▄▄███████▄ IGR - Infinite Grooves
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┌───────────────--·(Infinite Grooves ·· Proudly Presents)·-─────────────────┐
└─┬╥─--∙· ·∙-──╥┬─┘
│║ the O'jays - Give the People What They Want ║│
└╢ ╟┘
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┌────────────────────────────--·(Release Info)·-────────────────────────────┐
└─┬╥───────────────────────────────--∙·∙-────────────────────────────────╥┬─┘
│║ Record Label: Sony Music No Of Tracks: 11 ║│
│║ Genre: Soul Quality: 192K HQ ║│
│║ Rip Date: Jun-19-2003 Total Size: 80,7 MB ║│
└╢ Issue Year: 1995 Original Media: [x] CD - [ ] Vinyl ╟┘
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┌─────────────────────────────--·(Rip Notes)·-──────────────────────────────┐
└─┬╥───────────────────────────────--∙·∙-────────────────────────────────╥┬─┘
│║ ║│
│║ Tracklisting: ║│
│║ ║│
│║ 01 - Give the People What They Want 04:11 ║│
│║ 02 - Ship Ahoy 09:40 ║│
│║ 03 - This Air I Breathe 03:52 ║│
│║ 04 - Don't Call Me Brother 08:56 ║│
│║ 05 - Who Am I 05:11 ║│
│║ 06 - (They Call Me) Mr. Lucky 03:18 ║│
│║ 07 - Rich Get Richer 04:24 ║│
│║ 08 - Shiftless, Shady, Jealous Kind of People 03:36 ║│
│║ 09 - When the World's at Peace 05:18 ║│
│║ 10 - Unity 04:59 ║│
│║ 11 - How Time Flies 05:14 ║│
│║ ----- ║│
│║ 58:39 ║│
│║ ║│
│║ ║│
│║ ║│
│║ ║│
│║ ║│
│║ All Tracks written between 1973-1975 ║│
│║ ║│
│║ Music is a mirror, its reflections a wonder of social ║│
│║ history-personal as a love affair, public as a revolution. Black ║│
│║ American music offers extraordinary revelations of its own, ║│
│║ sometimes couched in codes of irony, yet invariably expressed ║│
│║ with openhearted sincerity. The play between protest and ║│
│║ entertainment is a long-standing tradition: From Fats Waller's ║│
│║ "(What Did I Do To Be So) Black And Blue" of the twenties to ║│
│║ Snoop Doggy Dogg's raps of the nineties, strong messages ride on ║│
│║ seductive rhythms. ║│
│║ Prior to the mid-sixties, however, the political content of black ║│
│║ popular music was anything but blatant. The civil rights crusade ║│
│║ changed all that. The movement from clean-cut Motown (Miracles ║│
│║ and Supremes) to the nit-and-grit of Memphis and Muscle Shoals ║│
│║ (Otis Redding and Wilson Pickett) was fast and furious. James ║│
│║ Brown was saying it loud; black power galvanized the sound. A ║│
│║ decade after Chubby Checker danced "The Twist," Sly Stone ║│
│║ declared "There's A Riot Goin' On." The floodgates were ║│
│║ unleashed, the feelings couldn't by David Ritz be contained, from ║│
│║ Aretha Franklin's "Respect" to Edwin Starr's "War." ║│
│║ ║│
│║ In protesting the Vietnam War, Marvin Gaye declared his own ║│
│║ personal war against formulaic R&B and radically expanded the ║│
│║ genre with What's Going On, a 1971 suite of songs whose social, ║│
│║ economic and spiritual concerns broke conventional barriers. ║│
│║ Curtis Mayfield was on the same wavelength. Stevie Wonder ║│
│║ followed suit with his 1972 Music From My Mind. In this same time ║│
│║ slot, Philadelphia International writer/producers Kenny Gamble ║│
│║ and Leon Huff signed The O'Jays from Canton, Ohio, ferociously ║│
│║ talented singers who'd been recording for over a dozen years and ║│
│║ were ripe to explode. ║│
│║ The explosion is all over this disc. No wonder fans call them The ║│
│║ mighty O'Jays. The marriage of their muscular voices to the ║│
│║ seamless tracks represents one of the most satisfying ║│
