Funk Revelations Of 1987: ‘Hold On To Love’ by Third World

By this time Third World had been around ten years and,since they started off their career with a cover of a Gamble & Huff song, it made sense that Kenny and Leon would wind up the producer/writers of half of this album. Even with the band producing their own half this album doesn’t have the same high energy electro funk flavors of the excellent previous album Sense of Purpose and instead this is music that relies more on atmosphere and texture than on rhythms and grooves. “The Spirit Live”,”Hold Onto Love” and “Simplicity” all have elaborate arrangements than even typical pop-reggae.

There’s also Christian/gospel messages underlying these tunes which actually work in an interesting way with the bands Rastafarian back round surprisingly. As for the other two Gamble & Huff tracks here there’s the hardcore funk/reggae jam in “Corruption” which conjures up images of a Jamaican version of the O’Jays making music in the mid 80’s. “Manners” is a great uptempo Philly jam as only Gamble & Huff could deliver it that show that,no matter what your beliefs are treating other people right is always the way to go and it was a great plea for humanism in the “me” generation.

Of the songs Third World provided themselves, they bring the Minneapolis connection  back into their sound (in the most lean possible way) on “We Could Be Jammin’ Reggae”. This groove is also home to some amazing jazzy Latin chords too. “Get Outta Town” and “Reggae Radio Station” are the more reggae oriented of the songs here. And again showcase subtlety over showmanship. From the sound and lyric of “Pyramid” there’s no doubt that it comes from a similar musical environment as Michael Jackson’s “Liberian Girl” from his album Bad which by sheer coincidence was released the same year.

The album ends again on a somewhat gospel/Rastafarian combination (only this time from the bands own pens) on “Peace Flags”. Third World were always a reggae band who worked with American soul/funk artists such as Stevie Wonder, members of Kool & The Gang and on this album Gamble & Huff. Even still, this album shifts Third World’s  focus on melodic harmonics over rhythmic music/vocal approaches. It’s a different kind of Third World and at the very least it was a good example of a band progressing as opposed to remaining in the same place just to keep an audience.

Anatomy Of THE Groove: “Tight Money” by Leon Huff

Leon Huff is,along with Kenny Gamble one of the two production architects of the Philly Sound in the 1970’s. As such he represents the last time in the 1970’s that uptempo music was having enormous commercial success during that decade. During the earlier part of Gamble started the ‘Clean Up The Ghetto” projected,which had theme songs through a number of PIR message songs and allowed for the youth of impoverished communities  to help repair damaged and neglected residences. Following a payola scandal involving Gamble in the mid 70’s, Huff decided to record a solo album under his own name in 1980 entitled Here To Create Music.

The main reason I know about this albums existence was finding a somewhat beat up vinyl copy at that University Of Maine vinyl giveaway that their radio station put on 22 years ago this year. When the free vinyl we picked up was sifted through,it was my father who ended up with this album. Several years ago,I located it as a PIR CD reissue. The album itself was written,produced and arranged by Huff alone. Overall the flavor of the albums songs leans more towards the abstract,cinematic aspect of the Philly Sound with more jazz and blues influenced pieces. One song in particular stood out for me as a funk admirer. And it was called “Tight Money”.

A rhythmic up-scaling piano and upright bass line begin the song which goes from there into a slow swinging dance rhythm. On the instrumental intro a Fender Rhodes provides the solos backed up by a rhythm guitar. On each refrain,the up-scaling rhythm that begins the song repeats and something new is added to the arranged. At first it’s a female backup group providing the vocal chorus,next up it’s a spacey synthesizer wash and by the final refrain a muted trombone and a low violin are added into the mix. Just before the final few links to the refrain,there’s a mellower Rhodes solo before going into the next one before the song finally fades out.

Instrumentally speaking,Leon Huff brings to this particular song a very similar bluesy jazz/funk flavor that Marvin Gaye bought to his “Inner City Blues” nearly a decade previous to this. Interestingly enough,the lyrical theme of the song has a similar note of economic upheaval making it more difficult to advance and grow culturally. Though in this case,it’s more a repetitive chorus than Marvin’s narrative lyrics telling the story. Because the song builds on the instrumental as well,which each section adding a new musical element,it maintains Huff’s talents as an arranger. And found him doing so in a very intimately funk manner.