Lafayette Afro Rock Band

A few tracks for you from the Lafayette Afro Rock band - a bunch of Americans from Long Island that recorded mostly in Paris and under a few different names.

Lafayette Afro Rock Band - Darkest Light - Malik - 1975

Lafayette Afro Rock Band - Hihache - Voodounon / Movin' & Groovin' - 1974

Ice - Racubah - Afro Agban - 1978

Norman Connors - Captain Connors

Back from a great away win at Coventry and I haven't fully got my voice back yet. Tried soothing it with excess Easter chocolate and feeling a bit sick now after dancing around to this, the 12" version of Captain Connors, the bonus track from the CD reissue.

Norman Connors & The Starship Orchestra - Captain Connors (12" Version)

Ronnie Laws - Pressure Sensitive

Rushing off to the bush to see the Rangers, but before I go, here's what's been rocking my world this morning...

Ronnie Laws - Momma - Pressure Sensitive - 1975
Ronnie Laws - Nothing to Lose - Pressure Sensitive - 1975

I should also let you know that this album has the original of Always There made huge in the 90s by Incognito. I'll post it later if you want it...

Billy Cobham - A Funky Thide of Sings

Three tracks today from Billy Cobham's 1975 album A Funky Thide of Sings. Notable contributions from John Schofield on guitar and Michael and Randy Brecker on assorted brass with Billy directing proceedings from behind his drum kit. Panhandler and the title cut are funk workouts that could have been playing to aliens too hip for the Mos Eisley cantina. Sorcery is a portentous groove with some nice keyboard solos.

Billy Cobham - Panhandler
Billy Cobham - Sorcery
Billy Cobham - A Funky Thide of Sings

Believe in what you stand up for

Believe in what you stand up for.

Albert Ayler - Free At Last - New Grass - 1968
Archie Shepp - Attica Blues - Attica Blues - 1972
Doug Hammond & David Durrah - Wake Up Brothers - Reflections in the Sea of Nurnen - 1975
Gary Bartz Ntu Troop - Rise - Taifa - 1970
Sun Ra - Nuclear War - Nuclear War - 1982
Oneness of Juju - Love's Messenger - Space Jungle Luv - 1976

James Mason - Rhythm of Life

MY GOD! I've just read an almost identical post at Dilated Choonz even down to a Ready Brek comment posted two weeks prior to this one. How embarrassing.

Ready Brek. In 1989, when I was 13, I was given a tape. I can still picture it. A black 'limited edition' TDK. On side one were people like Eric B and Rakim, Big Daddy Kane and EPMD with every track detail written out in full. On side two, just two words: Rare Groove. I now recognise (most of) the tunes and it had classics from Bill Withers, Roy Ayers and Gil Scott Heron among others. This tape rocked my world, and I still cherish it (although I have no tape player any more). It opened with this first James Mason track which I later learned came from this, his only album; an album that almost defines Rare Groove since it was rescued from obscurity by the Acid Jazz scene. James Mason was heavily involved in Roy Ayers's supreme Running Away and took much of that feeling into this 1977 record, particularly on Sweet Power Your Embrace. But Mason's album is more impassioned, urgent and less polished than anything the great Ayers achieves - Roy, I guess, is just too cool. In the liner notes James says "For making the music that has inspired and shaped my musical values over the years, SPECIAL THANKS to The Crusaders, Miles Davis, Wayne Shorter, Joseph Zawinul, Stevie Wonder, The Pointer Sisters and Stanley Clarke. And for the learning experience working as a member of his band afforded me, THANK YOU to Roy Ayers". Quite right. I love this sound and hope you do too.

James Mason - Sweet Power Your Embrace
James Mason - Free
James Mason - I've Got My Eyes On You

Allen Toussaint - From A Whisper To A Scream

Allen Toussaint is a New Orleans legend. He wrote for years under the pseudonym Naomi Neville for people like Ernie K Doe, Lee Dorsey and Irma Thomas. He produced the Meters first records after having hired them to provide backing for his record company's late 60s releases. He also produced Lady Marmalade for Patti Labelle in 1975. Today, nearly 70 years old, he's living in New York while his New Orleans home is rebuilt following Hurricane Katrina. This album, released in 1970, was his first recorded under his own name. Both songs here are effortlessly brilliant and real growers - good friends that you might not have seen for years but with whom you can immediately relax and laugh over a beer.

Allen Toussaint - From A Whisper To A Scream
Allen Toussaint - What is Success

Check out Home of The Groove for unbelievable coverage of the New Orleans sound.

