This Joy Is Something New: Andy Bey and the Bey Sisters Take Jazz to Church

My sisters and I don’t have a musical bone in our bodies. And neither of our parents could sing or play an instrument. But we all loved music; it filled the house day in and out. It fueled fantasies for me. In some of them, my sisters and I were a singing group. Despite our conflicting personalities, or perhaps because of them, we’d make gloriously complex music and could sing and swing anything. In my mind, we sounded like Andy Bey and the Bey Sisters.

The trio was one of the early jazz fusionists, weaving bold threads of gospel, blues and R&B into the idiom. Between 1957 and 1966, Andy Bey and the Bey Sisters played clubs along the East Coast, all the key spots in New York City. And for a time, the New Jersey siblings were the toast of Europe. They didn’t record much, though – only three albums, each a gem.

Around the time the trio released its 1961 debut for RCA Victor, jazz was in the midst of a soulful awakening. Marquee names like Charles Mingus, Horace Silver and Jack McDuff added more funk and groove to their takes on standards and originals. The music was sophisticated always but still down-home and drenched with blues. A gospel prodigy out of Detroit named Aretha Franklin, John Hammond’s discovery over at Columbia Records, also recorded in the same gospel-jazz vein and early on shared New York club stages with Andy and the Bey Sisters.

The trio had a style similar to Lambert, Hendricks & Ross, but the Beys were far churchier. They sang with the same lived-in grace of the Staple Singers but were much more daring and jazzier vocalists. The group was anchored by Andy’s piano and mahogany baritone, but his sisters Geraldine and Salome also shone. They all sang different lines that melded beautifully over arrangements that echoed the gospel of their childhood. The harmonies were often exquisite, the phrasing supple and the timing unerring. It’s the kind of instinctive, tonally rich singing that seems easy for folks who share a blood line.

Though not a hit, the RCA album, the only one Andy and the Bey Sisters cut for the company, is a fine but uneven introduction to the siblings’ style. Three years later, the trio signed with the legendary Prestige Records, which released the group’s other two albums: 1964’s Now! Hear!, and 1965’s ‘Round Midnight. Each is studded with dazzling interpretations of jazz and pop standards.

The first LP opens with perhaps the definitive take of “Willow Weep for Me.” Many have recorded the tune, most famously Billie Holiday. Andy and Bey Sisters imbue it with loads of deep, delicious blues and gospel feeling, a happy marriage of the Baptist church and the jukejoint. Next is the only rendition of “A Taste of Honey” that should ever matter. The ballad has often received overwrought treatments, either too precious or too self-conscious. But Andy, Geraldine and Salome beautifully wring all the sultry nuances that others either overlook or overcook. They swing “Sister Sadie,” the Horace Silver number, into bad health. Usually done as an atmospheric ballad, “Besame Mucho” is also treated as a funky swinger, a refreshing take on the Spanish chestnut.

The selections were a bit more pop-oriented on ‘Round Midnight, with Andy and the Bey Sisters dashing soulful spice onto such disparate numbers as “Tammy” – yes, the Debbie Reynolds song, and “Hallelujah I Love Her So,” the Ray Charles jam. The title track, the Thelonious Monk classic, is hauntingly rendered with Andy on lead. The trio creates a mood that suggests film noir and, of course, the church. The feel is melancholy but transcendent. You hold your breath until the last note.

Soon after ’Round Midnight hit stores, the Beys broke up. Andy later collaborated with Gary Bartz, Max Roach and Stanley Clarke and released a string of well-received jazz albums. He still performs these days. Geraldine and Salome have retired.

In their youth, the siblings fused jazz with exuberant elements that made it crackle with life. The musicality was always rich and beautifully nuanced. More important, they sounded like they were having a ball.
 

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Take a Look at Me, Boy!: Lambert, Hendricks & Ross Move the Crowd

The human voice is the first instrument, and Lambert, Hendricks & Ross brilliantly embodied its wonders and dexterity. More than 50 years after the trio stormed the worlds of jazz and pop, its gnarly vocal arrangements still devastate.

Dave Lambert, Jon Hendricks and Annie Ross broke new ground back in late ’50s. As the country was mired in segregation and the Civil Rights movement, L,H&R was an interracial trio, with Jon, the sole brother, providing witty lyrics and resonant blues sensibility. The group also helped popularize “vocalese,” the art of singing note for note the instrumental lines of jazz tunes. You can say that vocalese is  the elegant great-grandfather of rap.

