Tune Tag #44 with Matt Fish of Best Music of All Time: LaBelle, Ronettes, O'Jays, Ray Barretto, Dwight Twilley, Allen Toussaint, Pointer Sisters
Today's menu: A Filet of Soul, finished with a delicious, but no less funky Creole sauce, paired with a glass of our sparkling Voulez-Vouz Coucher Avec Moi Ce Soir Chardonnay. ¡Celebremos con yos!💃🕺
Howdy, Matt!
You’re IT!
Tune Tag welcomes of Best Music of All Time!
“My name’s Matt, and I write the Best Music of All Time newsletter! The newsletter’s goal is simple: to provide quality, algorithm-agnostic music recommendations to internet users. I cover classics, new releases, you name it. I’m a total music obsessive.
“I was that kid who stayed up late listening to my record collection on a semi-busted CD player or deeper, weirder cuts on after-hours radio shows. I became a DJ in my teens, and a full-time radio host before I was 25.
“I’m that guy whose idea of time well-spent on a weekend afternoon is thumbing through used album bins for eclectic finds to add to my enormous record collection (at last count, totaling over 150,000 songs across physical media and digital files).
“I’m also Canadian, a professional marketing moron by trade, and currently standing while I write this to try and burn some phantom calories!”
Last week, we tagged tunes with of CERNIG:
And, next week, we’ll enjoy the musical Tune Tag stylings of singer/songwriter,
of Organizing an Accident!
Matt’s song #1 sent to Brad: The O’Jays, “I Love Music,” 1975
The of-the-era studio version: The 10-minute 12-inch disco single Tom Moulton Mix! Time to hit the floor!
Don Cornelius’s Soul Train: O’Jays performing to studio recording…with live mics!
Matt’s rationale: My undying love for the O’Jays and the Philly Soul sound in general: The mission statement embedded in its title—I mean, how more on-point can you get?
Perhaps most importantly, the video itself is a window into some of my most cherished memories as a music fan: Sitting at home, watching hour upon hour (sometimes in a row without breaks) of old Soul Train and other retro-TV music performances from that golden period for the R&B genre.
An insane amount of good music came out and charted during that time, much of it enduring to the present day, which is striking in its own right. How much of today’s “top of the pops” will still be around in 50 years? 60 years? That number’s not zero, but it won’t be as high as ‘70s music I don’t think: From the outfits to the dance choreography and beyond, I can’t explain it in words other than there’s something really magical about having this window into a moment in time where music was so uplifting and, in a way, fueled the innocence of the era.
Less jaded, less cynical. It’s the only environment where a song like “I Love Music” could exist. [Brad emerges: Unless it appears at Daryl’s House!]👇
More Philly soul’n’disco with a custom 10-song playlist:
Brad’s song #1 sent to Matt: The Ronettes, “I Can Hear Music,” 1966
Matt’s response: So, some obvious connections off the top of my head: staying in the vintage soul lane, similarly themed song titles, and another group who could create effortless-sounding harmonies. I have to say, even with all the love they get in music nerd circles, part of me still thinks The Ronettes are underrated as hell.
You have the Phil Spector “Wall of Sound” that props some of their songs up, no doubt, but the vocals at the center of their hits are among the very best girl group efforts, regardless of the era. Talk about a group that can make me swoon!
Brad’s rationale: It took a lot of strength and fortitude to turn Matt’s first song away from Philadelphia! I could’ve gone (and really wanted) to “Soul City Walk” by fellow Houstonians, Archie Bell & The Drells, to keep it in Philly and with Gamble & Huff:
I could’ve gone with the Beach Boys’ well-known cover or Ellie Greenwich’s 1973 arrangement, but decided to go with this rare Jeff Barry production on a Philles label release! Frankly, by 1966, I was wondering if Spector “had the time” to tend to label stalwarts like The Ronettes, busy as he had become with The Righteous Brothers and their massive “You’ve Lost That Lovin’ Feeling” and his next hoped-for masterpiece, “River Deep, Mountain High”!
We actually picked up that very time frame, recently, as we drilled down on the hit-song bridge that spanned all the way from The Righteous Brothers’ “You’ve Lost That Lovin’ Feeling” to The Beach Boys’ “Good Vibrations,” with Tina Turner’s “River Deep-Mountain High” in the middle, and creating an historically viable creative girder:
Matt’s song #2: Ray Barretto y Su Charanga Moderna, “Ritmo Sabroso,” 1963
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