Catalyst: "A Tear And A Smile"

Catalyst is one of those groups I thought I’d never find on original vinyl.  They only made four albums for the Cobblestone and Muse labels, all of which are incredibly obscure, even by rare groove standards.  Their fourth and last, “A Tear And A Smile,” may be the rarest of the bunch, and is by a long shot the funkiest.  While their earlier records featured sporadic soul-jazz jamming in the midst of heady, almost avant-garde spiritual cuts, “Tear…” is no-holds-barred funk-fusion.  The opening track, “The Demon,” is broken into two parts, starting with a grim, dirge-like synth-funk groove, moving through a hard fusion section, finally bursting into all-out street-funk towards the end.  Other highlights include “Fifty Second Street Boogie Down,” which is as earthy and strutting as its title suggests, and the haunting “Suite For Albeniz,” a series of variations on a Spanish-flamenco theme that beats groups like Weather Report at the whole “world-fusion” game.  In the ‘70’s, fusion groups were a dime a dozen, but very few ever sounded this intense, or committed to their craft.  It is truly a shame that, after “A Tear And A Smile” failed to make a major (or even minor) commercial impact, the Philadelphia-based band called it quits.

Prince Phillip Mitchell: "Make It Good"

This album cover is hilarious.  Mitchell seems a bit confused as to what image it is that he wants to convey; on the front he strikes an extremely generic, late ‘70’s, “I’m chillin’ with this chick” pose, and then on the back, he is curiously wearing a pair of Bootsy glasses.  …?  Perhaps no-one bothered to tell him that there was already a major star in the R&B world cultivating that exact same persona, and making a LOT more money doing it.  However, don’t let the rather schizophrenic album photos fool you…this is quite an amazing record.  Mitchell scored big as a songwriter for a laundry list of soul acts throughout the ‘70’s, and so when he struck out on his own, he’d had years to perfect his unique style, which is in all its full glory here.  “Star Of The Ghetto” kicks things off, with Prince Phillip demonstrating an impressive falsetto yowl over dreamy keys, until his mom yells at him to “get out the house with that noise!”  He then proceeds to narrate the history of his life in music, despite both of his parents’ objections, over an unbelievable, conga-driven, dance-funk groove.  He concludes that he doesn’t care whether or not he makes the big-time, as long as he’s a “star in the ghetto” he’ll be satisfied.  This is interesting lyrical material, to say the least, and not exactly your typical late ‘70’s R&B fare.  The rest of the album features a mix of Southern soul flavor mixed with uptown arrangements and changes, best displayed on slow jams like “Falling From Heaven” and “Only Smoke Remains.”  The cut for the funk heads, though, is the strangely-titled “You’ll Throw Bricks At Him.”  It starts out with an oft-sampled harp-over-breakbeat intro, then goes into an insane, pocket-heavy funk throw-down, somewhere in between the Meters, Dorothy Ashby, Lamont Dozier and the Isley Brothers.  If that combination isn’t enough to pique your curiosity, I don’t know what to tell you.  Regardless, this is a great, underrated album, and after a few listens, you’ll begin to think, “ya know, I think this guy deserves to be wearin’ those Bootsy glasses, ‘cause dis shit is off the chain!”

Shuggie Otis: "Inspiration Information"

So, I just had to mention this one as being in the company of my recent finds, as anyone who is even a casual fan of ‘70’s funk knows what a holy grail this is, particularly in its OG vinyl incarnation.  I’m not sure it’s necessary to bore you with yet another tirade about how “brilliant,” “futuristic” and “ahead-of-its-time” this album seems, though it is all of those things.  The truth is that it’s all been said before, mostly in the wake of Luaka Bop’s re-release of this classic LP some years back.  What I did think, however, is that my (very) recent review of Van Hunt’s new album might serve as an interesting comparison.  Both Shuggie and Van are restless souls, and Van Hunt’s newest is the “Inspiration Information” of his own career.  While people often discuss how revelatory Shuggie’s experimentation on “Inspiration…” is, what is often overlooked is that it might not have been fun to actually BE the Shuggie Otis that made such a record, as he most certainly knew that it was not something his peers would quite comprehend, and that, if it were ever to receive the accolades and appreciation it deserved, it would be years after his own star had faded.  Still, thank goodness he did make “Inspiration…,” ‘cause it continues to be a standard-bearer for the kind of creative innovation that only a select few can actually attain.  From the lucid summer dreaming of the title track, to the personality crisis of “Aht Uh Mi Hed,” to the moody, all-instrumental B-side of the album, this really is one of those pieces of art that people are still racing to catch up to.  In keeping with my aforementioned comparison, I can’t help but think that Van Hunt’s latest occupies the same sort of space.  Van Hunt and Shuggie Otis…idiosyncratic to a fault, but what would the world of music be without them?