But the style started long before L,H&R formed, and the group wasn’t the first to score hit records with it. About five years before the trio released its 1957 debut, King Pleasure notched a big vocalese hit with “Moody’s Mood for Love.” King sang lyrics to a sax solo by James Moody. 
 

 L,H &R expanded vocalese and made it hipper and smarter. Each member possessed a dynamic tone and range, especially Annie, an early influence on Joni Mitchell and one of the most underrated female vocalists in jazz. Each also graduated from the school of bop, and the style informed just about everything the group did.
Dave masterminded the trio, which was born out of jam sessions at his apartment. He and Jon shared similar musical tastes and recorded together in the mid ’50s to limited success.

Their fortunes and sound changed when Annie joined the fold, bringing her fluid, refined trumpet-like range. Dave wrote dense vocal lines for each singer – lines that didn’t seem at all related. But they merged wondrously over spare instrumentation. Jon wrote deft lyrics with a poet’s eye, leavened with a down-to-earth wit. The trio sang with Broadway dazzle and had flair to spare but never forsook the rich and nuanced musicality of its approach.
 

The eight albums L,H&R put out between 1957 and 1962 are all excellent, brimming with stunning vocal performances. Three of those LPs – The Hottest New Group in Jazz, Lambert, Hendricks & Ross Sing Ellington and High Flying with the Ike Isaacs Trio – were released by Columbia between 1959 and 1961. The label was perhaps the biggest in the world and had the marketing muscle to push the group. Columbia also had top-shelf engineers and studios, and the L, H&R albums were expertly recorded. The sessions were overseen by Teo Macero, famous for his work with Miles Davis, and Irving Townsend.

The Columbia albums feature some of the group’s best performances, including “Twisted,” which Joni covered on her 1974’s classic Court and Spark, and “Cloudburst,” soulfully reworked by the Pointer Sisters on their gold-selling 1973 debut. “Gimme That Wine” is a fine showcase for Jon’s blues-suffused approach. Extolling the joys of alcohol, the humorous song is also a great display of Jon’s underappreciated writing skills.

“Come on Home” is an exuberant blues number, with the voices of Dave and Jon paneled far to the left and right, with Annie’s voice and the group’s harmonies mixed in the center. The trio also ventured outside vocalese. They swung anything, including the alphabet song on “The New ABC.” They sing with breakneck speed and amazing fluidity on “Mr. P.C.”

When Annie left the group for a solo career in ’62, she was replaced by Yolande Bavan. She was good but no Annie. The group disbanded two years later. Dave died in 1966. He was hit by car while changing a tire.

Jon and Annie established respected solo careers and still perform these days. But they're largely known for their stunning work with Lambert, Hendricks & Ross, a combination of talent, brains and magic that’s hard to match.

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Play Saxy for Me: The Gospel According to Gary Bartz

Gospel doesn’t have to come out of the church. If the music tells the truth and distills a feeling or an experience with authenticity, that’s gospel. It’s even better when it’s all driven by a funky beat or floats on a melody that haunts you long after the music fades. The song propels you to think and do better; that’s gospel.

The music of Gary Bartz, particularly his jazz-funk fusion period between 1970 and 1977, was secular church. Righteous and passionate, cool but never aloof, Gary’s approach often brilliantly embodied the volatility of black America during that period. But the music was leavened with a sense of hope and transcendence.

The jazz saxophonist and band leader from Baltimore was very much a part of that sophisticated black message music era, when acts like Curtis Mayfield, Marvin Gaye, Stevie Wonder, Earth, Wind & Fire and the stable of artists at Philadelphia International released open-hearted songs that unblinkingly delved into socio-political topics. And, of course, there was always room for romance.

But Gary, who established himself in the ‘60s as a respected sideman with Max Roach and later Miles Davis, never notched big hits. And although his work in the ’70s continues to inspire DJs and hip-hop producers all over the world, especially in England, Gary remains something of a cult figure.

