SEALED LP: Average White Band & Ben E. King: Benny And

$

20

Average White Band & Ben E. King: Benny And Us

FACTORY SEALED LP

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Songs

• Get It up for Love
• Fool for You Anyway
• A Star in the Ghetto
• The Message
• What Is Soul
• Someday We'll All Be Free
• Imagine
• Keepin' It to Myself

Credits

Roger Ball: Keyboards, Saxophone, Sax (Alto), Horn Arrangements

• Ray Barretto: Conductor, Conga
• Michael Brecker: Horn, Sax (Tenor)
• Randy Brecker: Trumpet, Horn
• Robin Clark: Vocals
• Louis del Gatto: Saxophone
• Malcolm Duncan: Saxophone, Sax (Tenor)
• Steve Ferrone: Percussion, Drums
• Alan Gorrie: Bass, Guitar, Vocals, Vocals (bckgr)
• Debra Gray: Vocals
• Lewis Hahn: Engineer
• Ben E. King: Vocals
• Jim M.: Guitar
• Arif Mardin: Producer, Horn Arrangements, String Arrangements
• Nicky Marrero: Percussion
• Onnie McIntyre: Guitar, Vocals
• Jim Mullen: Guitar
• Gene Paul: Engineer
• Barry Rogers: Trombone
• Marvin Stamm: Trumpet
• Hamish Stuart: Bass, Guitar, Vocals, Vocals (bckgr)
• Luther Vandross: Vocals
• Bobby Warner: Engineer
• Yaltkaya: String Arrangements

Album Review

Review by Jason Elias

Benny and Us celebrates two distinctly different acts at interesting career junctures. AWB had just come off of the moody classic Soul Searching, and King's last album release, 1976's I Had a Love, came and went. Benny and Us benefited both acts as AWB gave King camaraderie and skilled backing; King gave them a context -- something they needed at this point. Ned Doheny's "Get It Up for Love" is a great mix of King's methodical delivery and the band's effortless, glossy yet earthy sound. "Star in the Ghetto" has skilled horn and string arrangements by album producer Arif Mardin and features emotive backing vocals from Hamish Stuart and Alan Gorrie. The best track, the relentless and funky "The Message," has Gorrie's high-pitched, popping basslines and Stephen Ferrone's great drum kicks providing a great counterpoint to King's stiff vocals. This effort has its fair share of remakes and revamps. King's 1967 hit, "What Is Soul," gets a Tower of Power-styled production. More notable tracks, Donny Hathaway's "Someday We'll All Be Free" and John Lennon's "Imagine," merge into one another and have good and surprisingly felt performances from King. For the last track, the group does a remake of the AWB classic "Keepin' to Myself." Although King can't attain Gorrie's laid-back proficiency on the original, it's fun to hear Ferrone play on a track so identified with late drummer Robbie McIntosh, who had played with King. Although Benny and Us wasn't a huge commercial success, fans of both King and AWB will be pleased with the work here.

Biography

Average White Band biography by Jason Ankeny

Their self-effacing name to the contrary, Average White Band was anything but -- one of the few white groups to cross the color line and achieve success and credibility playing funk, with their tight, fiery sound also belying their Scottish heritage, evoking American R&B hotbeds like Detroit, Memphis, and Philadelphia instead. Singer/bassist Alan Gorrie, guitarists Hamish Stuart and Onnie McIntyre, tenor saxophonist Malcolm Duncan, keyboardist/saxophonist Roger Ball, and drummer Robbie McIntosh comprised the original Average White Band lineup. Veterans of numerous Scottish soul and jazz groups, they made their debut in 1973 as the opening act at Eric Clapton's Rainbow Theatre comeback gig, soon issuing their debut LP, Show Your Hand, to little notice. After adopting the abbreviated moniker AWB, a year later the band issued their self-titled sophomore effort, topping the American pop charts with the Arif Mardin-produced instrumental "Pick Up the Pieces." The record's mammoth success was nevertheless tempered by the September 23, 1974 death of McIntosh, who died at a Hollywood party after overdosing on heroin.

Ex-Bloodstone drummer Steve Ferrone replaced McIntosh for AWB's third album, 1975's Cut the Cake, which scored a Top Ten hit with its title track as well as two other chart entries, "If I Ever Lose This Heaven" and "School Boy Crush." (Put It Where You Want It, issued later that same year, was simply a retitled and repackaged Show Your Hand.) With 1976's Soul Searching, the group reclaimed the full Average White Band name, scoring their final Top 40 hit with "Queen of My Soul." Following the live Person to Person, they issued Benny & Us, a collaboration with soul legend Ben E. King. However, after subsequent outings, including 1978's Warmer Communications, 1979's Feel No Fret, and 1980's Shine, failed to recapture the energy of AWB's peak, the group dissolved in 1982, with Ferrone later joining Duran Duran and Stuart recording with Paul McCartney. Gorrie, Ball, and McIntyre reformed Average White Band in 1989, tapping vocalist Alex Ligertwood for their comeback effort Aftershock. Oft-sampled by hip-hop producers throughout the 1990s, the group continued touring prior to releasing Soul Tattoo in 1996. The live album, Face to Face, followed three years later.

• This record came from a record store called "Phantasmagoria" which was located in Allentown, Pennsylvania. Phantasmagoria went out of business in 1978. I purchased most of their unsold inventory some years later when I owned "Music Madness" - a new & used record store in Catasauqua.
• Phantasmagoria used round colored stickers to indicate the price of the albums. They had a sign on the wall with the color sticker combinations for the customers to use so they knew the price of the albums. Most of the albums still have these stickers on them, and in some rare cases, the stickers are written on. Some of the records have prices on them. This is the price you would have paid for the record in 1978 if you would have bought it at Phantasmagoria. Please don't confuse these prices with their current value.
• All sealed albums are being sold as collector's items and cannot be returned due to manufacturer's defects. It may be almost impossible to replace many of the sealed albums that I am selling.

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