Lee Fields & The Expressions-My World
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Artist:Lee Fields & The Expressions
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Album:My World
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Track:My World
My World
Sometime around 1999 I was living in New Haven, Connecticut and working at Cutler's Music, a local record store that had been around since the 50's. I met a cat there who was working at the raw funk label Desco, commuting to New York everyday to do publicity for them or some such thing. He augmented his income by selling funk y 45's on ebay and was generally,the most gentlemanly of funk purveyors. After finding out I was a Desco fan (for those just dropping in to the burgeoning raw funk scene, Desco was the predecessor of todays new-old school labels Dap-Tone and Truth & Soul), he invited me to a record release in NYC for Lee Fields and Sharon Jones.
The event was on a weeknight, so the specter of 3 hours of driving and work the next day loomed, but we decided to jump in the car anyway. In retrospect, it was not a mistake. Both Lee and Sharon put on an incredible, blue light in the basement, rafter rattling soul show, with a band (which featured some of the folks you've heard on records from Antibalas, The Dap-Tones, The Budos Band, Amy Winehouse, and more) that played funk and soul with conviction and skill. Horn blasts, scratchy rhythm guitar, big bottomed bass, and funky break-laden drums, along with testifying vocals that I thought were no longer available in a live setting.
Even though she wasn't a youngster, I found out that Sharon Jones was new to the music biz. She was not a "lost" singer from the 70's, she was just beginning what would become (in the last few years) a solid career. Lee Fields, on the other hand, was a veteran of soul scene, newly revitalized and rediscovered by the raw funk crowd.
Love Comes And Goes
Lee Fields' 2009 record, My World (Soul Fire) is his 8th studio album and, 40 years after his first James Brown-inspired recordings, it might just be his best. How he arrived at this record, which is most definitely more soul than raw funk, is a story of maturation for both artist and band (My World is billed as, Lee Fields and The Expressions), and a distillation of all the roads Mr. Fields has travelled.
In the late 60's and early 70's he earned the nickname, "little JB", criss-crossing the south on the chitlin' circuit, while dropping a grip of 45's on small labels like Angle 3, Norfolk, Sound Plus, and Bedford, that would become collector's items to crate diggers of southern soul and funk. The disco outfreakage of the late 70's and early 80's seemed to dry up the demand for soul singers, and though he worked locally in the Carolinas, no new Lee Fields material was released in the 80's.
The 90's though saw a resurgence for Mr. Fields, spurred by rare soul/funk crate diggers in England. His profile in the collectors market led to a signing with Ace records and recordings of new material and renewed touring in the south. These records were strictly Southern Soul in the 90's Malaco style..cheating songs, ballads, electric keys, and drum machines. Not really my cup of tea, but very popular to older soul fans who frequented the adult (over 35) clubs that dot the south and a few northern enclaves.
After 3 records for ACE, and one for Avanti and almost no exposure outside of the South, Lee somehow hooked up with the folks at Desco (I haven't heard that story yet), and after guesting on a few singles, cut a serious down and dirty raw funk record, Lets Get A Groove On, the first LP on the label.
In a lot of ways those first records by Lee Fields and Sharon Jones were the beginning of a raw funk revival that finally burst into the mainstream when the Dap-Tones were tapped to bring the "real soul"sound to Amy Winehouse's Back In Black. In the interim, organ, drum, bass, guitar, and horn funk groups sprung up all over the world, along with a neo-soul movement, that had new singers tapping into classic 60's and 70's sounds to varying degrees.
The ongoing vault mining in the collectors sphere, the reappearance of soul singers like Solomon Burke and Bettye LaVette, PBS specials on the significance of Soul , and even the election of Barack Obama, have caused quite a few folks to take a look back to the pre-funk era, including the new funk folks at Dap Tone/Soul Fire/Truth & Soul. In the beginning, it was all about scorching the dance floor, with organic grooves, but recent developments are in the smoldering, sometimes string laden soul category.
Honey Dove
The golden era of soul is where Lee Fields is mining on My World. Sure there are some tight drum parts, and the bass (a real plus on this record) bumps nicely, but this record is smooth, like an Impressions record or something the Delfonics might do. Lee's voice comes off like Bobby Womack's, adding a roughness to the glass-like soulscapes. There's none of the "purity" of a raw funk session where strings or synth (or synth- like )keys are no-no's. On My World, the sound serves the songs, it doesn't define them. The songs are loaded too; grooves, lyrics, arrangements, and Lee Fields voice, 40 years later, in perfect form. Although I don't make top 10's anymore, this would easily be on my 2009 list.
Tracks From My World (2009)
Money I$ King
Happily, the new record also includes 3 soulful instrumentals..
Last Ride
Tracks From Problems (2002)
The Right Thing
I'm the Man
Tracks From Let's Get A Groove On (1999)
Hey Sallie Mae Get Off My Feet
Watch That Man
Funky Screw (1974)
Comments (27)
I was familiar w/ Cutler's whem I worked for Universal. Who was your UNI/PGD Sales rep? Are they still surviving do you know?
I'm pretty sure they are still there. Didn't see too many reps there, though i was in charge of their used cd's and didn't do any new buying..Phil Cutler, son of the founder was in charge.
Cutlers
A Cody B post - in every sense - entertaining and informative. Well constructed with stellar writing.
