Wow. I didn't know that anyone else liked Tower of Power.
So, while we're talking about TOP, can anyone post a discography of the band, complete with opinions, and some mention of the lineup. The only albums I've been able to get are:
- Urban Renewal - Back to Oakland - (?) (I'm not sure if this one has a name, but it starts with "What is Hip", "Clever Girl", ..., "Soul Vaccination", etc.
These are by far my favorite TOP albums. I think they're from the early 70's with Lenny Williams singing. Good all-out blowing mixed with Lenny's impeccable vocals and totally inane, totally 70's lyrics.
- We Came to Play
I think this came out in 78? Lenny had left, and they had been through at least one singer (see below) before settling with sax player Emilio Castillo (I'm doing all this from memory, so the names might be a bit wrong). He's no Lenny, but he's got a good style all his own. This album is up and down. "Yin-Yang Thang" is a genius in song titles.
- Power
I think this album came out in 86? I actually got to see them right around this time and was blown away. They're just incredibly tight. Unfortunately, I haven't been able to see them since. After seeing them, I bought the album and was a bit disappointed. It seems a bit too pop, and not funky enough. It has good moments though.
- Live and in Living Color
A live album, with one good side, and one side with an incredibly long sax solo. I guess it's good if you like incredibly long sax solos.
- Ain't Nothing Stopping Us Now
My only guess is that Lenny left to become a disco star around 1976, and they tried to replace him with (?) Edward McGee. Bad Move. Despite good song-writing for the most part (the title track, and "By your side" are good songs, with terrible vocals), Eddie-Baby manages to bone up almost everything he sings. There are also some mid-seventies travesties like "You Ought to be Having Fun", which ought to be eradicated from this universe.
Last, I actually saw a Lenny Williams solo disco album being sold by a street vendor for 25 cents, so I had to pick it up (along with "Go with the Dream," being sung by (H)akeem Olajuwon). Oh my. Lenny should have stayed with the group.
I'd be interested in hearing about other TOP albums, and in hearing some history of the group, as I only know what I can guess from reading the record jackets.
I knew the '80s were over when j...@cs.Princeton.EDU (James Plank) said, Yo! Wow. I didn't know that anyone else liked Tower of Power. Yo! Yo! So, while we're talking about TOP, can anyone post a discography Yo! of the band, complete with opinions, and some mention of the lineup. Yo! The only albums I've been able to get are: Yo! Yo! - Urban Renewal Yo! - Back to Oakland Yo! - (?) (I'm not sure if this one has a name, but it starts with Yo! "What is Hip", "Clever Girl", ..., "Soul Vaccination", etc. Yo! Yo! These are by far my favorite TOP albums. I think they're from the Yo! early 70's with Lenny Williams singing. Good all-out blowing mixed Yo! with Lenny's impeccable vocals and totally inane, totally 70's lyrics. Yo! Yo! <...> Yo! Yo! I'd be interested in hearing about other TOP albums, and in Yo! hearing some history of the group, as I only know what I can Yo! guess from reading the record jackets. Yo! ////////////////
I'm real glad to see all this interest in Tower of Power also, Jim. It's the first time I've ever seen any sustained discussion of TOP on this newsgroup, but I'm not real surprised to see a bunch of enthusastic Tower fans come out of the woodwork all of a sudden to testify with minimum provocation; Tower was, and continues to be, the baddest of the bad. They've had their ups and downs, and paid a lot of dues, but they've been doin' it to death continuously for over 20 years, and can lay serious claim to the ~funk standard~ in anyone's book.
Few groups have so perfectly and consistently captured an ~attitude~, created such a strong traveling wave of fan loyalty throughout an entire generation, and enjoyed professional respect as a consummate musician's band - not only among funksters, but from rock to jazz.
