A delightful, ringing guitar riff bouncing around some open notes and featuring pop energy from the clapping percussion. Cindy Wilson sings the track with an effervescent smile, bursting out those wonderful moments

I’ll give you fish,
I’ll give you candy,
I’ll give you everything I have in my hand!

When she almost cracks as she yells, “Give me…back my man”, I get a chill, it is just fabulous. She sings low and sultry, but the punky energy means the song becomes a pure earworm, digging itself into your head and never leaving.

It would be hard to top a track like this.

But then we have Private Idaho, probably the band’s greatest track, as far as I am concerned. It opens with a superb rising riff on Ricky’s Danelectro Silvertone 1448 tuned to EBDxBB. Kate scats a jazz-tinged owl hoot before Fred begins to sing about “your own private Idaho”, the place we try to use to escape the world. But it’s a dangerous place! There’s a magnificent Twilight Zone organ riff before the stunning chorus which explodes. Ricky plays this cool riff in the background as Kate and Cindy sing and joust with each other, Fred jumping in with lines, Keith Strickland building up to a rolling and rumbling drum line.

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The band sing with blistering energy and the song just never seems to stop. Ricky plays a cool guitar line before everyone starts to improvise for Cindy’s wordless end. Even the chords at the end are fantastic, as it ends without resolving, an uncertain and strange final chord adding to the mysterious nature of this “private Idaho”.

This film clip is joyous; watch the band at their very best. It’s worth it just for Cindy’s arm rolling dancing.

Side two

Side two is more of the same, although it can’t quite reach the joyous heights of those last two tracks.

It opens with Devil in My Car, a glam rock track filtered through post-punk eyes. The riff buzzes and crunches as the band sing. It’s a great rocker, and Schneider sings with his usual wide-eyed craziness, an affectation that some people found difficult by the time of Love Shack, but here it just adds to the cool quirkiness.

Quiche Lorraine is magnificent. It starts with a tick-tock riff and a burst of keyboard in the background. It is a new wave groove, simple and hypnotic, chugging and swinging, full of hidden energy, ready to explode at any moment, but always holding back. Most of the instruments hold off for a cool spoken section before the spiky groove continues.

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Strobe Light is an absolute blast, realy post-punk fire over a surf rock riff using an odd DGCxxx tuning on Ricky’s Sunburst Mosrite MK V. This song is made by it’s girl group chorus: “Want to make love to you under the strobe light”, joy bubbling over as they sing. Schneider plays the quirky lover:

I'm gonna kiss your eyes
Then I'm gonna kiss your neck
Then I'm gonna kiss your tummy
Then I'm gonna kiss your pineapple

and the song explodes back into another singalong chorus before its sci-fi ending.

And 53 Miles West of Venus opens with another sci-fi sounding riff, Ricky showing just how he uses his strings to create slicing, cool sounds, as this mesmeric track pulses in and out. The band just sing the title, over and over, a mantra-like new wave feel and a cool way to bring the album to a conclusion.

The following year the band put out a great remix record, Party Mix, with three songs from their first album and three from Wild Planet. They chose the best tracks, adding a disco beat and merging the music into one long party piece.

I like their later albums, but feel they never reached the wonderful heights of the first two records again.

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In this early year of the 1970s the world was in turmoil. The Vietnam War still raged, and the US carried out a strategic and deadly campaign of bombing the country that Christmas. Rather than end the war it showed that peace would still be a few years away. The country was still reeling from the slowly emerging information around the Watergate scandal that ultimately led to Richard Nixon’s resignation in 1974.

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The two albums have just been issued on vinyl for the first time, celebrating the recent 10th anniversary, so it feels right to look at them in a bit more depth.

Every Prince album is looked at through the lens of his very best work, Purple Rain, 1999, Sign O’ the Times, Dirty Mind and so on. They cast a huge shadow on his later work and perhaps it is true that nothing post Lovesexy came even close to his best work, but there’s usually something good on every album.

