“Shining Star” by Earth, Wind and Fire (1975)
We’ve gotten through eight of our ten 1970s funk songs and are only now moving past 1973. Disco was coming around the corner and would wipe out much of the dance music that stood in its way. But there were holdouts. Earth, Wind and Fire, was just a group of some of the very best soul session players when Maurice White formed them into a band. They added the glorious tenor of Phillip Bailey, and they soared up the charts with a blend of funk, soul, and pop.
“Shining Star” has all of those impulses. White’s gravelly vocals carry much of the song, but Bailey provides a gorgeous counterpoint. Johnny Graham’s rhythm guitar is definitive funk while Al Mckay’s leads are far jazzier.
Meanwhile, the horn section is firing away and the ever-present clavinet rides along with Verdine White’s bass. “Shining Star” was the lead track and first single from the hit album That’s the Way of the World. It is not a funk album. Maybe its greatest song, “Reasons,” is pure pop-soul with Bailey’s otherworldly tenor front and center. But when they chose to get funky on “Shining Star,” EW&F blew it out of the park.
“One Nation Under a Groove” by Funkadelic
You can’t write about funk music without mentioning George Clinton. Whether as a solo artist or with the loose collective that made up Parliament-Funkadelic, Clinton took funk music further than anyone. His fusion had elements of soul and rock to be sure, but also was one of the forefathers of hip-hop, world music, and even disco. He was responsible for any number of great funk numbers in the 1970s, but I’m picking “One Nation…” for two reasons.
First, I needed something from the second half of the decade, when disco was sweeping the dance floors clear of all other music, and Clinton was always strong enough to stand up to any tidal wave. And “One Nation…” combines pretty much everything that had been in the neighborhood of classic R&B and soul music from Jimmy Hendrix to Sly.
I mean, just consider the repeated instructions “Feet don’t fail me now.” That had been the title of Little Feat’s 1974 country funk album and was about to be the title of jazz-funk icon Herbie Hancock’s 1979 album. If there was even the slightest hint of funk in a piece of music, George Clinton could make it his own.
And now, as promised, a brief defense of the disco music that ruled the popular roost in the second half of the decade. I would argue that “Stayin’ Alive” (the Bee Gees), “Le Freak” (Chic), “Last Dance” (Donna Summer), “I Will Survive” (Gloria Gaynor), and yes, even “Y.M.C.A” (Village People) – all released over a ten-month span between December, ’77 and October, ’78 – are worthy dance pop numbers that have a place in history.
My contention is that if they hadn’t been relentlessly overplayed on radio and in the clubs to the exclusion of all else in 1978, they would all have better reputations today. You can choose to disagree.