Alice Clark: "Alice Clark"

I paid $15 for this, at a tiny store near Tacoma, WA.  The circumstances by which I obtained it were a bit bizarre…there was only a tiny selection of records on display that were actually priced, while on shelves below, there sat hundreds, maybe thousands, of much more interesting, valuable, and un-priced records.  I would have liked to have taken several of these with me, but being on a limited budget, and not knowing what any of them would cost me, I settled on this single platter.  I took it to the girl behind the counter, and she says, “oh, the records underneath aren’t for sale yet.”  Are you kidding me?!?  I insisted I had to leave the store with the LP I had selected, and eventually she quoted me a price, though not without some more unnecessary side-stepping.  $15 may not seem like a bargain, but those in the know will recognize that, for this particular record, it’s an absolute steal.  Oh yeah, and did I mention that it was a white-label DJ copy, in mint condition?

The music recorded here is sublime, akin to an early fall day where, while you may be lamenting the loss of the summer, you are nevertheless anxious for the cold winds and dark nights to take hold.  Alice Clark’s voice is perfection, very much in the ‘70’s soul diva tradition, but with none of the histrionics so often associated with that genre.  She has remarkable range and control, never seeming to over-exert to achieve the vocal impact desired.  When paired with Bob Shad’s crystal-clear, warm production and Ernie Wilkins’ complex, subtle arrangements, the end result is transcendent, heavenly, ethereal, miraculous.  Individual track analysis is fairly irrelevant here; this is the kind of album that has to be listened to as a whole to be fully appreciated.  I must say, I am so happy to have found this, even if it did require a small amount of diplomatic haggling on my part.  This is an LP for all moods and surroundings; it feels equally comfortable in the drunkenness of the wee hours as it does with coffee on the following hung-over morning.

Hodges, James And Smith: "Incredible"

The first thing that caught my eye about this one was the funky West Coast rhythm section listed in the credits—Paul Humphrey on drums, Joe Sample on keys, Wilton Felder on bass, Roland Bautista on guitar.  In the ‘70’s, this was a session engineer’s dream team, the kind of cats that could make anybody’s music sound good.  It helps, however, that Hodges, James And Smith are no slouches in the vocal department.  These ladies can swang, sang and testify with the best of ‘em, and on this LP they are given a beautiful set of grooves over which to demonstrate their considerable talent.  The listener is reeled in immediately with the opening “Turn The People On,” where Roland Bautista makes his presence known with the kind of screaming guitar leads he would later bring to such diverse artists as Earth, Wind & Fire, George Duke, and Morris Day.  From there the girls stretch out into all kinds of different bags, from the juke-joint stomp of “Rock Me Baby/Steamroller,” to the near-gospel of “Oh,” to delicate, heartbroken slow jams like “Signal Your Intention” and “You Take My Love For Granted.”  They even try their hand at laid-back Latin rhythms on the LP’s final cut, “Love Was Just A Word.”  Needless to say, the experimentation with multiple styles pays off, and wraps itself up into a remarkable whole, one in which these gifted women strut their stuff and sing their asses off.  This is the kind of obscure record that justifies all the endless hours of crate-digging—or, as my friend Barry put it, the “vinyl archaeology”—that so many of us are consumed by.

