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| Exhibit A. |
I would never have guessed where this band came fro - and I couldn’t have connected them to their hit with a gun to my head.
The Hit
“Harris realized quickly that ‘Let it Whip’ was special — ‘It’s a fun song and easy to sing, so people can sing it’ — and chasing the brass ring at the same level would be futile.”
The “Harris” in that quote refers to Bobby Harris, the founder of a succession of jazz, jazz-fusion, and, by that time, funk/R&B bands that hailed from Cleveland, Ohio. Big as it blew up – it topped Billboard’s “Hot Soul/Black Singles” charts, came within one spot on the “Dance Club Play” charts, and hit No. 5 on Billboard’s Hot 100 - I didn’t stumble into any great stories about the making or inspiration behind “Let It Whip.” That’s less surprising when you know Harris’ back-story, but still.
When I just think of the song, all my mind’s ear hears is a monotonous electronic drum, that squiggling bass and some pulsing synths, but “Let It Whip” holds up nicely in a closer listen – and how the hell does my brain hiccup over that guitar? – but the vocal fills/harmonic melodies are what tickle my ears just so...
...not bad for a songwriter who only never really thought of R&B/funk until he learned he could make a decent pile performing it.
The Rest of the Story
“’It was like cooking biscuits from scratch and I cook biscuits from scratch,’ he said. ‘It’s an old-school formula. You grow organically and don’t try to force a square peg in a round hole.’”
“’We never did stop performing,’ Harris said, laughing that he avoided ‘sitting on a corner with a tin cup in hand.’”
I didn’t find many killer quotables for Dazz Band, but those two do what I know of them justice. Charming as I found the long-form interview with Harris (linked to below with the rest of the sources), they lean far harder into the working band mold than they do something visionary. I don’t mean that as a knock. They formed back in 1976, if with a different name, and just kept on putting out music and performing from there.
The Hit
“Harris realized quickly that ‘Let it Whip’ was special — ‘It’s a fun song and easy to sing, so people can sing it’ — and chasing the brass ring at the same level would be futile.”
The “Harris” in that quote refers to Bobby Harris, the founder of a succession of jazz, jazz-fusion, and, by that time, funk/R&B bands that hailed from Cleveland, Ohio. Big as it blew up – it topped Billboard’s “Hot Soul/Black Singles” charts, came within one spot on the “Dance Club Play” charts, and hit No. 5 on Billboard’s Hot 100 - I didn’t stumble into any great stories about the making or inspiration behind “Let It Whip.” That’s less surprising when you know Harris’ back-story, but still.
When I just think of the song, all my mind’s ear hears is a monotonous electronic drum, that squiggling bass and some pulsing synths, but “Let It Whip” holds up nicely in a closer listen – and how the hell does my brain hiccup over that guitar? – but the vocal fills/harmonic melodies are what tickle my ears just so...
...not bad for a songwriter who only never really thought of R&B/funk until he learned he could make a decent pile performing it.
The Rest of the Story
“’It was like cooking biscuits from scratch and I cook biscuits from scratch,’ he said. ‘It’s an old-school formula. You grow organically and don’t try to force a square peg in a round hole.’”
“’We never did stop performing,’ Harris said, laughing that he avoided ‘sitting on a corner with a tin cup in hand.’”
I didn’t find many killer quotables for Dazz Band, but those two do what I know of them justice. Charming as I found the long-form interview with Harris (linked to below with the rest of the sources), they lean far harder into the working band mold than they do something visionary. I don’t mean that as a knock. They formed back in 1976, if with a different name, and just kept on putting out music and performing from there.
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| Exhibit B. |
That long-form interview (it’s just over 30 minutes, for what it’s worth) gives the best history of how the Dazz Band came together. Some members grew up with Harris, some played with him in the jazz clubs and lounges of Cleveland, Ohio – and he does a great job of honoring the people he likes (wait for it) – but, Sennie “Skip” Martin aside (who had about 20 years with latter-day Kool & the Gang), the listing the rest of the names wouldn’t be so different from listing names from a phone book. As such, I’ll focus on Bobby Harris.