I am a huge fan of his rock album Plectrumelectrum and thought Art Official Age from 2014 had some great tracks, but I don’t remember these two very well.

The first thing I have to say is that the design is glorious! The two records are packaged with some fantastic artwork, both featuring…

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The month has been cold and wet in the UK. These albums seem to reflect that icy auste sense

Reviews this month

1. Jana Horn [2026] by Jana Horn Album of the Month!

2. Memorias [2025] by Juan Pastor's Chinchano

3. A Selection Of Hyrs [2026] by psmyth

4. CINCO [2026] by Manager

5. Yans [2026] by YANSANEH

6. My City, My Music [2026] by elliott keith music

7. Dunkle Magie [2025…6] by Oehl

8. Gnawa Jabaryou [2026] by Brahim Hikmi

9. URGH [2026] by Mandy, Indiana

10. In This Room [2026] by Hannah Schneider

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Jana Horn [2026] by Jana Horn

Album of the month

This is superb, creaking, swaying folk music from an artist I’ve not properly listened to over the years. The album is gentle but powerful opener Go on, move your body is icy and brittle, moving with grace, and Horn uses her expressive voice with calm. Don’t think is hypnotic, a mesmeric finger-picked line rolling behind her voice. On All in Bet, the band add a shuffling brushed beat to the music, voices calling with beauty. Come on has textures that remind me of Cate Le Bon with Horn’s clarinet-like voice, the track moving at its own controlled pace. A track like Love has a cute acoustic indie groove, and it skips gently to its brief conclusion. It’s alright feels darker, another simple acoustic line picked out, piano ringing in the background, the band tight and cool. Unused slowly emerged, cymbals riding, before the song forms itself. It has hints of country folk, but it is reflective and thoughtful throughout. I assume she is harmonising with herself on this, the two voices entwining to create a beautiful sound. Designer has the most metallic sound of the album, chords cleaning as they ring, drums stamping and stabbing, the song cracked and dancing. Quite hypnotic in how it draws you in.

That sense of calm meditation runs through these songs, tender and touching. On Without she pushes her breathy voice close to the mike, feeling near, in the room, music sparse and skeletal, giving a human connection. The record ends with the lo-fi Untitled (Cig) a perfect example of homemade folk, using the instruments to build a musical picture, and rounding off a fabulous folk album.

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After courting Daryl Hall and Patty Smyth of Scandal he zeroed in on Sammy Hagar, formerly of hard rock band Montrose. At the same time, Roth secured the remarkable Steve Vai as his guitarist. Coming from almost ten years of working with Frank Zappa, I think Vai is one of a very small number of guitar players who could genuinely compete with Eddie Van Halen. This led to a period in 1986 when Van Halen and Roth released albums in their new incarnations.

I bought both when they came out, and still listen to both, but I wanted to run a little personal competition, comparing the albums song by song. Now, Roth’s debut, Eat ‘Em and Smile, has one extra tra…

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It was their third single, the smash hit Happy Hour, which properly introduced their sound to me, and they soon followed it up with their fantastic debut album.

London 0 Hull 4 (1986)

With a title that cemented their position on the North-South divide, this was a ball of bright energy from the start. Singer Paul Heaton (noted as P.d. Heaton on the back cover) has a stunningly melodic and beautiful voice, full of passion. Stan Cullimore played the jangly, busy guitar and had been busking with Heaton back in the early-80s. On bass was Norman Cook, who we all know now as Fatboy Slim, or the man behind Beats International, or Zoe Ball’s ex-husband, bu…

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I love the way George Clinton recycles old tracks. This idea has been on my mind for a while and some recent listens have pushed it back to the front of my mind. So…

…let’s go track by track. I’ll try and add Spotify links for each song I discuss although it’s amazing to see how much of George Clinton’s early work is missing from the streaming service. People who only discover music that way will be missing out on a lot of great music.

If you missed my 1971 rundown: here it is…

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Good Ole Music

The Parliaments 1968

I can’t find this on Spotify, but it’s worth knowing. A well paced funky songs with a fuzz guitar and a fantastic organ swirling around.