│║ developments in the history of R&B. Eddie Levert, who sings lead, ║│
│║ along with Walter Williams and William Powell, became dominant ║│
│║ vocal forces during the volatile years surrounding Nixon's ║│
│║ Watergate. While George Clinton's monumental funk found ║│
│║ expression in his Parliament/Funkadelic federations and Al ║│
│║ Green's brilliant soliloquies reinforced the strength of southern ║│
│║ soul, Gamble-Huff held their own as socially conscious ║│
│║ orchestrators- and formidable funksters to boot. ║│
│║ Having cut their teeth in the sixties on the Soul Survivors ║│
│║ ("Expressway To Your Heart"), The Intruders ("Love Is ║│
│║ Like A Baseball Game"), Jerry Butler ("Only The Strongest ║│
│║ Survive"), and Archie Bell ("I Just Can't Stop Dancing"), Gamble ║│
│║ and Huff grew more intense in the seventies. They spoke through ║│
│║ two primary groups and two primary singers-Teddy Pendergrass of ║│
│║ Harold Melvin & The Blue Notes (See If You Don't Know Me By Now: ║│
│║ The Best Of Harold Melvin & The Blue Notes, EK/T 66338) and Eddie ║│
│║ Levert of The O'Jays. ║│
│║ In the aftermath of a war that seemed senseless and an ║│
│║ administration that proved corrupt, the seventies was a time of ║│
│║ frustration and disillusionment. Rage was in the air. And if the ║│
│║ content of several of the songs selected for Give The People What ║│
│║ They Want supports a system of predictable middle-class values, ║│
│║ the style reveals impassioned outrage. The lyrics can be ║│
│║ simplistic, but the emotions are fierce, thesinging sensational. ║│
│║ "Give The People What They Want" may sound like sloganeering, but ║│
│║ Ronnie Baker's blistering bass turns high rhetoric into hard ║│
│║ reality. With echoes of The O'Jays' earlier Gamble-Huff hit "For ║│
│║ The Love Of Money" (itself an echo of Berry Gordy/Barrett ║│
│║ Strong's "Money That's What I Want" from 1960), "Give The ║│
│║ People..." pulsates with a gut-level groove that's immediate, ║│
│║ demanding and unrelentingly right. ║│
│║ I especially love "Ship Ahoy." A close cousin to Randy Newman's ║│
│║ "Sail Away," another ironic tale of the slave trade, ║│
│║ Gamble-Huff's melodic narrative includes sloshing oars and ║│
│║ snapping whips, an onomatopoetic production which quotes from ║│
│║ "Old Man River" and sways between profound despair and faint ║│
│║ hope. Exhausted and frightened, the prisoners are moving to the ║│
│║ "land of liberty." A cold wind is blowing-"can't you feel the ║│
│║ motion of the ocean?"-but the sun's shining through. The long ║│
│║ song, and the journey ║│
│║ described, finally stand as a metaphor for the black experience ║│
│║ in America, an historical blues which is, at once, traumatic and ║│
│║ triumphant, embittered and confident. ║│
│║ Considering the subject, the musical attitude of "This Air I ║│
│║ Breathe" is strangely upbeat, rocking along to a happy island ║│
│║ beat. The precedent is Marvin Gaye's "Mercy Mercy Me (The Ecology ║│
│║ Song)," but here gloom is lifted by cheerful optimism. "Someday ║│
│║ there'll be," they sing, "the finest air around ... clean, pure ║│
│║ and sweet and warm ... so cold and nice." The gospel enthusiasm ║│
│║ pointing to a better day is infectious, the sentiment ║│
│║ irresistible. ║│
│║ "Who Am I" is a touching lament of lost love. Co-writer Bunny ║│
│║ Sigler and arranger Norman Harris are key contributors to the ║│
│║ Philadelphia sound. Together with Otis Redding, Levi Stubbs, ║│
│║ David Ruffin, Dennis Edwards and a handful of others, Eddie ║│
