This is a rewind production, from the days I discovered this Boston, M.A. R&B group so we're pressing play today.
Way back in 1982 I tended to buy 7 inch singles and one I bought was Centerfold by the J Geils Band and that lead to me buying the cassette of the album it was from which included Flame Thrower that I played rather a lot at the time.
While the inserts remain good, sadly the black rubber pad that holds the tape against the players heads has decayed to a sticky mess which is a common problem on EMI tapes from the late 70's onward where they removed the metal supported spring pad for a block of foam.
I managed to get hold of the well regarded British BGO label cd from 1993 of this album recently which sounds just great.
Also in that series was Love Stinks, the 1980 release that include the U.S. hit single Just Can't Wait apart from the title track.
Back in early 1987 I joined a compact disc library that allowed you try discs first for seven days and if you liked them you'd send payment and get the cd case and booklet to keep it and this was one title I tried and copied on a TDK tape cos I thought even then it wasn't a generous retrospective of this bands EMI America era recordings.
Sadly that tape left the building some years back but I was able to get very cheaply the original US cd for some tracks I don't otherwise have in my collection.
Just relaxing here as you do having spent part of the morning would might of seemed uneventful other than going flying under mud with rice krispy shaped indentations while out walking chasing butterflies and bees.
So that meant cleaning up my shoes and changing my socks as they were covered in mud when I got back place cleaning up a cut before applying a band aid to it.
One minute you're on your feet and the next you're on the grand slide, trying to apply the breaks, trying to keep the small Sony camera I had with me well away from the mud having had to replace the old Canon compact one earlier in the year.
Talking of replacements, this was replaced earlier on in the week after two decades of feline claw damage was getting to me from the time one of my cats got stuck behind the record storage area and clawed it's way out damaging the outer and in this instance the inner sleeve of a number of albums which was annoying as I'd only had it for a month.
After all this sorting myself out, I played this new copy.
Because this month I may not be away with friends due to you know what doesn't mean I cannot look back at those moments and some of the views I saw such as walking around this lake in East Anglia enjoying the tranquility of it all.
Nor does it mean I forget the joy of being able to stroll around the grounds of where we usually stay enjoying the trees and watching the insect life on a warm Winter's day.
It's the memories we make that help us get through difficult times such as those we are all facing presently.
It is to be hoped we'll be able to get together in February.
We enter a new month, see some changes around what we can do (and how) and a few things have arrived here.
The music of Kool and the Gang goes back quite along time, actually to the dawn of the 1970's but as flavours changed, the group itself did coming up with a smooth soul and funk style that was extremely popular until again in the late 1980's a mix of more electronic instrumentation and the influence of HipHop moved what had become dubbed "R&B" along a very different line.
This is a set that across three discs takes six albums from 1979 through 1985 all of which had major hit singles in either the US or the UK that many regard as some of the must enduring of the era.
Songs like 1979's Ladies Night as covered by Atomic Kitten, Celebration, Get Down On It, Big Fun, Joanna, Fresh and Cherish are all songs featured in this collection together with minor singles and deep cuts.
It comes with a booklet that carries the original album credits and adds background information on the group and each albums history in a single slim package.
For the £13.99 I paid for this Beat Goes On set, that was quite a bargain.
