A quick search over at the Now Playing blog shows that I listened to Say She She's debut record "Prism" in October of 2022. This was before I started rating what I was listening to, so I don't know how I felt about it. It was never played again, and I totally missed out on their follow-up, so that might be an indication.
I listened to this new record, "Cut & Rewind," because it is getting some heavy hype and after two passes, I understand why. This album transported me back to 1980, Sheepshead Bay Brooklyn, and the summertime battles between the rock heads and the disco gang. I loved both rock and disco then and still love both now, and the music on "Cut & Rewind" plays like the best of those disco/soul singles heard blasting over boom box radios on the streets and stoops, and on Blaupunkt car stereos as we cruised to Coney Island. "Cut & Rewind" calls to mind the S.O.S. Band, A Taste Of Honey, early Prince, Kool & The Gang and Chic.
This album is tight and hook-filled, and there were enough quotes, intentional or not, that evoked some of my favorite records of that time. The instrumental break in "Shop Boy" brings to mind Prince's "Head" 40 years later. The funky fun of "Chapters" and the breezy "Possibilities" make me think of Skyy's "Call Me" and the S.O.S. Band's "Just Be Good To Me,' respectively. Both would have been huge in 1980 and should, in a just world, be huge now.
The band shared the five albums that influenced them while working on "Cut & Rewind."
1. The Free Design- Kites Are Fun
2. ESG- Come Away
3. Lonnie Liston Smith & The Cosmic Echoes- Visions Of A New World
4. Gil Scott-Heron & Brian Jackson- The First Minute Of A New Day
5. The Sylvers- S/T
If you were already turned off by the word "disco," I can't help you. Maybe you've enjoyed one or more of the five records listed above. But if the complaint remains "today's pop music is manufactured crap," consider listening to "Cut & Rewind." Say She She made a real record and it's damn good.
3 comments:
Sal - Say She She also appear on a few songs on the album Neil Francis released earlier this year- "Return to Zero"
I heard this great Neal Francis single a few years ago, "Don't Call Me No More," but then I listened to "Changes" and the album left me cold. I'll give the new one a shot.
You nailed it. I never thought of Disco being "cool", but once Blondie dropped "Heart Of Glass", and a bunch of proto MAGA burned disco records in a stadium, I was buying Donna Summer, Kid Creole And The Coconuts, Was (Not)Was, Material, and other mutant Funk and Disco. I made mix tapes that any of those "Cut & Rewind" songs would have sounded at home on. Between "Stool Pigeon", and Ray Parker's "Mama Used To Say", and after "We Move" by Visage.
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