Any Major Dude With Half A Heart

And here we come to an end of the 1970s in the Any Major Soul series. There are two mixes covering ’80s soul HERE and HERE. Still, the years 1980/81 and possibly 1982/83 were good enough to yield any major mixes; I’ve not thought about later years.

It’s tempting to dismiss the soul music produced in the disco era. I think this mix shows that it was still a golden era for soul, if not of quite the incredible standards a few years earlier when there was the happy confluence of the influences exerted by the likes of Philly, Motown, Hi, Muscle Shoals, Atlantic, and the Chicago scene. Read more…

Just in time for New Year’s Eve, the fifth Any Major Funk mix (and I am going to reupload the first two two mixes before the year is out; the links for mixes 3 and 4 are still live). And I still have at least one more mix in me.

As always, this is serious disco from the golden age of 1978-1983 (with two songs falling on either side of that timeframe). Joyful, funky, dancable. But not suitable for hilarious Afro wigs and Travolta dance moves. And as always, the mix is timed to fit on a standard CD-R.
The song of particular interest here is the opener, Loleatta Holloway’s Love Sensation, written by Dan Hartman and recorded with the backing of the Salsoul Orchestra. The song was liberally sampled on the big dance classic a decade later, Black Box’s Ride On Time. In the video we saw a young, lithe woman incongruously belting out the lyrics. The deception was exposed (though legally it was not fraud, because Black Box paid Salsoul for the samples off Love Sensation).

While Love Sensation hints at the emergence of Hi-NRG a few years later, Two Tons O’ Fun’s I Got The Feeling could be regarded as the first Hi-NRG hit (as opposed to its Euro Disco progenitor), or at least as a link between the disco funk of, say Chic, and the Hi-NRG sound of the mid-80s. A few years later, the group’s two singer went on to to record one of the defining Hi-NRG hits: It’s Raining Men, as the Weather Girls.

TRACKLISTING
1. Loleatta Holloway – Love Sensation (1980)
2. Two Tons O’ Fun – I Got The Feeling (1980)
3. The Jacksons – Shake Your Body (Down To The Ground) (1979)
4. Cheryl Lynn – Shake It Up Tonight (1981)
5. S.O.S. Band – Take Your Time (Do It Right) (1980)
6. L.T.D. – Back in Love (1977)
7. Instant Funk – I Got My Mind Made Up (1978)
8. Phil Fearon & Galaxy – What Do I Do (1984)
9. Commodores - Lady (You Bring Me Up) (1981)
10. Shalamar - There It Is (1982)
11. Mtume - So You Wanna Be A Star (1980)
12. Teena Marie – I Need Your Lovin’ (1980)
13. Change - A Lover’s Holiday (1980)
14. Evelyn ‘Champagne’ King – If You Want My Lovin’ (1981)
15. Melba Moore – Mind Up Tonight (1982)
16. France Joli - Feel Like Dancing (1979)

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I’m not sure whether it is due to popular demand after last week’s compilation, but here is a second ’80s soul mix, with a third and final installment in the works. The first mix was an attempt to create a fairly representative cross-section of the genre. This mix is less self-conscious about that. What we have here, then, are some of my favourite soul tracks from that comparatively barren decade. As in any compilation of favourites, the measure of quality may be secondary to the compiler’s emotional connection to a song. Is Smokey’s Just To See Her any good? I don’t rightly know. It may not be a better song than Being With You. But much as I like Being With You, it does not transport me back to a particular time. Play Just To See Her, however, and I smell the girl’s hair, taste the vegetarian gunk I used to eat, feel the anticipation of going to the club and the anxiety of missing my friends in London. And so it is with many songs in this mix (especially Pendergrass’ wonderfully Marvin-esque Joy). Read more…

This mix might come in time for your New Year’s Eve party: great disco/funk tracks from the glory years, 1978-82. The songs should fit on a CD-R.

I’ve tried to stay clear of the usual fare offered disco samplers, so no synth-driven Euro disco, no Bee Gees, no Michael Jackson, no Alicia Bridges, and damn well no Village People or Boney M. This mix is not supposed to encourage the “hilarious” donning of Afro wigs, white suits and other such hi-jinx as doing the Travolta SNF pose. This is for people who take the funk and disco seriously and groove to it joyously.

1. Odyssey - Going Back To My Roots (1981)
2. Cheryl Lynn – Got To Be Real (1978)
3. Raydio – It’s Time To Party Now (1980)
4. Billy Ocean – Stay The Night (1980)
5. Shalamar - A Night To Remember (1982)
6. Skyy - Here’s To You (1980)
7. One Way feat. Al Hudson – Push (1979)
8. Positive Force – We Got The Funk (1980)
9. Fat Larry’s Band - Act Like You Know It (1982)
10. Jimmy ‘Bo’ Horne – Spank (1978)
11. Sharon Brown – I Specialise In Love (1982)
12. Tom Browne – Funkin’ For Jamaica (1980)
13. The Whispers – Let’s Go All The Way (1978)
14. Hi Gloss – You’ll Never Know (1981)
15. Sister Sledge – He’s The Greatest Dancer (1978)
16. Webster Lewis – Give Me Some Emotion (1979)
17. Leon Haywood – Don’t Push It, Don’t Force It (1980)
18. Rodney Franklin - The Groove (1980)

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