│║ Levert is a fabulous exponent of the "begging song," a man on his ║│
│║ knees, understanding his mistakes, pleading his case. "Who Am I" ║│
│║ (as distinguished, say, from Marvin Gaye's more traditional ║│
│║ "Distant Lover") has an existential tinge. "Who Am I," asks the ║│
│║ broken man with a gentleness that breaks your heart, "to think ║│
│║ that I would never cry?" The guitar fills are equally gentle. ║│
│║ Along with "Ship Ahoy," "Don't Call Me Brother" strikes me as ║│
│║ another masterpiece, another breakthrough blues of extraordinary ║│
│║ depth and distinction. Bobby Martin's chart is a model of ║│
│║ unadorned elegance. The jazz setting, the loose play between ║│
│║ bass, guitar and vibes, gives way to the slower-than-molasses ║│
│║ doo-wop cadence, a take-your-time setting for a neighborhood ║│
│║ story of brother versus brother. The brother under scrutiny is a ║│
│║ hypocrite, a character who hides his thievery under the guise of ║│
│║ the pseudo-radical political correctness"skinning and grinning ║│
│║ with the power sign and talkin' about 'my man, solid on down, my ║│
│║ brother."' He's called a backstabber-the name of a previous ║│
│║ O'Jays' hit and a recurring GambleHuff theme-and a "low down ║│
│║ rotten no good son of a sea cook." Two decades later, the ║│
│║ language, in contrast to raw rap, seems exceedingly tame, while ║│
│║ the singing is unrestrained, an exercise in extreme emotional ║│
│║ dynamics. ║│
│║ Gamble and Huff wrote "Shiftless, Shady, Jealous Kind Of People" ║│
│║ with Whitehead and McFadden, whose "Ain't No Stopping Us Now" ║│
│║ became an inspiring hallmark of the late seventies. Here the mood ║│
│║ is dark, the backstabber motif still in play. Perhaps influenced ║│
│║ by Norman Whitfield, Motown's enfant terrible whose 1971 "Smiling ║│
│║ Faces Sometimes" for The Undisputed Truth was a seminal study of ║│
│║ hypocrisy, Gamble-Huff were blessed with the capacity to turn ║│
│║ anger into melody and fury into velvet-smooth grooves. ║│
│║ "I wanna talk about the rich and super rich, the poor and the ║│
│║ super poor." So opens "Rich Get Richer," a rocking anthem of ║│
│║ economic inequity. The elite are "styling and profiling," ║│
│║ described in no uncertain terms as class enemies of the ║│
│║ downtrodden. The world, according to the song, is controlled by ║│
│║ 16 families. But if the message seems a bit unsophisticated, it ║│
│║ deepens as the rhythm rushes to the bridge where we're told, ║│
│║ "Ain't nothing wrong with being rich, just be rich through and ║│
│║ through." ║│
│║ "When The World's At Peace" is a tour de force, a delicious ║│
│║ amalgamation of James Brown and Sly with Tower of Power horn ║│
│║ licks locked in for good measure. The vision is utopian with a ║│
│║ twist of hard-nosed street wisdom: "Some may say that love's a ║│
│║ sacrifice; love is not a state of mind, love's a fact of life." ║│
│║ The stop-and-stutter syncopation with its powerful Family Stone ║│
│║ feel slides into an a cappella conclusion which, we wish would go ║│
│║ on forever. ║│
│║ The whimsical moments on this collection the ingratiating "(They ║│
│║ Call Me) Mr. Lucky" and "How Time Flies," a piece of sweet ║│
│║ nostalgia-are warm and relaxed, yet the prevailing spirit, the ║│
│║ true thesis, is "Unity." The message is delivered with absolute ║│
│║ clarity: "I want to talk to all the people that's listening to my ║│
│║ voice; we've got to make our own decisions, we've got to make the ║│