Funkadelic 1970

Recycled, slowed down and psyched-up. A bending guitar replicates the organ work in this much longer. Drips with soul, but I prefer the original.

Can’t Shake it Loose

In 1968 Clinton co-wrote this track for Diana Ross. A northern soul styled groove.

He produced a slightly more gritty version for Pat Lewis in 1970…

…which is very similar to the Funkadelic version, which I can’t find on Spotify. This track can be found on their collection of singles called Music for your Mother.

I’ll Bet You

A great favourite from the self-titled debut is I'll Bet You which follows the model: reverb heavy drum intro followed by soul-dripping blues riff:

Clinton had submitted it to Motown and it became a minor hit for the Jackson 5 (a few months before, I think). This isn’t as psychedelic, but it’s fun even if it’s much more straight.

But the original production was from 1966, and it's a cracker.

I also have this track by Billy Butler, but that's just a cover. However, it’s a similar Northern Soul type version. Slightly slower than the Theresa Lindsey version

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Some More

In 1971 this song, Some More, seemed to bubble deep from the drugged depths of his mind, with it's soul drenched keyboards, blues licks and underwater vocals. It’s a perfect example of early 70s George Clinton, dripping with LSD, reverb and insanity.

but I prefer the previous year's northern soul stomper, Headache in my Heart.

Can You Get to That

On Maggot Brain there is this utterly fantastic track, Can You Get to That, which starts with an acoustic lick and hints at Parliament with its multiple singers. To me, it's one of their very best tracks.

It comes from a track a few years earlier, What You Been Growing, released by The Parliaments. You can hear the similarities, although it is more insistent and more danceable, but it misses the real soul of the new version. Still had the multiple singers, but it's not the same song.

Interesting that the seems to be very little from The Parliaments, the original group, on Spotify.

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I Call My Baby Pussycat

In 1972 Funkadelic released their double album, America Eats Its Young. I don't think it's like anything else they released. I love it, but it is an album of a band transitioning. Two songs on here had appeared in very different versions, on the first Parliament album, Osmium.

It’s a late 60s rock track, with an opening jam that reminds me of Japanese rock band The Flower Travellin’ Band. It bursts into life, whistle and cheers after a few minutes.

I mean, how clearly is this band Funkadelic... That's Ed Hazel on guitar, and this is too (although there were three other guitarist on AEIY), and it follows the common pattern of slowing things down, drawing out the beat and making the soul deeper. It still has an opening jam, but this is much more mantra like, and there is an anthemic sound to this version. I’ve always loved this one.

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Let’s Make It Last

In 1973 there was a slight shift to a more soulful Funkadelic. We don't have full-blown Parliament funk here, Cosmic Slop still has loads of psychedelic soul at its very best such as Let's Make It Last…

…which also has that great Clinton staple as it nods its head to country music in the double time ending but it was recycled from this, which is not hugely different. A kind of dramatic Northern soul sound here, as Clinton tries to outdo his former employers at Motown:

Can't Stand the Strain

Cosmic Slop also has this great soul track, Can't Stand the Strain, again foreshadowing the Parliament sound

A 1968 track written by Clinton and performed by Rose Williams. George Clinton and the Funkadelics(!) has the same tune…

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and in a great bit of recycling this was then released by Parliament in 1974

INTERMISSION

It's worth stopping here to show this great advert for Up For The Down Stroke

Up for the Down Stroke is a deep mine of Clinton recycling, Apart from the above we have

I Wanna Testify

and

Testify

The Goose That Laid the Golden Egg

and

The Goose

All Your Goodies are Gone

and

All Your Goodies are Gone

It's great having these different versions of the same songs. I can listen to both versions quite easily - you'll only get the Parliament version in concert nowadays, though. (And I did get The Goose last time I saw Clinton live).

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I’ll Stay/Wait

1974 also saw Funkadelic release Standing on the Verge of Getting it On.