I can give you the TOP discography throughout the '70s off the top of my head (with no guarantees of clinical accuracy, but with no reference material at hand, either); I worked with the band for the entire decade, designing and producing every album cover they did between 1970 and 1979, from "East Bay Grease" to "Back on the Streets":
1970 East Bay Grease (San Francisco/Atlantic) 1972 Bump City (Warner Bros.) 1973 Tower of Power (WB) 1974 Back to Oakland (WB) 1975 Urban Renewal (WB) 1975 Drop It in the Slot (WB) 1976 Live and in Living Color (WB) 1977 Ain't Nothin' Stoppin' Us Now (Columbia) 1978 We Came to Play (Columbia) 1979 Back on the Streets (Columbia)
The entire band can be found on various other obscure albums such as a greatest hits compilation (also called "Bump City," but with the originally developed, pre-"chicken fist" cover art) released in the Philippines around 1975, or "Lights Out: San Francisco," an eclectic mix of funk, jazz, blues, and Middle Eastern music produced by former late-night KSAN and KSFX (S.F.) DJ, Voco, and released on Blue Thumb in 1972.
Of course, the infamous Tower of Power Horn Section did sessions and gigged with Santana, Elton John, Rod Stewart, Huey Lewis, and dozens of others too numerous to mention or even recall.
Tower's influence on other contemporary artists is easily underestimated. I remember standing next to Herbie Hancock during a Tower set at Winterland in S.F. one night in 1972, just behind the notorious drummer Dave Garibaldi. Although Herbie and Tower had at one time shared a common producer (David Rubinson, who had signed the band to Bill Graham's San Francisco label immediately following a Tuesday night audition gig at the Fillmore West), it was the first time he had ever seen the band. He had most recently come through a period of such albums as "Mwandishi," "Sextant," and "Crossings," and Tower was blowing him away - and into a whole other groove. He couldn't stop moving; "These cats are BAD...!," he said.
Within a year, he had put together his Headhunters group, and cut their first album, including the signature funk classic, "Chameleon."
(And BTW, Headhunters bassist Paul Jackson, who had most recently worked with Azteca and wrote "Chameleon" with Herbie, had grown up in East Oakland and taught most of what he knew to another East Oakland kid, Francis Rocco Prestia, who'd go on to become Tower's future [and _still_ playing to this day] bass player.)
As I e-mailed to Al McKay (who started this whole Tower thread last week), I never know know how closely people on the net are actually tied into the UNIX business itself, but if you know anything about The Santa Cruz Operation, Inc. (SCO) - and in particular, if you recall the freeway sign motif in our advertising and trade show graphics several years ago - well, I run marketing communications down here these days (as well as being in-house creative director), and any similarity between that ad and the cover of "Back to Oakland" is anything but coincidental. :-)
I'm still in touch with Tower personally, and Mimi and The Doctor got a big kick out of SCO using the freeway sign. In fact, I am pleased and proud to announce (please forgive a slight commercial message here) that Tower will be playing at SCO Forum91 this coming August in Santa Cruz (with BBQ imported directly from East Bay, natch). For some obscure reason, the towering display of various OEMs' MP machines that run SCO MPX at trade shows and SCO Forum has come to be called the "Tower of Power" - go figure :-). (Please E-mail uunet!sco!forum91 or foru...@sco.com for more info.)
The band's gone through a lot of changes, but Doctor, Mimi, Greg, and Rocco are still holding down their original slots, the energy is as high and tight as ever, and on any given night, when the fellas kick into "Down to the Nightclub," well, hipness is what it is... bump-de-bump-de-bump. -- Bruce Steinberg (uunet!sco!bruces) The Santa Cruz Operation, Inc.
In article <16...@scorn.sco.COM> bruces (Bruce Steinberg) writes:
>I'm real glad to see all this interest in Tower of Power also, Jim. It's the
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ So am I. I have to admit that listening to squib cakes on a good system, or through good headphones still gives me an adrenaline rush, and makes the hair on the back of neck stand up when they hit that last horn crescendo after the solos. Whew...gets me pumped up just running it through my head. :-)
>Good commentary on TOP , and discography deleted
There is a 'direct to disk' CD out that someone previously mentioned. I saw it at Tower once and to my dismay it was gone when I returned. It did have squib cakes and 4 or 5 other tunes on it. Does anyone know if these really are from a new session, or are they remasters of the original recordings?
I've also had trouble finding very many of the 'mainstream' TOP recordings on CD at my local TOWER outlet. (geez with a name like that, you'ld think they would have the whole discography on hand at all times :-) Is this just a local aberration or are only a few of their albums released on CD?
