GAP Band Fans

The Commodores played around these parts a few nights ago, and without Lionel Richie, they sounded like a cover band singing Commodores songs.

 

That's a bummer, but at least "Nightshift" sounded original?

 

"Nightshift" sounded OK. "Brick House," "Three Times a Lady"....other ones, not so much.

 

In the spring semester, I teach a class called Mass Media & Pop Culture, and on the Tuesday after the Super Bowl, we talk about the history of the game and, specifically, the halftime show. I talk about how it's evolved from marching bands and Up with People to what it is today. We watch a few minutes of the Janet Jackson/Justin Timberlake show with the wardrobe malfunction, and then we watch halftime that took place the previous Sunday. (Last year, a student said she was on Facetime with her parents during the old school hip hop show, and they were all crying because the music meant so much to her family.)

Then we talk about Prince's halftime show from Miami, in the rain. And I tell them how Prince refused to lip sync, and then I talk about Tony Ward, the electrician who held a cable in a plug for 12-and-a-half minutes, in the rain, so the show could proceed. Then we watch Prince's performance.

The assignment I give them is they have to watch a performance from another year and summarize the game and halftime show: where the game was played; who won and lost; who performed at halftime; what was the critical reaction to the show at the time. And then in the final paragraph, they have to tell me why the show they watched wasn't as good as Prince's. I won't entertain any other opinions on that.

 

U2 playing in 2002 with the Patriots beating the Greatest Show on Turf.

 

Objects

 

Test that theory by putting party pleaser "There's A Riot Goin' On" or any of Sly's 70s albums for that matter.

I mean, the fact that no one has mentioned P-Funk is an abomination, really. Many of the bands that have been mentioned are directly influenced.

Isley Brothers are very legit. Bar-Kays' 70s stuff is choice. Gap Band is cool electro-funk. Roger and Zapp do it right.

I bought lesser-known-in-the-States Boney M's "Nightlfight To Venus" at an antique store recently. Euro-disco at its finest. I kinda dig it.

 

Mindnight Star, mother fuckers.

 

Disco was sort of evolving into another form of R&B that the Gap Band, SOS and others were working on. It was more of fun party music, but then Kurtis Blow, Whodini and rap just took over.

 

You forgot the last embers with New Jack Swing, then it went to hell with just over produced “Hip-Hop”. Yeah I’m the old guy yelling “get off my lawn.”

and on comes..Freak-a-Zoid….Wet My Whistle

 

And, he stands alone.

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All the ones listed. As for Kool and the Gang, this one is just so smooth and timeless.