Description
Release Date: 15th September 2023
New 20th anniversary edition of Soul Jazz Records’ long out-of-print ‘Miami Sound:
Rare Funk & Soul from Miami, Florida, 1967-74’. The album has been unavailable for
more than 15 years and is newly remastered. Soul Jazz Records’ ‘Miami Sound’ features rare and classic funk and deep soul from
Miami, Florida between 1967 and 1974. The album brings together million-selling
artists such as Gwen McCrae, George McCrae and Timmy Thomas alongside artists
little known outside of the sunshine state such as James Knight and The Butlers,
Frank Williams And The Rocketeers and All The People.
Miami funk, soul and disco was dominated by TK Records, founded by Henry Stone
in the early 1970s. Through myriad associated record labels such as Alston, Blue
Candle, Dash, Glades, Cat and more, TK Records made international artists out of
Gwen McRae and her brother George McRae, Betty Wright and KC and The
Sunshine Band, all in the mid-1970s crossover period between soul and disco.
The music on this compilation shows the roots of this Miami sound. All the artists and
musicians on this album worked together throughout the heyday of TK Records,
when it produced hit after hit on an almost daily basis. The house band (the
equivalent to Motown’s Funk Brothers) included songwriters such as Clarence Reid
(AKA Blowfly, the adult comedian), Casey Finch (KC from KC and The Sunshine
Band) along with musicians Little Beaver, Frank Williams and Robert Moore. As well
as being the in-house band, most of these artists also ran successful solo careers,
making Miami one of the most musically creative hot spots in the USA.
The artists on this compilation include Helene Smith, Miami’s first lady of Soul, Frank
Williams and The Rocketeers (featuring a very young Little Beaver on vocals),
George McRae’s rare groove classic ‘I Get Lifted’ (written by Casey Finch), Timmy
Thomas’ truly experimental track ‘Funky Me’, Gwen McRae’s classic ‘90% Of Me Is
You’, as well as a host of practically unknown Miami artists who never managed to
make it outside the city borders.
Tracklist
- All The People – Cramp Your Style
- Helene Smith – You Got To Be A Man
- George McCrae – I Get Lifted
- James Knight And The Butlers – Funky Cat
- Gwen McCrae – 90% Of Me Is You
- Little Beaver – Funkadelic Sound
- James Knight And The Butlers – Save Me
- Joey Gilmore – Do It To Me One More Time
- Helene Smith – A Woman Will Do Wrong
- James Knight And The Butlers – Fantasy World
- Timmy Thomas – Funky Me
- The New Clarence Reid – Cadillac Annie
- Frank Williams And The Rocketeers – The Spanish Flyer
- Della Humphrey – Don’t Make The Good Girls Go Bad
- Frank Williams And The Rocketeers – You Got To Be A Man
- Joey Gilmore – Somebody Done Took My Baby And Gone
- Little Beaver – I Love The Way You Love
