Classic Soul/Funk/Motown thread

Thought about this the other day and floated it in the RnB thread. Seeing the Four Tops/The Temptations thread, thought I’d go ahead and make one.

I’ll start off with a favourite of mine and an obvious classic…

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Great thread idea but wish you hadn’t led with an opening track from an album, now it’s back to the drawing board for music league…

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:grimacing: sorry!

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Was listening to the album this comes from the other day. It’s so good. Produced by Willie Mitchell who also produced the classic Al Green records - so if you like that sound

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Three stunning, faultless tracks. That Penny and the Quarters one is just unbelievably good. No idea how only three songs of theirs exist.

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I’ve gotten into funk and soul quite a bit in recent years. Funkadelic, sly stone and the family stone were my way in once I realised there was some rocking/psychedelic stuff out there.

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Love this Parliament track. If I could play piano I would learn this and never play anything else

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Three heartbreakers, in decreasing order of peppiness. All amazing, haunting tunes.

I play this over and over, I want to hear it again as soon as it finishes

Written by 16 year old (wow) Stevie Wonder and much later recorded by him, I like his version but i much prefer Tammi’s with the classic Motown skip, eerie backing vocals and her voice clear as a bell

I think I first heard this on the This Is England TV series? Woody riding his scooter at night in the rain…it’s an incredible song

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There’s an absolutely banging piece in the current Mojo about Gaye and the early 70s. It made me remember that as a kid, seeing this trailer was my first exposure to What’s Going On?, and it fits perfectly.

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Sometimes folk miss this album because it doesn’t get the respect of the classic ‘Innervisions onwards’ era but Music Of My Mind has got some bangers

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How’s about a northern soul banger - R Dean Taylor, There’s A Ghost In My House.

I knew The Fall’s cover of this before the original. Also great.

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One Northern Soul banger deserves another

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Here are some good ones:

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this was so nearly my choice for the current round of music league, and given how badly my actual pick is doing I should have gone with it:

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oh yeah

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Greatest backing vocals of all time

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Nice! Not heard that one before. A lot of p funk music for me still to discover. I’m mainly familiar with the first 5 or 6 funkadelic albums at the moment.

My favourite version of ‘Walk On By’. The arrangement and production on this is just incredible and the album that this is taken from, ‘Hot Buttered Soul’, is a psychedelic, cinematic masterpiece.

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Chocolate City, Up for the Down Stroke and Mothership Connection are all great on the Parliament side

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