I'll Stay has such incredible guitar work throughout, featuring Eddie 'Smedley Smorganoff' Hazel interplaying with Gary Shider and the "white devil" Ron Bykowski:

You’ll hear the sample De La Soul used for Millie Pulled a Pistol on Santa Claus front and centre here.

It's a huge improvement on I'll Wait - a final doo-wop blast from the Parliaments

Baby I Owe You Something Good

In 1975 Clinton released two of his greatest albums: Let's Take It to the Stage (Funkadelic) and the incredible Mothership Connection (Parliament). To this balding head there is very little in 1975 that can match them. The Funkadelic album has this one

Now dig this

It’s a proper Northern stomper and is a blast of excitement.

I Can Feel the Ice Melting

Clinton felt disco simplified funk, moving it from "the one" to a straight 4-4 beat and I think I agree with him. In his hands a disco laden track is much more interesting. This is from 1978: The Brides of Funkenstein

This is a bona fide Northern soul classic from 1967

I prefer the earlier version but you can hear how Clinton can make disco sound more real and mature than the usual fare. The “Lewis” who has the writing credit is Tamala Lewis, George’s wife. Their son is Tracey Lewis, who funked it up in the early 90s himself as Trey Lewd.

I think that's enough for now... well one more. This soulful number from around 1967:

was re-done in 1975 for inclusion on Mothership Connection but didn't make the cut

Which is a shame but makes sense to me.

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The year has started with some great releases but I also look back at a few from 2025.

Reviews this month

1. Yeah, mostly [2026] by Will Epstein Album of the Month!

2. Chapter 1 [2026] by SAULT

3. Rough Justice [2025] by Reavsey

4. Hello From Paradise EP [2026] by The Moths Of Manchester

5. Spyrk į kėdę [2025] by Palėpė

6. Lear [2025] by Ethan Daniel Davidson

7. The Blue Hour [2025] by Nadine Carina

8. Bardo [2026] by Cassie Watson Francillon

9. God Made The Highway [2025] by Lawn

10. ...quando fuori piove… [2026] by La Cilla Band

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Yeah, mostly [2026] by Will Epstein

Album of the month

It’s only January but this is one of the best albums I’ve heard this year. Deliberately lo-fi, gentle and beautiful, but arch and comic at the same time. Saturday is quite brilliant, built around his electric piano and bouncing guitar chords, his voice bare and brittle. There’s a funky opening to Brideshead Revisited Revisited, until we move into another stunning piece of swooning lo-fi cool, hints of Grandaddy in its brilliance. Dishwasher is a rolling pop funk song about, yes, a dishwasher. He juxtaposes the funky groove with the mundane with perfection. On Riverside we get a slow and beautiful indie folk track, woozy and hazy whilst Socks in LA pulls out his grungier side as the guitar crunches and buzzes. That’ll Be Me is delightful, an indie pop ballad, simple and gentle, calling Conor Oberst to mind with its composition.

The comically titled Little Tony Soprano waves from side to side over a see-saw guitar line, clapping percussion and electric piano. There’s a strange bounce to Window Window Window, but it’s sweet and catchy, a touch of late 60s sunshine pop. Dimmer Switch is slow and cool, a piece of 70s pop groove, delightfully stylish, delightfully infectious. As the album draws to a close we get the gentle rain of Standing At My Standing Desk and the slow balladic groove of Lauren Bacall, two songs that really show just how great Epstein is.

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Chapter 1 [2026] by SAULT

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Oh, we’re in the year I was born! Now things get exciting - although obviously we’re still quite a few years away from me experiencing songs first-hand. This list is full of great songs. There’s a couple of classics, a couple of surprises, a bit of rock and roll and some dynamite soul.

It’s a bit of a watershed year as we say goodbye to the 60s and get the occasional glimpse at some of the more popular sounds of the 70s, but both decades are on display here.

Change was happening in 1971 in the UK. The country said goodbye to the old monetary system, introducing decimalisation and the new Divorce Reform Act came into force, reflected the changing social attitudes of the time.

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