Blisterd

We’re in the Top 50! We’re in the Top 50!

To recap, here’s the most recent installment. Go to the bottom of that article and you can find all previous installments!

50. “A Woman Needs Love (Just Like You Do)” by Ray Parker Jr. & Raydio (2 weeks at #1, May ’81 | Amazon)

Ray Parker isn’t much of a singer. He gets over on a glorified purr, and his best songs are those in which the musical bed matches the purr purr-er, perfectly. On “A Woman Needs Love,” Ray turns advice columnist. He tut-tuts a neglectful partner and lays down the line: “one day you’ll come home early from work/open up the door and get your feelings hurt.” Ray is at his lyrical best here, even referencing previous Raydio topics Jack & Jill in one couplet. The superior pen game on “A Woman Needs Love” not only converted any female soul music fan who wasn’t already a Ray fan, but it gave Parker his first chart-topper, and the only one released using the “Raydio” name.

49. “Stomp!” by The Brothers Johnson (2 weeks at #1, April ’80 | Amazon)

Is it me, or are the lyrics to “Stomp!” almost completely indecipherable?

Damn year 35 years and I still find myself singing along to the Brothers Johnson’s last smash hit with gibberish words. It’s telling that the Brothers (Louis & George), songwriter Rod Temperton, and producer Quincy Jones were on such a hot streak that it didn’t matter what was being sung. Stomping never really caught on as a dance move, or as anything other than a surefire way to put the exclamation point on an ass-whupping, but shit–how can you resist busting a move when the opening bass notes filter through the radio waves?

Between “Stomp!”, “Give Me The Night”, Rufus’s Masterjam and Off The Wall, I can safely say that Quincy Jones was responsible for more than 50% of all ass-shaking that took place in the years 1979 and 1980 in the U.S.

Was Louis Johnson the first tattooed R&B star?

48. “On Our Own” by Bobby Brown (1 week at #1, August ’89 | Amazon)

Bobby On Our Own Single

Bobby Brown’s “On Our Own” single from 1989.

By far, the better of the two Ghostbusters themes. Maybe with the new all-female cast, they’ll get Beyonce to drop the theme for Part 3.

There is NOTHING more 1989 than this video: the cast of Ghostbusters, Christopher Reeve, The Ramones!,  Bob hanging with Doug E. Fresh and Big Daddy Kane. Bob’s Gumby. The biker shorts. That shirt that I always wanted but no one ever bought for me. The only thing that would’ve made the video more of its time would be if Bobby was wearing a Batman shirt. Which, of course, he couldn’t. Competing blockbusters and all.

Super Music Nerd Fact: “On Our Own” was the fourth cassingle I ever bought–following “Nothin’ (That Compares 2 U)” by The Jacksons, “Workin’ Overtime” by Diana Ross and “I Like It” by Dino.

47. The Way You Make Me Feel by Michael Jackson (4 weeks at #1, December’87-January ’88 | Amazon)

“The Way You Make Me Feel” was Michael’s most successful R&B single from Bad, and is arguably the best of the set’s seven U.S. singles.

It’s the only way I was able to stomach a post-beating Chris Brown/Rihanna duet.

The video’s interesting. It certainly featured a more earthy, less moralizing version of Michael than the previous clip (“Bad”) did, and it also featured a lot more eye candy in the form of Tatiana Thumbtzen. The mid-video breakdown is a bit odd, though…especially the floor humping and orgasmic moaning. But bless Michael’s heart for doing his best to make sure La Toya stayed employed.

46. “Let It Whip” by The Dazz Band (5 weeks at #1, May-June ’82 | Amazon)

Ohio was a hotbed of funk in the late Seventies and early Eighties. The state produced Roger Troutman & Zapp, Slave & Steve Arrington, Lakeside, and a gaggle of other bands who took the baton left by The Ohio Players and ran to the top of the charts with it. One of the biggest hits from an Ohio funk band was “Let It Whip,” the best-known song by the Motown ensemble The Dazz Band. “Dazz,” of course, was a mix of “disco” and “jazz,” and while I wouldn’t call “Whip” particularly jazzy, there are certainly elements of disco. Maybe “The Dunk Band” didn’t have the same ring to it?

I’m curious to know if “Let It Whip” was inspired by “Whip It,” which was a smash for new wave band Devo (who ALSO came from Ohio.) There’s a (very) slight similarity between the two songs, and for what it’s worth, “Whip It” was pretty popular with Black folks. Whatever the inspiration, it birthed a monster. Only three Motown artists had top ten pop hits in 1982: Lionel Richie, Stevie Wonder…and The Dazz Band.

Quincy connection: since this round is all about Q: “Let It Whip” was co-written by Leon “Ndugu” Chancler, who would go on to play drums on Michael Jackson’s Q-produced “Billie Jean.” With that in mind, it’s hard to not notice the similarities in the intros of “Let It Whip” and Michael’s also Q-produced “Beat It.”