Harris’ father was a working saxophone player who encouraged his son’s interest in music. The younger Harris started on the clarinet around age 8 and, after a detour into the alto clarinet in high school (he noted that most of the girls played in the orchestra), he transitioned to/through the various saxophones before landing on the alto sax. He rode around to gigs with his dad and, by this later teens, started to fill in for backing jazz bands around Cleveland – and started connecting with the area musicians who would ultimately fill in the various groups he formed.
He started with a group called Bell Telefunk, a jazz fusion act that left no footprint I could find. By cobbling together the sources, it appears that everything happened around the time Harris formed another band called Kinsman Dazz, though the order’s a bit sketchy. So, in some unclear order....
The name “Kinsman Dazz” tells two stories about the band, 1) that Harris grew up on Kinsman Street in Cleveland and that the owner of the Kinsman Grill, Sonny Jones, acted as their co-manager for some time, and 2) “dazz” is a “portmanteau” (the Wiki-editor’s word, not mine) for “danceable jazz,” which hints that Harris had already switched from fusion-jazz to jazz that would pay. I don’t mean to make him out as some kind of money-grubber, but he had no interest in funk/R&B, or even danceable jazz, until his longtime friend/other future co-manager, Ray Calabrese, spun him some records from the record distribution company where he worked and got him thinking. That connection scored Kinsman Dazz an audition – which they aced, and to the tune of getting singed by 20th Century Records - but the guy asked them if they had any original songs at the end. They did not, but Harris fibbed for time and came back with nine songs that went onto vinyl shortly thereafter.
That “original line-up” – this was 1977 – included Harris (sax/back-up vocals), Kenny Pettus (lead vocals/percussion), Isaac “Ike” Wiley, Jr. (drums), Michael Wiley (bass), and Michael Calhoun (songwriter/guitar), and some of them stuck around, but this gets ahead of their success. It wasn’t for lack of trying: they asked to have Marvin Gaye produce, and 20th Century delivered, only for Gaye to get sick during recording. They kicked them over to Phillip Bailey of Earth, Wind & Fire fame, who took over producing and floated a couple of singles – “I Might as Well Forget About Loving You,” and “Catchin’ Up on Love” – but nothing took off over their two albums with 20th Century. That took switching to Motown Records.
The band morphed its name to Dazz Band, made some personnel changes – they dropped a couple horn players I neglected to mention, and rounded out the group with Martin, Pierre DeMudd (trumpet/backing vocals), Kevin Kendricks (keyboards and, curiously, the only white member), plus Eric Fearman on guitar. This would be Dazz Band’s prime line-up, but they’d have to wait till their third album with Motown to breakthrough. (Invitation to Love came out in 1980, Let the Music Play in 1981, for what it’s worth).
Motown connected them with producer Reggie Andrews for their third album, Keep It Live (and you’ll see a theme on the album covers). When “Let It Whip” blew up, Andrews punched his ticket to produce Dazz Band’s next five albums. Again, I didn’t come across any great tour stories, tales of general debauchery, or even moments of inspiration across all the sources: the band kept playing, just probably in front of bigger crowds. The best anecdote I read came from when they won the Grammy for (get this) “Best R&B Performance by Duo or Group with Vocals” in 1982. After they burned time waiting to get in by circling the venue, the Dazz Band finally got to their seats just as they announced the category; they barely had time to sit down by the time they heard they won the Grammy.
Harris’ father was a working saxophone player who encouraged his son’s interest in music. The younger Harris started on the clarinet around age 8 and, after a detour into the alto clarinet in high school (he noted that most of the girls played in the orchestra), he transitioned to/through the various saxophones before landing on the alto sax. He rode around to gigs with his dad and, by this later teens, started to fill in for backing jazz bands around Cleveland – and started connecting with the area musicians who would ultimately fill in the various groups he formed.
He started with a group called Bell Telefunk, a jazz fusion act that left no footprint I could find. By cobbling together the sources, it appears that everything happened around the time Harris formed another band called Kinsman Dazz, though the order’s a bit sketchy. So, in some unclear order....