It was through my love for A Tribe Called Quest that I discovered Gary’s music. The celebrated hip-hop trio sampled the gorgeous melody of “Gentle Smiles” on its 1991 cut, “Butter.” Gary’s work wasn’t easily available then, and iTunes and YouTube didn’t exist. It was more than a decade later when I found a few of his classic Prestige LPs. The music fanned the flames of a soul fire.

Powerful nationalist anthems like “Celestial Blues” and “Uhuru Sasa,” featuring the planet-shifting baritone of Andy Bey, were instant self-esteem enhancers. At the time, I was heavy into black history, on the same search-for-self trip many African Americans took back in the early ’70s when those songs were first released. Andy sings “Uhuru Sasa” with a dignified defiance. He repeats “hell no” as though it’s a prayer while Gary’s sax trills, soars and winds around the propulsive groove.

African rhythms, uptown jazz and black poetry coalesce on “I’ve Known Rivers," a live 1973 adaptation of the Langston Hughes poem. Gary takes over the vocals. And although he’s much better singing through his sax, so to speak, he’s charming.

Around 1975, Gary smoothed out his style with help from the Mizell Brothers, famous for their excellent work with Bobbi Humphrey, Donald Byrd and others. Gary had been producing himself up to that point. But given the Mizell’s progressive, wondrously layered fusion of jazz and streetwise funk, the collaboration made sense. And it bore delicious fruit with The Shadow Do, Gary’s 1975 masterstroke. The nationalist messages take a back seat, as classy, mostly instrumental club tracks like “Sea Gypsy” drive the album.

“Gentle Smiles” is another gem off that LP. Gary is multi-tracked, singing a slinky, transporting duet with his horn. Reggie Lucas and James Mtume, former sidemen with Miles and later hit producers for Stephanie Mills, play guitar and percussion respectively.

The success of The Shadow Do led to a contract with Capitol Records, and the company released Music Is My Sanctuary in 1977. The album reflects a bigger production budget and is unabashedly glossy and dance-oriented. That’s not a knock against it. Assessing the album on R&B standards, Music is My Sanctuary is a fine effort, brightened with romantic overtones via Syreeta’s sparkling soprano vocals.

The album also was a lovely close to a deeply explorative artistic period for Gary, when his music delivered stinging truths with dignity, grace and loads of funk. Later, his music helped sharpen my perceptions of an ever-shifting self. It renewed the spirit just like gospel is supposed to do.

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I'll Bring All Your Dreams Alive for You: The Magical Pop of Olivia Newton-John

For nearly a decade, roughly between 1974 and 1982, no other act in pop embodied the problematic idea of “American sweetheart” better than Olivia Newton-John.

But all of that striking beauty and seemingly bottomless charm was imported. She was born in England and raised mostly in Australia. For a time, she was inescapable. And although her skills on the mic remain underrated and her “naughty” hits from the early ’80s seem quaint by today’s standards, Olivia’s influence is far-reaching.

In the ’70s, she blurred the lines between pop and country, when Faith Hill, Shania Twain and Martina McBride were still playing with dolls. For better or worse, Taylor Swift couldn’t exist if there hadn’t been Olivia Newton-John. During the height of disco and punk debauchery, Olivia’s music and image seemed to offer a pillow-soft refuge. Her role in “Grease” – the classic 1978 musical that sanitizes and to a certain degree makes a cartoon of 1950s America – all but cemented Olivia's good-girl image. But, in a way, it also freed her.

Olivia smartly extended her character’s turn from sweet angel cloaked in white to naughty girl romping around in black spandex. It’s now a tired trajectory in “feminist pop,” when acts declare their “independence,” starting careers anew, by asserting their sexuality in often garish ways. Such a “movement” can be traced to the rise of Madonna, who superseded Olivia’s pop reign. Given the advent of MTV and the pressure cooker that was the socio-political climate of the mid 1980s, Madonna and her spawn had to happen.

But just before juvenile garishness became the norm, Olivia sold sex and romance in ways that were coy, fun and always smart. No matter how banal the lyric, Olivia sounded “hopelessly devoted.” Her first No. 1 hit, “I Honestly Love You,” is as sincere and affecting as pop got in 1974. Olivia’s restrained voice is barely above a whisper for most of the song, and it ripples with emotion. “Have You Never Been Mellow,” Olivia’s second No. 1 pop hit from 1975, works because she makes it sound like a genuine concern for a stressed-out friend rather than a cheesy commercial for a reasonably priced wine or something.