The Futures: "Past, Present, And The Futures"

Success never really happened for Philly-based group the Futures, though it deserved to.  That lack of success, and thus distribution, is a major contributing factor as to why their records are so difficult to find nowadays.  What I dig about the Futures is that they are somewhat atypical of the Philly sound that so many of their contemporaries embraced.  Why this is the case is a bit of a mystery, as the musicians and arrangers responsible for their sound are the same people that worked magic on the Futures’ more popular peers…behind-the-scenes masterminds like Kenny Gamble, Leon Huff, Roland Chambers, Bobby Eli, etc.  I think what stands out immediately for the listener is that the arrangements here are more minimal than the average Philly International session.  While songs like “Party Time Man” and “Sunshine And You” might fit neatly into the famed label’s output of string-laden disco hits, tracks like “Ain’t Got Time Fa Nothing” and “Come To Me (When Your Love Is Down)” have a timeless, unhurried feel to them that foregoes the heavily orchestrated backings for a striking emphasis on the vocal group’s sterling harmonies.  “Ain’t Got Time…,” in fact, has a rare-groove vibe that still sounds light years beyond the era in which it was recorded, the sort of thing that current sampling beat-heads love.  Throughout the LP, the Futures’ vocals are highlighted in such a way as to make them the main focus for the listener, a sonic pleasure that seems to become more rewarding with each repeated spin.  The name of the group itself appears to be rather prescient, as with the hindsight of modern musical perspective, we are able to see that these cats had a vision that exceeded the expectations of their own time and space.

The Blackbyrds: "Cornbread, Earl And Me"

Been searching for this one for a while now!   The Blackbyrds have always been one of my favorite groups, I think because they keep the excesses of ‘70’s jazz-funk to a minimum and focus primarily on the groove.  “Cornbread, Earl And Me” is the most difficult album of theirs to find, probably because it doesn’t contain any of the group’s big hits, and instead presents a moody soundtrack vision of the film it accompanies.  Donald Byrd composed the score, and is even spotlighted on solo trumpet on a couple of tunes.  The combination of Byrd’s lyrical, elegiac writing and the Blackbyrds’ significant musical chops is wonderful, an “arrangements-as-played-by” equation that works surprisingly well.  The music here is definitely recognizable as theme-oriented, film-driven composition, particularly in the more heavily orchestrated segments.  Funk fans, though, will still find much to like, as the Blackbyrds grind through hard-hitting jams like “Cornbread,” “The One-Eye Two-Step,” “Soulful Source,” and the much-sampled “Wilford’s Gone.”  While these guys certainly garnered their fair share of commercial success, it still feels like they’re an underrated band, as they are able to tear through technically-proficient funkiness like few others of their generation.

Bobby Womack: "Understanding"

Woooooooooooo!!!!!!  This is some down-and-dirty, FONKY soul right here; it didn’t leave the turntable for about a month after the first time I played it!  This is an extremely rare occasion for me, considering the amount of records I cycle through during any given four-week period.  Not exactly a rare LP, but that’s neither here nor there when you’re in the company of a masterpiece.  You may think I’m exaggerating a bit, but this matches up with any funk/soul classic you’d care to mention from the same time-frame.  It encompasses the gutsiness of Riot-era Sly, the guitar theatrics of early Funkadelic, the uptown smoothness of the Philly and Chicago vocal groups, the politics of Marvin and Stevie, and even the Southern, gospel-drenched, country-soul flavor of ‘70’s Stax.  Womack’s razor-shredding voice testifies like a man possessed, hearkening back to the days when “soul music” wasn’t even a term, and the only place to hear such raw passion was the church.  However, this is no gospel album, as Womack mines deeply personal, secular territory to carve out a feeling for the material.  The blistering “I Can Understand It” was a huge hit for the New Birth, but Bobby’s original rendition is just as interesting.  It’s slower, and has more of a deliberate, loping drag to it, eventually propelling itself into an all-out funk-rock stomp via Womack’s fiery guitar leads.  “Woman’s Gotta Have It” follows, an effortless, mid-tempo number that is about precisely what you think it is.  Other key tracks are the near-country “Got To Get You Back,” the ferocious, thudding “Simple Man,” the back-porch, blues-with-strings meditation “Ruby Dean,” and the topical early ‘70’s cut “Harry Hippie,” a tune actually written by Jim Ford, yet found in its most definitive incarnation here.  Bobby Womack pulled off something unique with this LP, in that he took all the complex components that made early ‘70’s soul so fascinating, then added a gutbucket earthiness to the brew that kept the head nodding even as the mind contemplated.  A gem.