│║ world; now's the time to make it safe for little boys and little ║│
│║ girls." ║│
│║ Since the years of their initial glory, The O'Jays have enjoyed ║│
│║ more hits and wider recognition, consistently maintaining their ║│
│║ artistic integrity. (William Powell died of cancer in 1977 and ║│
│║ was replaced by Sammy Strain.) The Gamble-Huff insistence on ║│
│║ social concerns has spread and deepened in ways few would have ║│
│║ anticipated, Today's R&B/rap/hip hop reflects an enormous variety ║│
│║ of personal and political points of view. Black music is more ║│
│║ relevant than ever. And stylistically, the school associated with ║│
│║ The O'Jays-pure soul-has spawned disciples not only in Eddie ║│
│║ Levert's son, Gerald, but a score of artists from an even younger ║│
│║ generation, belters like R. Kelly and Aaron Hall. ║│
│║ Give The People What They Want. Twenty years later, the people ║│
│║ still want The O'Jays; the people will always want great singers. ║│
│║ David Ritz has written biographies of Marvin Gaye, Ray Charles, ║│
│║ Smokey Robinson and Jerry Wexler. His lyrics include "Sexual ║│
│║ Healing." His latest book is Rage To Survive, co written with ║│
│║ Etta James. ║│
│║ Original recordings Produced by Kenneth Gamble and Leon Huff ║│
│║ "When The World's At Peace" and 'Who Am I" Produced by Gamble, ║│
│║ Huff and Bunny Sigler Recorded at Sigma Sound Studios, ║│
│║ Philadelphia, PA Engineered by Joe Tarsia ║│
│║ Digitally Mastered by Thomas Ruff at Sony Music Studios, New York ║│
│║ TSOP, "The Sound of Philadelphia" ║│
│║ ║│
│║ ║│
│║ Remember to support these artists by some method if you like them ║│
│║ by going to their concerts / buying more of their material / etc. ║│
└╢ ╟┘
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┌───────────────────────--·(About Infinite Grooves)·-───────────────────────┐
└─┬╥───────────────────────────────--∙·∙-────────────────────────────────╥┬─┘
│║ ║│
│║ Infinite Grooves was founded in early 1999 with the belief that ║│
│║ the best music has already been made. This was a neglected part ║│
│║ of releasing in the MP3-scene - now that has changed with Infinite ║│
│║ Grooves at the top. We will constantly keep bringing you the very ║│
│║ best in disco-soul, rare grooves, jazz-funk etc. Like wine, a good ║│
│║ groove only gets better with age - so we will bring you back to ║│
│║ the olde school! ║│
└╢ ╟┘
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┌─────────────────────────--·(R-E-S-P-E-C-T To...)·-────────────────────────┐
└─┬╥───────────────────────────────--∙·∙-────────────────────────────────╥┬─┘
│║ ║│
│║ Everybody contributing to the MP3-scene, but these in particular: ║│
│║ ·∙-───────────────────────────--∙·∙-───────────────────────────--∙· ║│
│║ Not disclosed for security reasons, but you know who you are! ║│
└╢ ╟┘
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┌─────────────────────────--·(How To Contact Us)·-──────────────────────────┐
└─┬╥───────────────────────────────--∙·∙-────────────────────────────────╥┬─┘
│║ ║│
│║ Infinite Grooves is always open for new true funk-friends to help ║│
│║ us in our efforts to spread groovy music. This includes rippers, ║│
│║ site-ops, box-ops and just about anybody with skills or services ║│
│║ to offer that could be of interest to a group like us. If we want ║│
│║ you, you will know where to find us. All you gotta do is to love ║│
│║ the funk! ║│
└╢ ╟┘
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·∙-─(Updated 02-Feb-2002)-∙·∙-(logo by imo, nfo by univerz)─--∙·