We’ve been making an effort to include some international Jheri Jams this year, from the Japanese City Pop of Hitomi Tohyama’s “Wanna Kiss”to the French post-disco groove of J.M. Black’s “Lipstick (Shout!).”Today, we’re showcasing the Brit-funk cult classic, “Melodies of Love” by Pink Rhythm.
From the twinkling, dramatic synth opening to the throbbing bassline and dripping Moog solo, this song is soaked with jheri juice. I imagine it playing over a montage of extreme closeups of Jheri curls being seductively played with in a room full of mirrors and purple strobe lights. Don’t kink shame.
We have one more day of Jheri Curl June coming up tomorrow! Meanwhile, check out the YouTube and Spotify playlists below.
We’re breaking Jheri Curl June protocol in a few ways today: first, because Callie and I were both out of town on a family vacation last Thursday and Friday, we’ve extended Ladies’ Week into the first few days of this week. And second, rather than following up Callie’s 1985 Aretha pick with something later, I’m going a year back in time. My original plan had been to pick something from Destiny, Chaka Khan’s 1986 followup to her smash 1984 album I Feel for You. But, frankly, there isn’t anything on Destiny that slaps anywhere near as hard as I Feel for You’s opening track, “This is My Night”; and our priority for Jheri Curl June has always been to slap first, follow the rules later.
https://youtu.be/sy6IUDoL8Bg
But if any sticklers out there have doubts, allow me to enumerate the reasons why “This is My Night” deserves the spotlight today. First and foremost, there’s Exhibit A: the shimmering keyboards and freestyle-inspired drum programming by songwriters David Frank and Mic Murphy of JCJ vets the System. And if that isn’t enough, there’s Exhibit B: the above music video, an homage to 1930s backstage comedies featuring Chaka, in all her bewigged-and-décolletaged glory, acting opposite everyone’s favorite bald ’80s character actor, Wallace Shawn. I rest my case.
We’re now back on our regular schedule, so we’ll see you again tomorrow for a few more days of Jheri Curl June. Meanwhile, playlists are below!
Who’s Zoomin’ Who? was recorded and produced with a younger, more contemporary audience in mind, hence its Very Jheri production: slick synthesizers, a programmed drum machine beat, and a rhythm guitar that bounces like soft, wet curls.
Each June, we set aside a week to celebrate the women of Jheri Curl Music. This year, we’re kicking off Jheri Curl June Ladies’ Week with not one, but three women: Melissa Bell, Marsha Carter, and Barbara Fowler, who together comprised the vocal trio Sinnamon.
Sinnamon’s 1982 single, “Thanks to You,” is a certified Jheri Curl jam: a sassy kiss-off to an ex-boyfriend whose “lovin’ services” are no longer required because the ladies of Sinnamon have “found somebody new.” The track’s sleek, futuristic beat and gospel-inspired vocals took it to the top of Billboard’s Hot Dance Music chart–making it by far the biggest success of the group’s brief recording career. But at least one person involved with “Thanks to You” was destined to go on to bigger and better things: the song’s 12″ mix was handled by KISS FM DJ Shep Pettibone, who would go on to become the remixer du jour for house-flavored tracks in the late ’80s and early ’90s.
We’ll be back tomorrow for Day 2 of Jheri Curl June Ladies’ Week. In the meantime, remember to check out the YouTube and Spotify playlists below!
It’s honestly shocking to me that in the six-year run of Jheri Curl June, we’ve never covered Ashford & Simpson, the ultimate soul music couple. Ashford & Simpson are what Jheri Curl June inductees René & Angela aspired to look like: a powerhouse singer-songwriter married couple.
Beginning their careers as successful songwriters, Nickolas Ashford and Valerie Simpson wrote songs for Aretha Franklin and Ray Charles before joining Motown and continuing their trail of hits. But what we’re interested in here at Dystopian Dance Party is the second decade of Ashford & Simpson’s solo career: specifically, 1984’s Solid, when the couple went and got proverbial Jheri curls together.
Solid could be classified as a Jheri Curl album for the grown and sexy. Unlike most Jheri Curl Music that’s for the club or en route to the club, this is the album you put on when you’re about to pour champagne and have slow, sensual sex on satin sheets. It’s not spontaneous humpin’, this shit was planned out all week and you’re about to make this baby because it’s a Friday night AND the peak day of ovulation. Babies aren’t made in heaven, after all.
Anyway, let’s say you’ve poured out the champagne out and have been kissing and touching and all that, right? “Outta the World” is undressing and foreplay music. Things are getting steamy and wet now–you know, kind of like a Jheri curl. If I’ve said it once, I’ve said it a thousand times: at its best, Jheri Curl Music sounds like the wetness of desire AND/OR the literal feel of a Jheri curl, and “Outta the World” is a perfect example of this. Now check out Nickolas Ashford and Valerie Simpson’s sweet synchronized shoulder shrugs and get humpin’.
And with that, we’ll just leave you to start your weekend with the words “Ashford & Simpson” and “humpin’” emblazoned in your brain. Or, you can listen to the playlists below and try to clear your mind.