One fun time! Thanks
Thanks Rummy..I was shocked to find out this record has been around since May. But it's not like its going to get dated..
fo sho!
Thx for the post, Cody! Good stuff.
I grew up near New Haven and Cutler's was THE record store Mecca for Yalies and surrounding townies- like Tower Records was for NYC.
Last I saw it was still there- around the corner from the legendary Toad's Place, where I saw so many great acts from the Ramones, Talking Heads and REM to Steppenwolf, NRBQ, Robin Trower, George Clinton and P Funk, Tower of Power and James Brown.
I saw many shows at Toad's! We also used to throw down our cardboard outside the club and throwdown with our townie version of breakdancing when I was a little younger. Uprocking to Whodini's Haunted House Of Rock..good times. I wasn't much of a head spinner though.
Wow- I remember some break dancing going on around there back in the day.
Well, the other stuff is pretty damn good, but all the cuts from "My World" kick gigunda ass. Wow, what a voice - it has truly been everywhere. Sweet, sweet. Thank you a thousand times, Mr. Cody.....
Long time no, Ivy..glad you liked it.
Your posts are so generous that they invariably take some time, and while it is always well-spent, time is a scarce commodity for me these days. I apologize and I'm sorry, if you know what I mean....
No worries my friend..I get started on these things and tend to go a bit overboard.
thank you for this post, Cody, really. my own favorite posts of yours are the ones where you tell your personal music-related stories because i would never read any such anywhere else. (unless you have a doppelganger or a stalker fan.) priceless. with excellent music, to boot.
Thanks Ms. Poe. I do occaisionaly let my "journalistic integrity" get compromised.
Haven't heard all the tracks yet, but I had to respond right away. What they said above. Great post and great music. Thanks for calling my attention to this.
I was in Baltimore's True Vine Record Shop last summer. Jason and I were talking about his compilation of "library music". He said a lot of it was "English Funk". I made a coutious face. He said, "What? You don't like funk?" Meanwhile, I was groovin' to the latest Betty Davis album (not yet released at that time) destroying everything in the block from his store stereo system. I have learned a lot about "raw funk" as you say, since then. I had slid into complacency about funk and forgotten what the real thing was. Now, Sharon Jones and the Dap-kings and the other Daptone Records artists are energising me. (I'm having withdrawal symptoms since Dap Dippin' went down the tubes in my recent computer crash.) I have you and Jason to thank for thisw Renaissance. I hope to catch Sharon Jones and the Dap-Kings live sometime before the end of 2009.
No, actually, that's not until January 22, 2010.
Sharon Jones & the Dap-Kings
11/20 Higher Ground Ballroom, Burlington VT
11/21 Water Street Music Hall, Rochester NY tickets
12/3 Tarrytown Music Hall, Tarrytown NY
12/5 Starland Ballroom, Sayreville NJ tickets
12/11 The National, Richmond, VA tickets
1/22/09 State Theatre, State College PA
1/23/09 Diesel Club, Pittsburgh PA
There are tons and tons of library music (comminsioned for ads or movie scores or just on spec) comps out there..Alan Hawkshaw is like the king of that stuff..I think a lot of it is fun "in the mix" along with other tunes, but it is all instrumental and can drag a tad. When Daptone was Desco they put out some 70's library music:Nino Nardini & The Pop Riviera Group. A lot of it bends to the lounge-funk side..
The record collectors love that stuff cause of it's limitedness. hard to find originals, but there are many comps from various European countries. Italy has a bunch too.
I don't chase after 'em my self, but I'm always up to check 'em out if they come my way.
Wow, they are coming to Richmond... I am so glad we finally got a decent stage for people to play from... IE The National
Sharon will not disappoint.
TV Interview with Sharon Jones and Gabe Roth by Jeffrey Brown:
http://www.pbs.org/newshour/art/blog/2009/05/sharon-jones-and-the-dap-kings.html
Interview with Sharon Jones:
TV Iterview with Sharon Jones by Tavis Smiley: http://video.pbs.org/video/1148790159/
Something about the Jason and the True Vine, you spend hours there while the tickets pile up like flags on your windscreen. It's absolutely heady. Is he subtlely mezmerizing you? Is it the sound of that punchy stereo? Do you take up certain music as a dare? I overdramatize. But I did buy his library music CD. It grabbed me when I started picturing the imagined movie or Quinn Martin TV scenes I might have heard this music in. Often someone, a cop, a privat eye, a tough guy, maybe just a guy, driving a muscle car and then stopping and stepping out purposefully or with a flourish and a broad facial expression. Wide lapels and bell bottoms. Turtle necks and medallions. Swinging Medallions. Fros out to here. I think one CD of this will hold me for now.
Another way I think of library music has to do with my pursuit of getting in the dictionary for the word, Whitesploitation..which I have written about at length without receiving an entry yet.
I would've gotten that entry by now if it weren't for those meddling kids.
Thanks for those links!
I recall very clearly his "Let's Get a Groove On" catching my ear right when it came out when I was browsing at my fave Cinci record shop and the guys were playing it on the store's stereo. Raw and real!
Yeah. If only they hadn't split up and looked for clues.
Cody, you outdid yourself here. Thanks for the introduction; you sold me on buying My World. Top-drawer funk, great voice, band, rhythm, songs; and your eloquent prose.
My World is your world..or at least part of it Spike. Enjoy.