Search - Tower of Power :: Back to Oakland

Quintessential TOP Listening... heck QUINTESSENTIAL SOUL!

Eddie Landsberg | Tokyo, Japan | 07/02/2009

(5 out of 5 stars)

"If you're just getting into TOP, this probably would be the one album I'd recommend...

The year is 1974 and it's the follow up to their gold selling self titled album - - the one that gave the world WHAT IS HIP.



Aside from featuring the "classic" Warner Brother's era TOP line-up that most fans go ga ga over, high points of the album include its immaculately blistering opening and closer - - the ultra-sticky Oakland Stroke (What? Only a minute and a half???) - - also included, the tight and hooky yet extended jam that would become an instrumental soul anthem "Squib Cakes", and the TOP fan fave DON'T CHANGE HORSES (also featuring great organ work from Chester Thompson.)... Other tunes on the album are great, and even though don't think the tunes are as catchy as the ones on some of their other albums, they still represented the TOP rhythm section at its stickiest... with Garibaldi's drums recorded and mixed in a way that's really crisp, clear and upfront. - - His ability to take the simplest soul backbeat and turn it into something no other drummer could possibly have ever imagined and delivered with such imaginative drive and percision as him are amply demonstrated through the album - - his drumming on CAN'T YOU SEE being very high up on my list - - Tower of Power's ability to take moderately mellow song tunes and turn them into over the top bump fests also is apparent on Man From The Past. - - As for the horns... at times the horns arrangements seem a bit more laid back even "better orchestrated" than on some of their other albums (i.e. slick but at times a little less raw) - - within the overall concept of the album which is really a great vehicle for the band overall, it works... and on tunes like I GOT THE CHOP they still get to lay out their trademark vamps and grooves.



Overall, if you like this album URBAN RENEWAL and IN THE SLOT should probably be next on your MUST GET list...

Though if you want to hear a rawer even more blistery TOP, their early pre-Lenny Williams/Chester Thompson albums such as EAST BAY GREASE and BUMP CITY might also be on your list..."