Those '70s Songs

The soundtrack to my 2008 has started out with a very odd collection of music. I have my sister to thank for this. Being a lover of the iTunes Gift Card, she essentially provided me with $25 worth of random song choices that I never otherwise would have spent money on. But hey, it’s a pre-paid card, so it’s almost like it’s free! So since there was nothing new out there that I was dying to have, and since I am terribly impatient, I went on a spree for a bunch of titles that I had always thought once or twice about, but never actually followed through with.

The results of these purchases have been extremely interesting. I have two CD’s of burned music spanning numerous decades and genres, and for the life of me, I cannot stop listening to them. And while there are some good ones on there from a couple of current popular bands, I must admit that it’s the old school stuff that I can’t stop playing on repeat.

Now if you know me at all, you know that I naturally love the funky sounds of the 1970’s, and thus my attraction to songs from that period wouldn’t be all that shocking. But this was different. I went for stuff that I either didn’t know all that well, or I had some unflattering preconceived notions about. And while I found almost all of these forays to be positive, there were two bands that really sparked me: Steely Dan and Funkadelic.

Steely Dan? Yes, Steely Dan. Until recently I had always thought of them as a classic rock band. I will blame that on the incessant playing of “Reelin’ In The Years” and “Do It Again” on classic rock radio (though I do really like both of those songs). And due to my usually lukewarm feelings about classic rock radio, I just lumped Steely Dan into a group of bands that I wouldn’t be crazy about, and dismissed them altogether. However, a small clip from a rather funky Steely Dan tune in an entertainment law class got me curious, and I finally decided to probe further. These guys could not be any further from ordinary classic power rock. They blend jazz, funk, and rock into a style of music that can only be characterized as way ahead of its time.



The coolest thing about them though, is their story. Steely Dan was not even a real “band” in the traditional sense. It was (is) just two guys really. They were two musicians, named Donald Fagen and Walter Becker, who were hired as staff songwriters for ABC Records back in the late 1960’s. They weren’t all that successful though, because the stuff they wrote was usually too complex for any other artists to competently play. So they created this entity called Steely Dan, where they could properly record their music, with the two of them as the main performers. But what wound up happening was that with the exception of the main vocals and the keys, generally speaking, everything you hear on Steely Dan records is done by legendary professional studio musicians. Fagen and Becker hired only the best of the best to record their songs. As a result, their recordings have long been heralded by icons such as Mick Jagger (Rolling Stones) and Jimmy Page (Led Zeppelin) as being some of the tightest and cleanest sounds in music. They weren’t a band, so much as two gifted brains, and a slew of immensely talented hired guns. But hey, it worked. Their music captures the funk and soul of the 1970’s, and wraps it neatly inside the rock n’ roll sounds of the same period. As such, when you listen to Steely Dan songs, you can find jazzy bass grooves laid down underneath wailing guitar solos, and yet be amazed by how well it all fits together. Check out the album Aja. It’ a classic.



If Steely Dan captured funk in a neatly packaged form, then Funkadelic was definitely the loose, sloppy, wild style of the day. Led by the legendary George Clinton, Funkadelic was the sister group of Clinton’s more popular band Parliament (though this popularity claim is debatable). I have long been familiar with the sounds of Parliament. Songs like “Flashlight” and “Give Up The Funk” are funk standards, and are unapologetically fun and catchy. Funkadelic though, struck me as a deeper, more complex-sounding group that I wasn’t really interested in taking the time and brain power to examine. But again, thanks to gift certificates, I took a shot.



I was right. It is deeper. It is experimental and cutting edge for it’s era. It might not be as pop and disco oriented, but man is it impressive. It truly is deep, dark, almost psychedelic funk, at its finest. All things being linear, you can easily see how closely the hip-hop music of the past decade drew from the music of George Clinton and his bands. I like to think that Clinton’s bands, along with groups like Earth Wind and Fire, took what James Brown started, and ran with it. And while many of those groups went on to invent dance hall classics, Parliament and Funkadelic went with an unbridled sound that was so loose and groovy as to almost be scary and offensive. As far as I’m concerned, it’s great stuff, and highly underrated. Give it a listen if you’re feeling open-minded.

So I guess this whole rant is just a bit of advice to not forget the music of yesterday. For those of us who weren’t around during the ‘60’s and ‘70’s, we know about some of the stuff that came from those eras, but mostly only the stuff that was popular enough to stay on the radios and turntables all these years. There is still a ton of great music out there that has simply faded into obscurity. Go find it! Otherwise you’ll miss out on great stuff that was there all along. If you too have a sibling who loves giving iTunes gift certificates, take a shot on some random old stuff. You might be pleasantly surprised.

Song(s) For The Week: Peg by Steely Dan, and Cosmic Slop by Funkadelic. “Peg” has an infectious groove to it. It seems cheesy at first listen, but give it time and I bet you’ll be humming and singing away. The hook is reminiscent of (and was probably sampled by) countless early ‘90’s hip-hop songs… at least it seems that way to me. Bass legend Chuck Rainey makes the whole thing groove so incredibly well… especially the chorus. “Cosmic Slop” is just plain dirty. I love this song so much. Garry Shider, not George Clinton, handles lead vocals here. It’s the perfect example of that deep, loose funk that almost sounds like a haunting song more than a dancing song. Check them out and enjoy!

*One last note. I forgot to properly thank my very good friend Shelby Parnes in my first post. She writes a wonderfully interesting food blog called “Shelbs & Cheese” and she was a huge inspiration for me even deciding to do this. She is an amazing friend and person, and a damn good writer too. Check her page out (link on the right side of this one).