Word: funk
(lookup in dictionary)
(lookup stats)
Dates: during 1970-1979
Sort By: most recent first
(reverse)
Despite Zappa's undeniably brilliant musical abilities--now, he's even into producing, having helped churn out the latest Grand Funk Railroad offering--he's still haunted by a past he largely denies...
What of the other 50? "We have a Negro guitar player named Ray White with a red jumpsuit, and his dashing accomplice Bianca--they add an element of funk--and then there's me, for that Mediterranean raunch effect," he says...
...debut album In separable and picked up a pair of Grammys for her trouble. Cole's second LP confirms a talent that makes her a strong contender for Aretha Franklin's title as queen of soul pop. At her best getting down with hand-clapping, shooby-dooby funk, Cole tends toward dance-oriented tunes. Her voice is fresh and breezy, with more than a hint of Sarah Vaughan filigree. Well suited to Vegas show songs like Mr. Melody or the disco soul sparkler Touch Me, she lacks the weight for emotionally stormy ballads like Heaven Is with...
...mail, with screaming ads in the Wall Street Journal and other newspapers. Ringer spent well over $100,000 on the ads and intimidated some bookstores into placing their own ads by proposing to give rivals exclusive sales rights in their territories. When Intimidation caught on, Ringer had Funk & Wagnalls take over the distribution of his book. This was O.K. with Ringer's agent Henry Rearden, who turned out to be Ringer himself, hiding behind the name of a character in Atlas Shrugged, the ponderous novel by his right-wing idol, Ayn Rand...
Then there was the problem of instant promotion. So many new stars were appearing, so quickly, and with so little justification. Grand Funk had put out six gold albums; David Cassidy and the Osmonds were being greeted by Beatles-sized crowds as they arrived at foreign airports; Elton John behind his $3000 Foster Grants seemed the last straw. In the sixties, the rise of Dylan, or the Beatles, or the Stones was attributable to something--social trends, or taste, or recognition of talent--but in the seventies little explaine the existence of the new stars except pure hype. And what...