Tuesday, July 05, 2005

Popcorn Wylie - Funky Rubber Band

Stretch yourself!

I've really gotten into funky dance tunes recently, so here's one I jumped at when it came up on eBay. Got it for practically squat too. All the better for me.

I got my introduction to (Richard) Popcorn Wylie via his 1973 tribute to Hank Aaron, "Move Over Babe (Here Comes Henry)", a record that's been in my collection for several years. It was co-written by sports broadcasting legend Ernie Harwell and Wylie gives a straightforward soul performance. Not so on "Funky Rubber Band", a 1971 release. It's every bit as funky as its title would imply.

I'd never heard "Funky Rubber Band" before getting this record in the mail several weeks ago but it's one of those things that's worth the risk for the title alone. And, like I said before, it was dirt cheap. It has a heavy beat and some funky guitar. Popcorn shares vocal duties with female backing singers on each verse but it's almost all him on the chorus. And he's as funky as Mr. J.B. himself on this one. I got my money's worth and then some.

5 comments:

Larry Grogan said...

Don't forget the New Orleans "Rubber Band" explosion, with Eddie Bo's "Rubber Band", the Meters "Stretch Your Rubber Band" and Curly Moore & The Kool One's "Shelley's Rubber Band"!

Todd Lucas said...

Larry, thanks for checking out my blog. Funky 16 Corners was one of the big inspirations for getting me started. I remember the Eddie Bo tune being posted on your blog a few weeks back. I'll try and catch up with the other two.

Larry Grogan said...

Todd
I can't find an e-mail link so I'll post this here. My template didn't have links in it either. I had to go to the FAQ for the basic HTML, and the mess around with the code in the template to get it placed correctly.
Larry

Anonymous said...

Would love to hear this...
(and the others)

Todd Lucas said...

Would love to be able to post these as sound files but that might not happen anytime soon. I currently have no connection between my turntable and computer.