After “Grease,” Olivia and her main songwriter-producer, the brilliant and equally underappreciated John Farrar, added a pronounced edge to the singer’s style. In 1980, Olivia stalled her momentum as a bankable movie star with the pointless “Xanadu.” But she was the best thing about the soundtrack, which yielded “Magic,” one of Olivia’s finest cuts.

Her effervescent lilt is on full display, enfolded by a tasteful arrangement with muted rock overtones and a dramatic, soaring chorus. The Xanadu soundtrack also boasted “Suddenly,” a charming duet with Cliff Richard that sounds like it may have had an influence on Babyface’s cottony R&B approach.

Olivia’s break from the American sweetheart image was complete on 1981’s “Physical.” The Grammy-winning song and video were ubiquitous that year. She also helped set off the fashion trend of wearing work-out clothes outside the gym.
Sparkling with winking double entendres, the dance track is yet another combination of great voice and catchy lyric. It’s all bolstered by an ingratiating production from John. The song sat atop the pop charts for 10 weeks and the album, Physical, went double platinum, becoming Olivia’s biggest LP.

It’s also one of her strongest efforts, with several memorable well-crafted cuts, like the assertive “Make a Move on Me” and the neon-flashy “Landslide.”

Olivia scored other hits after ’82, namely “Heart Attack” and “Twist of Fate.” But her streak ran cold. Madonna came like a wind from nowhere, and pop audiences no longer had a sweet tooth for sweethearts. Besides, Olivia was in her 30s by then. She married and in 1986 had a daughter.
 

But for a time, the beautiful Brit by way of Australia brilliantly embodied the supposed innocence and honey-kissed charm of pure American pop. She did it all with a wink.

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Why Don't You Slide?: Slave Catches the Funk Sensation

There was something in the air or maybe in the water of Ohio back then.

Whatever it was, this thing was powerful and incessantly funky, working its way into the spirit of the people. In Cincinnati in the 1950s, it possessed Sallye Isley’s boys, better known as the Isley Brothers. Over in Dayton in the ’60s, it took hold of a group that eventually became the Ohio Players. This thing lingered in Dayton a decade later and invaded the minds and bodies of 10 gifted knuckleheads collectively known as Slave.  

The guys were barely out of high school when in 1977 they landed a deal with Cotillion, a subsidiary of Atlantic Records. Slave scored a smash right out the box with the classic “Slide,” which topped the R&B charts that summer and spurred gold sales for the band’s self-titled debut. The single encapsulated what made Slave special. They were purveyors of relentless, often hypnotic funk, overlaid with simple, sometimes nonsensical lyrics. Rock and jazz informed the grooves at times, and later strings were artfully incorporated. But stylistic ambitions never got in the way of the funk during Slave’s peak period between 1977 and 1983.

Personnel shifted during that time, but the classic lineup included guitarist Mark Hicks, bassist Mark Adams, drummer Tim “Tiny” Dozier, guitarist Danny Webster and the charismatic, idiosyncratic vocalist Steve Arrington. Slave toured with some of the best bands of the era: the Commodores, the Brothers Johnson and Graham Central Station. The guys absorbed those influences and synthesized them on a string of fine albums, including The Hardness of the World (1977), Just a Touch of Love (1979) and Stone Jam (1980).

Outside of R&B, Slave was virtually invisible to the pop crowd. And the group made few, if any, concessions to the mainstream. No big deal. Slave still packed venues and took home gold albums, sticking with a formula that sounds hip and vibrant more than 30 years later.

My favorite Slave cuts feature Steve on lead vocals. In interviews, he said he patterned his pinched winding singing style after the way John Coltrane blew his sax. That’s evident near the fade of “Watching You,” as Steve lets loose a freewheeling wail. His voice coils and spirals through “Just a Touch of Love.”  Keith Sweat was a teenager back then, digging on Slave. He must’ve studied Steve’s nuances, because his approach is almost a carbon copy of Steve’s. Keith later paid tribute to Slave with a faithful cover of “Just a Touch of Love.”

