Old School Tutorial:
The Gap Band

Since we Gen-Xers have a duty to pass on to the younger generations the best pop culture that was produced during the 1980s, I've decided to start an intermittent series that will introduce them to odds-and-ends that they might otherwise overlook.

The popularity of the musical genre known as funk was already on the wane in the early 80s when the Gap Band found success with their novelty funk single "I Don't Believe You Wanna Get Up and Dance (Oops Upside Your Head)". For the next several years they topped the R&B charts with some of the best funk music every produced.

Funk, a style of R&B that was popularized in the late 1970s, took its name for the slang term whose meaning was "transformed from the original one of a pungent odor to a re-defined meaning of a strong, distinctive groove." One of the most characteristic features of funk music is the dominant role played by the bass guitar. Today, hip-hop music is so bass heavy that it is difficult to imagine a time when bass was rare in R&B and Soul. But funk was the first popular genre to bring it to the fore and give it pride of place.

The Gap Band wasn’t the greatest funk band of all-time (that distinction belongs to Earth, Wind, and Fire) but they did have the greatest funk song. Early in the Morning is the pinnacle of funk. It is also the best song to ever incorporate a chicken.

The song is a mini-seminar in the genre of '80s-era funk. All of the key elements are represented: synth keyboards replacing the horn section; thumb-slapped bass guitar underpinning the wah-wah of a rhythm guitar; tight harmony between percussion and bass.

The song begins with a rooster crow, signaling that its time to turn it up (the song refuses to be played at low volumes). From there it unfolds into steady, driving beat that carries the listener for almost four minutes. At about the time most pop songs are winding down, Early detours into a jam session that lasts for another two minutes. The song structure itself is rather simple but the bassline provides a surprisingly complex backdrop for Charlie Wilson's distinctive vocals.

Another standout single is Yearning for Your Love. Younger listeners may not recognize the unfamiliar sound of a guitar being picked, something you don’t often hear in today's R&B slow-jams. Listen closer and they'll hear another guitar joining in with a bass, keyboard, and drum. Today, the only "hip-hop band" that plays their own instruments are The Roots. But back in the day, instruments played by humans, rather than beats produced by a computer, were quite common. The music from that era has a depth and fullness that's often missing from hip-hop songs produced by twiddling nobs on a console.

Sadly, the Wilson brothers hit their stride in 1980 with "Burn Rubber On Me (Why You Wanna Hurt Me)" but lost a step after the 1983 release of "Outstanding." They continued to have hit singles (24 from 1983-2004) but funk was being replaced by other genres. As Rod Dreher would say, "And then along came rap and ruined everything."

Essential Discography: The only album you really need is the 20th Century Masters - The Millennium Collection: The Best of The Gap Band. That disc contains the six essential singles (Burn Rubber, Outstanding, You Dropped A Bomb On Me, Early In The Morning, Yearning For Your Love, Season's No Reason To Change) along with some filler tracks.

Bonus video: Early in the Morning

Before you watch this video, be sure to listen to song a few times. The audio quality is substandard and causes the song to lose some of its flavor. However, the video itself is a pop art masterpiece.

The brilliance of this video, however, can be lost on a generation weaned on irony so let me point out why those of us who stayed up late hoping to catch it on Friday Night Videos found it transcendent. The beauty is in the details:

• The guy in the chicken costume is lame. Fortunately, everything else in the video is genius.
• Three words: Fire Stick Drummer
• The guy with the headset that says "Okay" is wearing a Members Only jacket with general stars on the epaulets.
• The Wilson brothers are dressed like a girl's high school drill team. And yet… they manage to totally pull off that look.
• The Tower of Power wannabes in the background that are too busy dancing to play their instruments.
• Two girls--who couldn't get a gig as Solid Gold Dancers--doing aerobics in the background.
• Everybody has a mustache (expect the girls, of course).
• The mysterious baby grand piano in the background that never gets played.
• A line-dancing bass player.
• The sideways dance that Charlie does at 3:27. Brilliant.

Next on OST: Steve Taylor