Summer Gladness

10 favorite '70s soul and funk jams for the hottest time of the year

Greetings, Jagged Time Lapse readers!

This post was supposed to go live yesterday, but some weird glitch involving the imbedding of YouTube videos screwed everything up. After hours of frustration, I tried the time-honored solution of turning off my computer and going to bed, and voilà — everything was fine when I woke up! I wish all solutions were that easy…

Also, before we get into the groove, I just wanted to say that I really appreciate the recent uptick in paid subscribers to this Substack. Being a full-time freelance writer ain’t easy in the first place, and my freelance outlets ain’t always as prompt about paying me for my work as they should be, so any money that you graciously deposit in my “tip jar” via paid subscriptions is tremendously helpful in these lean times. Thank you all from the bottom of my heart!

If you can’t swing a paid subscription, I totally understand — a whole lotta folks are struggling right now — but if you can spare five bucks a month (or fifty bucks a year), you’ll get access to all sorts of exclusive content (including interviews with a wide variety of musical luminaries like Smokey Robinson and Angus Young of AC/DC, and essays about everything from used record shopping in the 1970s to the infamous rumor about Rod Stewart’s, uh, “foolish behaviour”) and everything else in the already-sizable JTL archives. You’ll also quite literally help support the writing of all the entertaining and (hopefully) educational stuff that I post here for free — stuff that you won’t find anywhere else.

Anyway, that’s the sales pitch — and now for something decidedly funkier!

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I listen to soul and funk from the 1970s all year ‘round, but there’s just something about summer that makes me jones especially hard for the stuff. The heat and humidity somehow makes the beats sound fatter, the vocals sweeter, the horns hornier, the analog synthesizers stankier, the grooves get-downier. So it makes perfect sense to me that there are so many great soul and funk “summer” songs — and that great soul and funk “winter” songs are so few and far between.

Picking my 10 favorite ‘70s soul and funk summertime jams isn’t easy — there’s plenty more where these came from (and Sly’s “Hot Fun in the Summertime” is officially disqualified from consideration, having been released in the summer of ‘69) — but each and every one of the following tracks is guaranteed to add some serious hot sauce to any summer mix you’re putting together, as well as improve any conceivable summer activity you may find yourself engaging in.

The Blackbyrds — Rock Creek Park

Okay, this oft-sampled 1975 groover doesn’t specifically allude to summer in its title or lyrics, but if you’re gonna be “doin’ it in the dark” in D.C.’s Rock Creek Park, you’re certainly not gonna pick the colder months for it. And dig how that jazzy flute (courtesy of Jay Jones, I think) wafts over the fabulously funky music like a cool breeze on a 90-degree day.

East Coast Connection — Summer in the Parks, Pt. 1

Fellow D.C. residents The East Coast Connection surely knew where The Blackbyrds were coming from, having cut their own funky ode to al fresco partying a year earlier. I love how they start the song out out by complaining about the heat, but don’t mind sweating once they realize that Kool & The Gang, Earth, Wind & Fire and The Soul Searchers are all getting down in a park nearby. Hell, I’d leave the air conditioning behind for that kind of bill, too!

The Dramatics — Hot Pants in the Summertime

Summer in the 1970s meant women in hot pants, and The Dramatics were, for the record, very much okay with that. “Hey there, girl, you sure look good in your hot pants,” they cry on this 1971 album cut, sweat audibly beading up on their trembling brows as one leggy, callipygian beauty after another sashays past. Trust me, dudes — she doesn’t need you to tell her that!

Chic — A Warm Summer Night

Chic are rightfully lauded for creating some of the greatest dance floor anthems of the late ‘70s, but Nile Rodgers and Bernard Edwards’ slow jams were the real deal, as well. This slow-burning six-minute summer love mantra from 1979’s Risqué will have you icing up the cocktails — or jumping into a cold shower — before it’s done!

Quincy Jones — Summer in the City

The Lovin’ Spoonful’s original 1966 recording of “Summer in the City” is sheer pop perfection — even if I always find myself hoping that the song’s dramatic breakdown will explode into Jimmy Page’s “Stairway to Heaven” guitar solo — but leave it to “Q” to slow the song down, turn it inside out, and transform it into a masterpiece of cinematic summer funk.

Roy Ayers Ubiquity — Everybody Loves the Sunshine

Speaking of summers in the city, Ayer’s classic 1976 cut is the perfect soundtrack for those city afternoons where the heat’s radiating from the concrete so powerfully that you can only move and groove at a snail’s pace. Once you’re fully aligned with the song’s unhurried flow, though, you won’t even mind the smells ofbaked garbage coming up from the curb.

Ramsey Lewis — Sun Goddess

Maurice White, who played drums for numerous 1960s albums by the Ramsey Lewis Trio, gave Lewis this song in 1974 and brought in the rest of Earth, Wind & Fire to back him up on it. The result was a huge hit for Ramsey — and a fantastic summer groove that just keeps on giving nearly 50 years later.

War — Summer

War’s last great single — and, not coincidentally, their last Top 10 hit — really brings back the sweet summer of 1976 for me. I spent a substantial chunk of that summer in LA, where the band hailed from, devoting much of my free time to listening to the radio while committing a book of CB lingo to memory. So between the song’s hazy, lazy vibe and the lines “Rappin’ on the CB radio in the van/Give a big 10-4 to the truckin’ man” and “Kids of all ages digging Disneyland,” “Summer” seemed like the perfect summer anthem for me.

Kool & The Gang — Summer Madness

For whatever reason, I didn’t hear Kool & The Gang’s 1974 hit “Summer Madness” until nearly 20 years later, when I heard it on “Dusty 1390” while cruising around Chicago. I was immediately pulled in by the spacey synths, but it was the hypnotic groove that made me seek out a copy of my own — a groove so perfect that someone went ahead and made a one-hour extended mix that totally works.

The Isley Brothers — Summer Breeze, Parts 1 & 2

If I’d grown up in Ancient Greece, I would have worshipped at the altar of Apollo, the Greek god of music, dance and the sun. But since I grew up in late 20th century America, I worship instead at the altar of The Isley Brothers, because few things can take me to the sun like the life-affirming combination of Ronald Isley’s supple voice and Ernie Isley’s soaring guitar.

Though they’ve written a lot of great songs through the years, the Isleys also have a brilliant way with a cover. Their magical 1973 makeover of “Summer Breeze” turns Seals’ & Crofts humble ode to hippie homecomings into something slinky, sexy and soulful, then caps it with a jaw-droppingly interstellar guitar solo from Ernie. If I had to choose just one ‘70s soul song to listen to for the rest of my summers, it would be this one.

How about you? What are some of your favorite ‘70s salutes to summer, soulful or otherwise? Let me know in the comments section!

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