45. Atomic Dog by George Clinton (4 weeks at #1, April-May ’83 | Amazon)

Interesting how the Detroit-based Clinton became the go-to source for sample material from California hip-hop artists in the ’90s. I guess the funk is universal. For his only major hit outside the twin towers of Parliament and Funkadelic (during a time when Clinton was contractually barred from using either name,)  George delivered an ad-libbed string of double-entendres and dog puns atop a bed of banging synth funk. The result- let’s just say that it was hard to get away from “Atomic Dog” in 1983. A decade later, it was still hard to get away from “Atomic Dog,”: you couldn’t swing a cat without it hitting a contemporary song that either referenced “Dog” or directly swiped the smash.

Bow wow wow, yippie yo, yippie yay, indeed.

44. What’cha Gonna Do For Me? by Chaka Khan (2 weeks at #1, May-June ’81 | Amazon)

My favorite reissue/discovery of the year has been Ned Doheny’s Separate Oceans, released on Light In The Attic records. It’s a complilation of music made by a singer/songwriter who split the difference between yacht rock and melodic soul. It contains an early version of “What’cha Gonna Do For Me?,” a song he wrote with Hamish Stuart of the Average White Band. AWB apparently recorded it too, but eventually it wound up in the hands of Chaka Khan & Arif Mardin. It was the title track to her classic 1981 album, and the breezy tune shot to the top of the soul charts in no time. Chaka’s version has a little more “boom” to it (although that may not be a fair comparison, as the Doheny version appears to be a demo) and I love her breezy delivery in the verses. I also love her growly ad-libs during the chorus, the bright sax solo…yeah, I love pretty much everything about “What’Cha Gonna Do For Me?”

43. Give It To Me Baby by Rick James (5 weeks at #1, June-July ’81 | Amazon)

Rick James Give It To Me BabyThe original Slick Rick’s most popular song, “Super Freak,” never hit #1. The top spot was awarded to that single’s precusor, the irresistibly funky “Give It To Me Baby.” A thumping bassline (one that, according to several sources, was later “borrowed” for Michael Jackson’s  Quincy Jones-produced “Thriller” single) sets things off and Rick is in typically frank form. Shame was not an issue for him, if you listen to the lyrics: he’s asking his lady-friend to give him some even though he’s (in the words of the Dead Kennedys) too drunk to fuck. The playful tone with which Rick sings keeps things from getting too sketchy-sounding.

After 1980’s ballad-heavy (and relatively unsuccessful) album Garden Of Love, Rick knew he was going to have to come with some heat to regain his “Mary Jane” level of success. “Give It To Me Baby” and the album from which it was culled, Street Songs, gave Rick his mojo back plus some. In the wake of the arrests, the drugs, and his death, it’s easy to forget that Rick was, for a time, an “A” lister whose contemporaries in the R&B field were Stevie, Michael, and no one else.

42. “Control” by Janet Jackson (1 week at #1, January ’87 | Amazon)

AKA Janet’s Declaration of Independence.

AKA some of the most complex drum programming Jimmy Jam & Terry Lewis ever attempted. In an interview, Jam says that the inventive percussion sounds came about by accident: “When you program drum machines, you program a lot of different patterns in. But the way we do it, we never put the programs in a sequence. We play and change the sequences by hand. So at one point in ‘Nasty,’ I changed to the wrong sequence and it made this weird drum break. A lot of times when that happens, we leave it and figure out what to do with it musically later. That’s what happened on ‘Control.’ There are two or three breaks where it stops and there’s a little ‘do-do-do-do-do,’ and that was the creation of hitting the wrong drum program at the wrong time. But it worked.”

AKA the title track to one of the five most important albums of the past three decades. There would be no Rihanna, no Beyonce, no Britney, no Nicki Minaj, had it not been for Control. Bow down.

WILLONA AS KATHERINE JACKSON!!

41. Give Me The Night by George Benson (3 weeks at #1, September ’80 | Amazon)

Quincy Jones was a busy man in 1979-80. Shit, so was songwriter Rod Temperton. The twosome served at the helm for Michael Jackson’s Off The Wall, The Brothers Johnson’s Light Up The Night, Rufus’s Masterjam, and this smash by George Benson (and Temperton was still writing songs for Heatwave around this time, too.) All of these artists saw an uptick in their chart success after hooking up with Q & Rob. “Give Me The Night,” somewhat improbably, was Benson’s first #1 R&B hit. I love the looser feel George has here. His vocal turns seemed a bit too buttoned-up prior to “Give Me The Night.” Plus, those eerie background vocals that Patti Austin did so well. Goofy, but charming on the video tip, as well. He may have been the only person to ever play a guitar while roller skating in a music video.