Slave embodied the masculine aggressiveness of funk. The bass and drums thumped hard – always. But there was an attractive smoothness to the sound. That light application of gloss was best realized on 1981’s Show Time, perhaps the band’s most accomplished album. It features the seductive single “Steal Your Heart,” with Danny on lead vocal. The song is a creamy funk nirvana, the muscular rhythm wrapped in satiny strings. Though a limited vocalist, Danny croons with a sly boyishness that sounds sincere, as the gossamer harmonies sway behind him.

“Snap Shot” was the album’s biggest single, peaking at No. 6 on the R&B chart. Gimmicky with the sound of snapping cameras throughout, the summery groove also boasts spirited jazz-kissed horns and a dramatic vocal from Steve.  

Like many groups before it, Slave eventually splintered and spun off other groups, including Aurra and Steve Arrington’s Hall of Fame. Slave left Cotillion in 1984 and recorded a handful of ho-hum albums for the indie label Ichiban. With most of the original members gone, Slave never recaptured its classic sound, which has been heavily sampled by hip-hop producers over the years.

I’m not sure if anybody ever pinpointed exactly what that thing was in Ohio, that sensation that swept through the air and moved through the water back in the day. It gave several young black men the power of funk, and they were never the same.  

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Bring Back that Feeling: Q-Tip Expands on Kamaal the Abstract

In early 2002, soon after I started my job as a music critic for a suburban paper outside of New York City, I received a promotional CD of Kamaal the Abstract, the sophomore album by Q-Tip.

I had long been a fan, going back to when he was the fluid, left-of-center member of A Tribe Called Quest. I immediately tore open the package from Arista Records, Tip’s label.

Amplified, the rapper’s 1999 solo debut, had turned off many diehard Tribe fans with its unabashed sheen and fun, freewheeling rhymes. Q-Tip wanted to dance and hang out, not deliver “message raps” of social and political progress, like he had done so brilliantly with Phife and Ali of Tribe. The record went gold anyway.

When I spun Kamaal the Abstract at the office, I was excited. I’ve never gotten into predicting “hits,” what will sell or what will flop. If I had that skill, I would be making a much fatter paycheck as a record executive. But I felt Tip had delivered something special – if not a classic, then something close to it. His expansion of hip-hop emblazoned with elements of fusion jazz, pop reminiscent of vintage Beatles and adventurous soul recalling Innervisions Stevie Wonder was thrilling.

A month before the album was supposed to drop in April, 2002, Q-Tip appeared on the cover of JazzTimes magazine. Writer John Morph wrote, “If Amplified was an extroverted disco-romp for the hip-hop generation, then Kamaal the Abstract is an inward journey with jazz, rock, R&B, folk and hip-hop acting as mile markers along the musical roadmap.”

John was spot-on. But such a daring hip-hop album apparently unnerved the suits at Arista, and the album was shelved. Meanwhile a year later, OutKast, Tip’s label mates, put out the indulgent Speakerboxxx/The Love Below, which teemed with some of the same musical ideas Tip explored on Kamaal the Abstract. That album was a Grammy-winning, multi-platinum smash. In 2009, Kamaal the Abstract was quietly released by Jive Records. A decade after its initial release date, the album remains a strong, ingratiating set and an underrated hip-hop gem.

The sound Tip established on Amplified – the polished clipped beats in particular – was expanded to include more jazz-like improvisation. Live instrumentation carries the album, and Tip is laidback throughout. “Feelin’,” the first cut, is a biting commentary on racial profiling. Tip says all he needs to say in the first two minutes or so before an elegant organ solo gives the swaggering rhythm some levity. Then the guitars grind on the chorus, turning what started as a brooding commentary to an almost festive celebration of liberation. The instrumental solos extend and embellish Tip’s lyrical longing to “be free.”

“Do You Dig You?” features jazz guitarist Kurt Rosenwinkel and flautist Gary Thomas. Tip plays spacey Fender Rhodes, creating an anti-gravity track that sounds like something Roy Ayers would have done back in ’76. “A Million Times,” a drowsy rock-funk cut, is a bit undercooked and recalls the meandering grooves on D’Angelo’s 2000 album Voodoo.

“Blue Girl” is a seductive track where Tip forgoes rapping for singing. His range is limited but charming and it works here. He indulges his love for early Beatles on “Barely in Love.” The stomping track sounds somewhat similar to the approach Andre 3000 took on “Hey Ya,” the No. 1 smash that momentarily made him a pop sensation.

