Porquois Fuqua?

The Nite-Liters : Theme from “Buck & The Preacher” ft. The New Birth
taken from the album “Different Strokes” on RCA (1972)

The New Birth : Got to Get a Knutt (excerpt)
taken from the album “Birth Day” on RCA (1972)

In the wake of O-Dub’s excellent homage to Fuqua, the lesser known North-American funk philosopher, I felt obliged to put my two cents in. Soul-Sides is one of the main reasons I got into this medium, and I want to pay my respects from the get go. The first Nite-Liters record I aquired came from Mexico City oddly enough. It’s a Mexican pressing of “Instrumental Directions” that fell into my hands via an ex-record-shop-owning German duf-duf who was living in Guatemala. On my copy, “Afro-Strut” is “Contoneo-Africano”, and track one reads: “Tema de Shaft”.

My favorite track from “Different Strokes” is this flute friendly theme from a movie that I’d like to see. The New Birth (= Nite-Liters + Love, Peace & Happiness) does a full vocal version of this tune as well, but I think this beat fills up quite enough space by itself. And yeah, mad props to Harvey for the arrangement here.

On “Knutt”, we get a taste of The New Birth without Fuqua-fication. I just gave you guys a little more than half of the full seven-minute song. It’s been sampled, but certainly not slayed. The DJ that manages to anoint this behemoth upon a crowd-in-motion is beyond bravery and courage, that DJ hath the deep-rooted power to freakify. Behold an orgy of sound.