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.