For this penultimate post in Week 2 of Jheri Curl June VIbe, I thought I’d highlight another piece of International Jheri Curl. This time, our world tour takes us to France: a country with a vibrant post-disco and boogie scene documented by Born Bad Records’ excellent Chébran compilations.
One of the highlights of Chébran Volume 2 (which I reviewed last June for Spectrum Culture) is this 1984 track by J.M. Black. “Lipstick (Shout!)” actually isn’t as “international” as you might expect: as the 7″ sleeve (above) proudly proclaims, it was recorded in the boogie ground zero of New York City. But Black’s bilingual vocals–complete with a rap!–give the smooth jheri-curl groove a certain je ne sais quoi of Continental cool and sophistication. You won’t know whether to dance or smoke a cigarette and stare morosely into the distance.
Tomorrow, we’ll return to our usual domestic JCM with another post from Callie. In the meantime, check out the growing playlists below!
Today’s Jheri Curl June inductee, Michael Wycoff, was a backup singer on Stevie Wonder’s Songs in the Key of Life, as well as a contributor to some of 7th Wonder’s and Natalie Cole’s albums. In 1980 he began releasing solo albums, but it wasn’t until 1983’s On the Line that he fully embraced the Jheri.
Aside from the obvious musical qualifications of the title track in particular, On the Line also makes use of a red landline phone on the album cover. My theory, which I’m still fleshing out, is that the red phone is is a staple in Jheri Curl Music imagery: as you might recall from Jheri Curl June 2017, it also makes an appearance on the cover of Kleeer’s Intimate Connection.
We’ll be back with more Jheri Curl Music–and possibly even more red phones, who knows–tomorrow. In the meantime, YouTube and Spotify playlists are below!
Listen, I have been sitting on this Jheri Jam for a whole year, sustaining multiple burns on my ass from trying to contain this hot track. But, before we get into that, LOOK AT THAT ALBUM COVER. Larry Graham peeks out from a hot pink, palm-leafed environment, popping his collar and looking like Magnum motherfuckin’ PI. If ever there was an album cover that looked precisely how the album sounds, this is it.
By the release of 1982’s Sooner or Later, Graham was already an elder statesman of funk, having been a member of Sly & The Family Stone, worked with the likes of Betty Davis, fronted his own Graham Central Station, and oh yeah, INVENTED SLAP BASS. Sooner or Later is his foray into the new world of the ’80s, effectively saying, “Here I am, new and improved and ready to slay all the Kingdom Hall pussy.”
This is especially true of the instrumental version of the titular track, which contains some of my favorite tropes of Jheri Curl Music: a talk box vocal that sounds like a horny robot a la Roger Troutman, laser gun noises, and a bright, trilling synth line. This is a song made for cruising on a neon lit street in a Ferrari 308 GTB convertible with the top down on a steamy summer night, the warm air lightly caressing your curl and ruffling your mustache.
Week 1 of Jheri Curl June VIbe comes to a close tomorrow! In the meantime, check out the Spotify and YouTube playlists below.
It’s a testament to the depth and breadth of Jheri Curl Music that in five Jheri Curl Junes, only two bands have been featured repeatedly: Slave (with 2015’s “Watching You” and 2017’s “Turn You Out”) and the Gap Band (who kicked off 2015 with “You Dropped a Bomb on Me,” followed by last year’s “Disrespect”). This year, for our sixth Jheri Curl June, we’re bequeathing that honor on a third group: Cameo, whose 1986 jam “Candy” was part of the very first JCJ way back in 2014.
My pick for this year comes from earlier in the group’s career, but is even more of an essential Jheri Curl cut. “Flirt,” from Cameo’s 1982 album Alligator Woman, has it all: futuristic synths, a funky groove that splits the difference between P-Funk and the Minneapolis Sound, and a music video (above) that is roughly equal parts synchronized dance moves and leering closeups of models’ butts and cleavage. And speaking of leering, you’ll probably recognize the young lady from the Alligator Woman album cover: that’s none other than Denise Matthews, a.k.a. Vanity, star of the 1985 Jheri Curl Cinema classic The Last Dragon.
We’re halfway through our first week of Jheri Curl June VIbe and just getting started! Click through for YouTube and Spotify playlists, and see you tomorrow.
Two years ago, we admitted that Bootsy Collins is probably not the first name that comes to mind when thinking about Jheri Curl Music. And while that may still be true, in the early 80s he definitely dipped an entire platform boot into the jheri curl juice. Here, he joins fellow Ohio funkateers Dayton on this Jheri Jam from 1982, “Krackity-Krack.”
Though still sounding very much like a P-funk groove thanks to Bootsy’s inclusion, “Krackity-Krack”’s whiny synths and hard robotic beat coat this heavy groove in a chrome plating that smoothes out the hard edges of its ’70s funk influence. It’s a hint of things to come: a year later, Dayton would fully embrace the Jheri Curl (in every sense of the word) with this smooth jam, complete with a Roger Troutman-style talkbox:
Remember to follow along on Spotify as we continue to update this year’s playlist. See you tomorrow!