>I'm still in touch with Tower personally, and Mimi and The Doctor got a big >kick out of SCO using the freeway sign. In fact, I am pleased and proud to >announce (please forgive a slight commercial message here) that Tower will be >playing at SCO Forum91 this coming August in Santa Cruz (with BBQ imported >directly from East Bay, natch). For some obscure reason, the towering display >of various OEMs' MP machines that run SCO MPX at trade shows and SCO Forum has >come to be called the "Tower of Power" - go figure :-). (Please E-mail >uunet!sco!forum91 or foru...@sco.com for more info.)
Is there an address where one can inquire on future TOP gigs?
>The band's gone through a lot of changes, but Doctor, Mimi, Greg, and Rocco >are still holding down their original slots, the energy is as high and tight >as ever, and on any given night, when the fellas kick into "Down to the >Nightclub," well, hipness is what it is... bump-de-bump-de-bump.
I read somewhere that Marc Russo, currently with the Yellowjackets, played for some time with TOP. Does anyone know the timeframe, or albums he played on?
Thanks for the info, and keep bumpin.
greg "I can't stand that air pollution but still I drive my car" Smith
-- **** Go Blazers - 1990 Western Conference Champs ************************ Greg Smith ..!uunet!sequent!gsmith Sequent Computer Systems, Inc. (503) 578-4364 -------------------------------------------------------------------------
I knew the '80s were over when gsm...@sequent.com said, Yo! In article <16...@scorn.sco.COM> bruces (Bruce Steinberg) writes: Yo! > Yo! >I'm real glad to see all this interest in Tower of Power also, Jim. Yo! ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^ Yo! So am I. I have to admit that listening to squib cakes on a good system, Yo! or through good headphones still gives me an adrenaline rush... Yo! <...> Yo! There is a 'direct to disk' CD out that someone previously mentioned. I saw Yo! it at Tower once and to my dismay it was gone when I returned. It did have Yo! squib cakes and 4 or 5 other tunes on it. Does anyone know if these really Yo! are from a new session, or are they remasters of the original recordings? //////////////// That was the Sheffield album, "Power," and it was an original direct-to-disk session, as billed. (The original Squib Cakes was on "Back to Oakland.") //////////////// Yo! I've also had trouble finding very many of the 'mainstream' TOP recordings Yo! on CD at my local TOWER outlet. (geez with a name like that, you'ld think Yo! they would have the whole discography on hand at all times :-) Is this just Yo! a local aberration or are only a few of their albums released on CD? //////////////// Just about the only TOP albums I see at all stocked new in stores anymore (vinyl, CD, or tape) are "Tower of Power," "Back to Oakland," "Live and in Living Color" (all WB), "Ain't Nothin' Stoppin' Us Now" (CBS), and the Sheffield album. I can't recall seeing anything else in "new" stock in years and have no idea what WB or CBS keep in active release, but I suspect that's about it.
And there actually was once a tie-in promotion between Tower Records and TOP behind the name, and it resulted in the record chain (then in maybe its third or fourth year) printing a run of "Back to Oakland" posters, now collectors' items. //////////////// Yo! Is there an address where one can inquire on future TOP gigs? //////////////// You can probably best get their schedule (or book a gig, for that matter :-) through their booking agent, William Morris Agency, 151 El Camino Drive, Beverly Hills, CA 90212. (213) 859-4235. //////////////// Yo! I read somewhere that Marc Russo, currently with the Yellowjackets, played Yo! for some time with TOP. Does anyone know the timeframe, or albums he played Yo! on? //////////////// Mark played with Tower for a few years in the early '80s after Lenny Pickett split for New York (and immediately before Mark joined Yellowjackets around '84-'85, and was replaced for a while by Richard Elliott, who is now on his own with a pretty solid solo career). No particular Tower albums in that period, but lots of sessions for other groups with the TOP horn section. //////////////// Yo! Thanks for the info, and keep bumpin. Yo! Yo! greg "I can't stand that air pollution but still I drive my car" Smith //////////////// No problem, Greg. Keep on strokin'.
B<you.can.get.it.with.your.good.credit>* -- Bruce Steinberg (uunet!sco!bruces) The Santa Cruz Operation, Inc.
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