The name “Kinsman Dazz” tells two stories about the band, 1) that Harris grew up on Kinsman Street in Cleveland and that the owner of the Kinsman Grill, Sonny Jones, acted as their co-manager for some time, and 2) “dazz” is a “portmanteau” (the Wiki-editor’s word, not mine) for “danceable jazz,” which hints that Harris had already switched from fusion-jazz to jazz that would pay. I don’t mean to make him out as some kind of money-grubber, but he had no interest in funk/R&B, or even danceable jazz, until his longtime friend/other future co-manager, Ray Calabrese, spun him some records from the record distribution company where he worked and got him thinking. That connection scored Kinsman Dazz an audition – which they aced, and to the tune of getting singed by 20th Century Records - but the guy asked them if they had any original songs at the end. They did not, but Harris fibbed for time and came back with nine songs that went onto vinyl shortly thereafter.
That “original line-up” – this was 1977 – included Harris (sax/back-up vocals), Kenny Pettus (lead vocals/percussion), Isaac “Ike” Wiley, Jr. (drums), Michael Wiley (bass), and Michael Calhoun (songwriter/guitar), and some of them stuck around, but this gets ahead of their success. It wasn’t for lack of trying: they asked to have Marvin Gaye produce, and 20th Century delivered, only for Gaye to get sick during recording. They kicked them over to Phillip Bailey of Earth, Wind & Fire fame, who took over producing and floated a couple of singles – “I Might as Well Forget About Loving You,” and “Catchin’ Up on Love” – but nothing took off over their two albums with 20th Century. That took switching to Motown Records.
The band morphed its name to Dazz Band, made some personnel changes – they dropped a couple horn players I neglected to mention, and rounded out the group with Martin, Pierre DeMudd (trumpet/backing vocals), Kevin Kendricks (keyboards and, curiously, the only white member), plus Eric Fearman on guitar. This would be Dazz Band’s prime line-up, but they’d have to wait till their third album with Motown to breakthrough. (Invitation to Love came out in 1980, Let the Music Play in 1981, for what it’s worth).
Motown connected them with producer Reggie Andrews for their third album, Keep It Live (and you’ll see a theme on the album covers). When “Let It Whip” blew up, Andrews punched his ticket to produce Dazz Band’s next five albums. Again, I didn’t come across any great tour stories, tales of general debauchery, or even moments of inspiration across all the sources: the band kept playing, just probably in front of bigger crowds. The best anecdote I read came from when they won the Grammy for (get this) “Best R&B Performance by Duo or Group with Vocals” in 1982. After they burned time waiting to get in by circling the venue, the Dazz Band finally got to their seats just as they announced the category; they barely had time to sit down by the time they heard they won the Grammy.
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| Exhibit C. I'm not judging. They're tasteful. |
And it’s just kind of work from there. Dazz Band may have had just the one hit on Billboard’s Hot 100, but they posted seven Top 20 hits in the R&B charts over the first half of the 1980s. Moreover, those hits came off a succession of albums – e.g., “Joystick” (title track for a 1983 release) and “Let It All Blow” (from 1984’s Jukebox) – so I see no reason to tag them with the one-hit wonder label. Even if they only went gold twice (once for “Let It Whip” and once for Keep It Live), they were popular in a way that tracks with the bands I’ve loved all my life (i.e., indie artists), bands that produce and have an audience.
It's really just a succession of line-ups and albums released from there – here’s the full discography, but their last one to claw even into Billboard’s Top 200 was Wild & Free (which I didn’t listen to). Some odd details aside – e.g., the enthusiasm Dick Clark showed them on their 1982 appearance on American Bandstand (he was a sincere fan) and Harris crediting Rick James for teaching him how to manage business – I don’t have anything to add beyond acknowledging that some ugly intellectual property disputes tore the band apart sometime prior to 2020. Harris had some low-key biting things to say about the people on the other side of that lawsuit. Because I don’t know anything about the particulars, the parties, or the truth of the matter, my only comment is that Harris comes off well in that long-form interview.
Last thing I heard (this is 2020), and some dearly-departed aside (Michael Wiley and Pierre DeMudd are the only two noted above), Dazz Band continues to play – and with Martin back in the fold. And both men have since left Cleveland. As Harris put it, “I had a ball in Cleveland. I just can’t deal with the winters.”