Dexter Wansel - Life on Mars

This is Dexter's debut album from 1976 and, as with much of his output, it's pretty hit and miss. From great funk workouts and luscious disco at one extreme to dire, sentimental sloppy claptrap at the other. Nevertheless it manages at least five killer cuts. You can't beat the title track for raw groove appeal - about the tightest jam around. But these others have their place, varying from the TV theme melodies of A Prophet Named KG, the strutting 'inspiring' disco of You Can Be What You Wanna Be, the slow-burning atmosphere of Theme From The Planets and the pure romance of Stargazer.

Dexter Wansel - Life on Mars
Dexter Wansel - A Prophet Named KG
Dexter Wansel - You Can Be What You Wanna Be
Dexter Wansel - Theme From The Planets
Dexter Wansel - Stargazer

Tim Maia

A selection of very decent Brazilian funk from Tim Maia from across a number of his albums. The first smoking, the second sunny, the third swaggering yet sweet and the fourth just consumate soul.

Tim Maia - No Camino do Bem

Tim Maia - Festo Do Santo Reis
Tim Maia - O Que Voce Quer Apostrar
Tim Maia - Imunizaco Racional Que Beleza

Lascivious: '72 to '79

Can you overdose on strings? On luscious funked soul? Here are 10 of the best, collected with rich production, grooves and sweet longing in mind. Starts off with one of my all time favourite songs and just gets sweeter. So sweet that by the end you might just have to dig out some Dead Kennedys to stop the onset of diabetes.

Stevie Wonder - As - Songs in the Key of Life - 1976 (watch Theo Parrish eulogise)
Syreeta - To Know You Is To Love You - Syreeta - 1972
Leon Ware - Share Your Love - Musical Massage - 1976
Minnie Riperton - Reasons - Perfect Angel - 1974
Leroy Hutson - All Because of You - Hutson - 1975
Marvin Gaye - I Want You - I Want You - 1976
Norman Connors & The Starship Orchestra - Wouldn't You Like To See - This Is Your Life - 1977
Deniece Williams - How'd I Know That Love Would Slip Away - This Is Niecy - 1976
Phyllis Hyman - Under Your Spell - You Know How To Love Me - 1979
Jean Carn - You Are All I Need - Jean Carn - 1977

Join the dots. Stevie of course needs no introduction. Syreeta was Mrs Stevie Wonder for two years. Niecy Williams made her breakthrough after successfully auditioning for Wonder when she was 26. She toured with him and also sang backing vocals for Minnie Riperton. Leon Ware sang with Minnie Riperton on several recordings including on songs from the same album as Share Your Love. He also co-wrote and produced Marvin Gaye's I Want You album. When Riperton was in Rotary Connection she worked with Phil Upchurch on guitar. He also adds the guitar to this Leroy Hutson track. Hutson was Donny Hathaway's room mate at university. Donny Hathaway and Roberta Flack's 1980 album featured vocals from Stevie Wonder and Eleanore Mills. Eleanore Mills sings this Norman Connors tune and Jean Carn appears elsewhere on the same album. Connors also featured Phyllis Hyman on several records over the years, most notably You Are My Starship.

Betty Davis

Betty Davis. A woman with an appetite. Married for a year to Miles Davis, her influence is credited with changing Miles's musical direction in the late 60s and bringing us Bitches Brew. On their divorce Miles said she was "too young and wild" for him. He also suspected her of an affair with Jimi Hendrix. The NAACP (National Association for the Advancement of Coloured People) called her a disgrace to her race for her suggestive lyrics.

Shoo-B-Doop and Cop Him, from They Say I'm Different (1974) is a great slow-burning funk soul chugger. Nice sounds, nice pace, nice backing vocals, nice dress. "when my goose gets loose she's gonna know I'll still be gettin' it on". Anti Love Song, from her self-titled first album in 1973 has the funkiest opening with Larry Graham's (Sly and the Family Stone veteran) bass giving a firm statement of intent.

Betty Davis - Shoo-B-Doop and Cop Him
Betty Davis - Anti Love Song

Buari

Some great driving hard-dancing funk from Ghana. Don't know much about it at all, but it appears that Buari released one album in 1975, and this first track, Karam Bani, opens it to real effect. The second track here is slower and makes me want to whoop like Mick Jagger before singing "and I miss you".

Buari - Karam Bani
Buari - Then Yebetheyet
The Rolling Stones - Miss You

David Shire - Taking of Pelham 123

The main title theme to this great 1974 New York Walther Matthau (!) crime flick. The plot (at the risk of putting you off) is very similar to Speed, but the effect is so completely different. Not least when it comes to the music. It's just so, for the want of a better word, dramatic. It's composed by David Shire who did a whole host of movie scores (including, in a very different vein, Saturday Night Fever). Shire, according to allmovie.com, married Francis Ford Coppola's sister, Talia (who played Stallone's girlfriend in Rocky).

David Shire - Taking of Pelham 123