Tip returns to his clever rapping, extolling women’s shoes on “Heels,” a smart funk-rock-rap amalgamation. It sounds like something Prince could pull off, if he could rap. Kamaal the Abstract closes with “Even If It Is So,” a swinging celebration of feminist values and single motherhood that's refreshingly free of condescension.

The musical ideas Tip played with on Kamaal were refined on 2008’s The Renaissance, one of the best rap albums released that year. Mainstream hip-hop, for the most part, can be such a Peter Pan culture, where hardly anyone grows up gracefully. If anything, one seems to grow out of it. But with Kamaal the Abstract, Q-Tip deflated that notion, proving that a rapper can evolve with grace, style and some dignity.

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I'm Lookin' for My Baby: Sam Cooke Sings the Blues on Night Beat

 In 1963, Sam Cooke was the most important soul singer in the world.

He had essentially invented the genre just a few years earlier, infusing the deeply burrowed feeling of gospel into satiny amiable pop, with phrasing that was unique and widely influential.

His hits up to that point were busy, sometimes gimmicky productions – plenty of strings and things, his marvelous voice treated almost as an afterthought. That changed in February of ’63, when Sam entered RCA Studios in Hollywood, Calif., for three nights. No orchestra was present, just a rhythm section, including a 16-year-old Billy Preston on organ. Sam created a hushed, intimate mood and beautifully crooned the blues on what stands as his best album, Night Beat, released in the summer of that year.

Sam had a vision for it. Perhaps inspired by the classic concept albums Frank Sinatra cut for Capitol, the singer-songwriter eschewed the usual approach for LPs, a hit single or two plus loads of filler. From start to finish, Sam and his stellar band create an after-hours feel.

“Nobody Knows the Trouble I’ve Seen” opens Side 1 and underscores Sam’s gospel roots. He had been a big star in the gospel field before he went pop in the late ’50s. It was a controversial move, one church folks resented and they dogged him for it. But the truth is Sam never left the church, not aesthetically anyway. That feeling was in everything he sang, even sugary fluff like “You Send Me,” his 1957 breakout smash. On “Nobody Knows the Trouble I’ve Seen,” he takes the blues people to church and vice versa.

“Lost and Lookin,” the second cut, is one of Sam’s most magical recordings. He’s accompanied by a bass and the soft taps of drum cymbals. His caramel voice curls around the melody, and his croon is like an intense soulful whisper that snatches your breath. It’s a marvel, one of the best recordings ever done, period.

“Mean Old World,” a self-penned tune, has a simple, repetitive lyric, which Sam shades with different meanings by slightly shifting the tone and texture of his voice. He remembers the underrated blues pianist Charles Brown on “Please Don’t Drive Me Away.” Legend has it that Sam initially wanted Charles to play on the album, but Charles went to the race track instead.
Side 1 closes with “Get Yourself Another Fool,” also originally done by Charles. Sam coats the lyrical venom with honey.

Side 2 begins with a bit of humor. “Little Red Rooster,” a finger snapping ditty about a runaway rooster who leaves the barnyard hens lovesick, features Billy Preston’s swooping organ interplaying with Ray Johnson’s blues-suffused piano. “Laughin’ and Clownin’” is a forlorn blues from Sam’s pen. Sam may have had big crossover pop and supper club ambitions, much of which he achieved in his tragically brief lifetime. But had the man stayed with the blues, he would’ve given the best of them, including Bobby Bland, a run for their money. Eschewing the gruffness of typical blues vocalists, Sam remains smooth as butter without forsaking the deep nuanced subtleties of the genre.

“Trouble Blues,” another Charles Brown song, flows in the same vein. “You Gotta Move,” a Sam original, picks up the pace a little, rippling with the fervent gospel he used to sing with the Soul Stirrers. The album closes with the raucous Big Joe Turner classic, “Shake Rattle and Roll.” Sam’s take is smoothed out, of course, but he doesn’t gloss over the sexual innuendo of the lyrics. It’s a spirited close to the album.

A year after the Night Beat sessions, Sam was gunned down in a hotel room in Los Angeles. He was 33. Nearly 50 years later, his death is still shrouded in mystery and conspiracies. But none of it matters. The world lost one of the best singers to ever step in front of a microphone. Luckily for us, he left behind a masterful album that distills his gift just as it was coming into full bloom.

