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Summer In The City
Manteca
“Sanford & Son” Theme
Chump Change Album: You’ve Got It Bad Girl (1973) |
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To mark the one month anniversary of Ye Olde Blog, I’ve got a new feature that I hope you will enjoy: LP Classics, a tribute to the best records in my collection. The rules: each selection must have a few 4- and 5-star classics, and it can’t be a compilation or live album.
I’d be hard-pressed to come up with a more auspicious debut for this feature than the LP I selected: Quincy Jones’s You’ve Got It Bad Girl. Released in 1973, it’s rarely mentioned among Q’s triumphs, but I’ve played and enjoyed this record countless times. I found it at a San Francisco sidewalk sale for $2, a deal that still makes me smile some 15 years later.
As you can see from the tags I assigned to this post, Quincy showcases his eclectic tastes on this LP. A few tracks originate from movies or TV shows, others are creative interpretations of other artists’ songs, and the liner notes detail several legendary session players providing support throughout the album.
The track that leads off the LP is also among Quincy’s most revered: a cover of “Summer In The City,” which takes The Lovin’ Spoonful’s 60′s anthem to euphoric and jazzy new heights. It won a Grammy for Best Instrumental Arrangement, but is probably best known for it’s opening loop, sampled in The Pharcyde’s magnum opus, “Passing Me By.” Various bits of the song have been sampled in lots of other tracks as well. Jones’s version is a mystical brew consisting of trippy grooves, sultry solos, and soaring vocals (provided by Valerie Simpson, of Ashford & Simpson).
“Manteca” is an aggressive update of a Dizzy Gillespie track from the 1940s. I love the tone shifts between the ridiculously tight horn section and Jerome Richardson’s breezy sax passages. I always feel so sophisticated when I hear Bob James’s jumpy electric piano solo. I kinda wish Q didn’t let the track’s propulsive energy spiral into chaos towards the last couple of minutes of the track, but this is still a total jam.
The final two selections are both themes to TV shows. Everyone knows and loves the “‘Sanford & Son’ Theme,” (aka “The Streetbeater”); how Quincy Jones manages to compose a perfect musical counterpart to the junkyard in which the show is set is beyond my comprehension. Sorry for the skips, but I’ve played this cut down to the bone!
Less known (and thus, slightly less pleasurable) is the theme to two different Bill Cosby shows, 1972′s The New Bill Cosby Show and a game show from 1974, Now You See It; neither made it past their first season, but their theme song endures. Little know fact: Q co-wrote the track with Cosby — Bill is one talented dude.