Best Of 70s Soul: Nice & Slow

Nicole Zimmermann (Nakid Magazine)

It's time to do it nicely and slowly this time with quite a few big soul names, like Minnie Riperton and Marlena Shaw. The latter sang the title track for the movie ‘Looking for Mr. Goodbar’ with Diane Keaton. The movie inspired Allee Willis to write ‘Boogie Wonderland’:

“An amazing film. You should see it. She's this very lost woman who would go to these clubs every night and dance to completely lose herself and forget how miserable she was. But she would end up literally bringing home serial killers. And my main thing with every song I write, especially in my later years, I'm really obsessed with music being the carrier of this whole self-esteem message. So if you look at any of my hits, like ‘Neutron Dance’ that's basically: If your life isn't working, get up off your ass and change it. Because it's really up to you.”

In the mid-seventies some glam rock artists started to cross-over to more soulful music on a few occasions. For 'Hobo with a grin' English singer Steve Harley went to California and he sounded very covincingly like Steely Dan on that album. He did even a cover of 'I wish it would rain', the classic song, originally by the Temptations. Pop band Mud did a very good Isley Brothers pastiche on the title track of 'Use your imagination'. The other way around, funk band American Gypsy, best known for their track 'Inside out' (sampled by DJ Shadow and Groove Armada) used a glam rock beat on their song 'Angel Eyes'. This American band was based in the Netherlands and never scored any big hits, but I like 'Angel Eyes' a lot! The song was written by Piet Souer, the same guy who played guitar on 'The troubadour', the Eurovision Song Contest winner of 1969.

'B-A-B-Y' is composed by Isaac Hayes (Chef from 'South Park') and David Porter. It was orginally sung by Carla Thomas in 1966. The version from Rachel Sweet on the punk label Sitff reached #26 on the Dutch pop chart in the winter of 1978/1979. Rachel Sweet was only 15 when she recorded the song. She disappeared from the music scene in 1982, after one album for Columbia Records.Ten years later she played Shelly on an episode of Seinfeld.

Enjoy this 'nice and slow part' of Best Of 70s Soul!

Tracklist:

Jesse Green – Nice And Slow (1976)
The Persuaders – It’s Love (1976)
Hot Chocolate - Cheri Babe (1974)
American Gypsy – Angel Eyes (1974)
Minnie Riperton – Stick Together (1977)
Mud – Use Your Imagination (1975)
Marlena Shaw – Don’t Ask To Stay Until Tomorrow (1977)
The Doobie Brothers – Dependin’ On You (1978)
Santana – I’ll Be Waiting (1977)
Samuel Jonathan Johnson – It’s Love (1978)
Barbara Mason – Give Me Your Love (1972)
Rachel Sweet – B-A-B-Y (1978)
Stoney & Meatloaf – What You See Is What You Get (1971)
Steve Winwood – Vacant Chair (1977)
Steve Harley – Riding The Waves (For Virginia Woolf) (1978)
Stanley Turrentine – You’ll Never Find Another Love Like Mine (1976)
First Choice – Gonna Keep On Lovin Him [A Tom Moulton Mix] (1973)
Patrick Juvet – I Love America (1978)
Fruit – If You Feel It, Say Yeah (1978)
The Tymes – You Little Trustmaker (1974)