Mizell: The Mizell Brothers at Blue Note
Funky proto-disco soul jazz pop. Working with established Blue Note artists such as Donald Byrd, the Mizell brothers, Fonce and Larry created a dancefloor friendly sound, layering in keyboards and strings into funky jazz elements. Sometimes the sound crosses my cheesy smooth threshold, but you can hear the beginnings of sounds that would evolve into disco and house and other genres of dance music that place emphasis on groove over narrative.
1) Wind chimes spacey intro, relaxed tempo male female duet vocals. Strings, Donald Byrd sounding nice on the horn
2) Laid back R&B guitar + strings. I'm not really feeling the vocals on this one
3) Slightly more up-tempo
4) Mild Latin flavor, mainly instrumental with flute and trumpet solos
5) Smooth, easy listening, flowing
6) *Bouncing, some vocals "Laaaaaannnnnnssaaaaannnnnnaaaa!"
7) **Electric bass and congas provide the core rhythm
8) * Down-tempo, quasi-bluesy with a touch of lounge
9) *Up-tempo froggy synth + wa was guitar, sassy female vox, tense at times, open drum break
10) Layered Hammond/wa wa/strings. Female vocals
11) *Remixed version of an up-tempo soul. With the remix the vocals have been toned down and the drums are harder, there's a pretty nice hook that was sampled by A Tribe Called Quest on their first album.
Tom Purcell, November 2005