Hello everyone and welcome back. Most of my music choices are classics as I love rock and roll, blues, and rhythm and blues.
During the mid 1960's, a new music genre evolved called "funk". This music originated in the African American communities. Musicians listened to their audiences' requests for tunes that they could dance to, had a beat you could feel in your chest, and an awesome rhythm.
So much of African American music is about words and feelings. It's about struggles, love lost, and love won. It's about expressing yourself. However, it has to incorporate rhythm, blues, and soul. You can often find jazz weaving throughout this genre also. When you blend funk with rhythm, you transform melodies into synchronized bass lines and drum arrangements. You can feel the beat.
Today's music list group band is from the alphabet "A" again and one who I grew up listening to, but you may not have heard of:
AVERAGE WHITE BAND
Known as AWB, the Average White Band was a Scottish music group formed in London by alan Gorrie in 1972. The original members were: Alan Gorrie, and Malcolm "Molly" Duncan, with Owen "Onnie" McIntyre, Michael Rosen (trumpet), Roger Ball, and Robbie McIntosh joining them in the original line-up. 1 Later, some of the band members were replaced.
According to Duncan, members of the band had played together before in Scotland, but had moved to London separately. They then met by chance at a Traffic concert. It was then they decided to get together and conduct a jam session. During that session, a friend heard them and stated, "This is too much for the average white man." The group loved the label placed on their sound and decided to adopt the unusual tag and tweaked it to the band's name.1
However, there was nothing average about them. In 1974 they began giving the Baby Boomers exactly what were craving...funk, rhythm and blues. They were sometimes mentioned with other Caucasian groups that successfully played soul music as "Blue Eyed Soul".
Supposedly the band got the break they needed when they accompanied Eric Clapton on his comeback tour and was given a slot to fill in. Eric's manager was impressed by the group and agreed to manage them. This was the break the band needed.
One interesting fact to note is that AWB was among hundreds of other artists and groups whose materials were destroyed in the fire that occurred at Universal Music Group in 2008.1
AWB is best known for it's funk song, "Pick Up the Pieces". However, they mellowed out some smooth tunes, such as "A Love of Your Own", my personal favorite.
I'd like to share with you today the two songs I mention above:
"A Love of Your Own"
"Pick Up the Pieces"
Pick Up the Pieces is an instrumental classic for the group and their top selling song.
Thanks,
@justclickindiva
Happy rest of the week everyone with whatever your endeavors.
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1 "The Average White Band". Wikipedia Online at: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Average_White_Band