Sources
Wikipedia – Dazz Band
Funk Chronicles, with Bobby Harris on Dayton’s “Funkologist” (2020; "long-form interview"/best source)
Daily Democrat Retrospective (2017; good, brisk source)
Classic Rock History Top 10 Songs Post (2022; and I didn't include 'em all)
Music Legends (Canada), Skip Martin Interview (2011)
About the Sampler
While I didn’t consume the Dazz Band’s entire oeuvre, I did my best the best of their prime years. The only outlier I knowingly included was “Anticipation” from 1988’s Rock the Room. That said, because Spotify scrambled the provenance – e.g., Funkology: The Definitive Dazz Band and 20th Century Masters: The Millenium Collection: Best of the Dazz Band – I can’t vouch that everything came from their hey-day.
As much as you get little shifts in sound – e.g., “Hot Spot” and “S.C.L. & P. (Style, Class, Looks, and Personality),” both from 1985’s Hot Spot, feature crunchier guitar and more computerized drums than the earlier stuff – the bulk of the Dazz Band’s material reminds me of all the early-mid-80s original movie soundtracks that I never liked. I mind the sound less now (something to do with age, oddly), but I’d still call the sampler more or less random, so here are the songs I haven’t linked to already:
“Swoop (I’m Yours)” (another biggish hit), “On the One for Fun,” “Shake It Up,” the solid slow-jam (and they have a lot) “Until You,” “Nasty Boogie” (one of my favorites), “Straight Out of School,” “Carry On,” “Let Me Love You Until,” and “Keep It Live (On the K.I.L.).”
Now you know, I suppose. And the next one goes in a different direction.
It's really just a succession of line-ups and albums released from there – here’s the full discography, but their last one to claw even into Billboard’s Top 200 was Wild & Free (which I didn’t listen to). Some odd details aside – e.g., the enthusiasm Dick Clark showed them on their 1982 appearance on American Bandstand (he was a sincere fan) and Harris crediting Rick James for teaching him how to manage business – I don’t have anything to add beyond acknowledging that some ugly intellectual property disputes tore the band apart sometime prior to 2020. Harris had some low-key biting things to say about the people on the other side of that lawsuit. Because I don’t know anything about the particulars, the parties, or the truth of the matter, my only comment is that Harris comes off well in that long-form interview.
Last thing I heard (this is 2020), and some dearly-departed aside (Michael Wiley and Pierre DeMudd are the only two noted above), Dazz Band continues to play – and with Martin back in the fold. And both men have since left Cleveland. As Harris put it, “I had a ball in Cleveland. I just can’t deal with the winters.”
Sources
Wikipedia – Dazz Band
Funk Chronicles, with Bobby Harris on Dayton’s “Funkologist” (2020; "long-form interview"/best source)
Daily Democrat Retrospective (2017; good, brisk source)
Classic Rock History Top 10 Songs Post (2022; and I didn't include 'em all)
Music Legends (Canada), Skip Martin Interview (2011)
About the Sampler
While I didn’t consume the Dazz Band’s entire oeuvre, I did my best the best of their prime years. The only outlier I knowingly included was “Anticipation” from 1988’s Rock the Room. That said, because Spotify scrambled the provenance – e.g., Funkology: The Definitive Dazz Band and 20th Century Masters: The Millenium Collection: Best of the Dazz Band – I can’t vouch that everything came from their hey-day.
As much as you get little shifts in sound – e.g., “Hot Spot” and “S.C.L. & P. (Style, Class, Looks, and Personality),” both from 1985’s Hot Spot, feature crunchier guitar and more computerized drums than the earlier stuff – the bulk of the Dazz Band’s material reminds me of all the early-mid-80s original movie soundtracks that I never liked. I mind the sound less now (something to do with age, oddly), but I’d still call the sampler more or less random, so here are the songs I haven’t linked to already:
“Swoop (I’m Yours)” (another biggish hit), “On the One for Fun,” “Shake It Up,” the solid slow-jam (and they have a lot) “Until You,” “Nasty Boogie” (one of my favorites), “Straight Out of School,” “Carry On,” “Let Me Love You Until,” and “Keep It Live (On the K.I.L.).”
Now you know, I suppose. And the next one goes in a different direction.
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