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I Wish You Bluebirds in the Spring: Gloria Lynne Casts a Spell

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We're Just Riding on the Waves: The O'Jays Sail on Ship Ahoy

Four years before Alex Haley’s “Roots” brought the story of slavery to a primetime audience and 15 years before Toni Morrison explored its psychological effects in “Beloved,” the O’Jays released Ship Ahoy. The trio’s second straight masterpiece, the album delved into various forms of slavery.   

Such a sensitive and complex topic doesn’t easily lend itself to any format, let alone a pop album. But Kenny Gamble and Leon Huff, the visionaries behind Philadelphia International Records and the O’Jays’ main producers, didn’t shy away from heavy subjects.

They put a “message in the music” and tackled everything from crocked politicians to wayward lovers, all from a lived-in perspective. For the follow-up to the O’Jays’ commercial breakthrough, 1972’s dynamic Back Stabbers, Gamble and Huff “went there” and dove into a topic nobody ever wants to discuss, especially a pop audience back in 1973.

By then, the O’Jays had become pop darlings, after about decade of toiling in obscurity on the chitlin circuit. The Ohio natives were ideal messengers for Gamble and Huff’s searing songs. One of the best soul singers to ever bless a mic, Eddie Levert seemed to sing from every cell in his body – centering every phrase with an earthiness that was equal parts sanctified church and funky pool hall. He was counterbalanced by the cognac-smooth Walter Williams, who could float or sting, depending on the mood. And William Powell’s strong tenor connected the two.

Side 1 opens with “Put Your Hands Together,” the first single off the album. Gospel anchored everything the O’Jays sang, and that stomping, joyous feeling permeates the song. Funk undergirds it, too, as the trio sings about a need for prayer and hope for a brighter day. In the hands of lesser singers, the song would have been hopelessly corny. But the guys imbue it with sincerity, as they did with the gospel-steeped “Love Train,” an across-the-board smash in early ’73. “Put Your Hands Together” peaked at No. 2 on the R&B chart and sealed the pop Top 10.

The epic title cut follows, opening with the ominous sound of crashing waves, a creaking ship and a whip cracking in the distance. Arranger Bobby Martin creates sonic cinema, as the strings and horns rise. The beat lurches and marches, overlaid with bluesy licks on the guitar. Eddie takes us into the bowels of the ship: “Can’t you feel the motion of the ocean/Can’t you feel the cold wind blowing …” The song rolls on for more than nine minutes, building and building, with no relief. It haunts long after the fade.

The mood picks up musically with “The Air I Breathe,” but the subject matter is far from light. The O’Jays address air pollution over a slightly jaunty rhythm. “Can’t they see the birds in the trees are dying every day,” Walter croons. Side 1 closes with “You Got Your Hooks in Me,” a blues-drenched ballad Eddie was born to sing. His tortured croon bristles with the confusion and hopelessness that consume you when you become a slave to romantic love.

Side 2 opens with “For the Love of Money,” hands down the best funk record to boast a pea-green PIR label. Written around Anthony Jackson’s jaw-dropping bass line, the song addresses obsession over the almighty dollar, another form of slavery. Like a soulful Greek chorus, the O’Jays warn, “People don’t let money change you/It’ll keep on changin’, changin’ up your mind …” The album’s second single, “For the Love of Money” peaked at No. 3 on the R&B chart and No. 9 on the pop side.     

The guys return to the chains of romantic love on “Now That We Found Love,” a sweet samba-spiced groove and a great showcase for the group’s satiny harmonies. “Don’t Call Me Brother,” the album’s other epic cut, opens with a floating jazz intro before sailing into an urban blues bag. And Eddie takes it all to church, as he sings about hypocritical revolutionaries.

The album ends with “People Keep Tellin’ Me,” a zipping, Vegas-style number about staying in a love affair despite the naysayers, or becoming a happy volunteer slave for love.    

Ship Ahoy was an immediate hit, topping the R&B chart and landing at No. 11 on the pop listing. It went platinum. The album also was a big hit with critics, garnering strong reviews and is rightly considered a masterpiece. Nearly 40 years later, the album’s messages still resonate. Anybody can be a slave to something.

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I Do Love You: Billy Stewart Rocks the Crowd

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