You've Got It Bad Girl [Digipak]

Performer: Quincy Jones
Producer: Quincy Jones; Ray Brown
Distributor: Universal Distribution

Notes: Personnel: Dave Grusin, Bob James (keyboards); Chuck Rainey, Ray Brown , Carol Kaye (bass guitar); Grady Tate (drums); Milt Holland, Bobbye Porter (percussion). Arranger: Quincy Jones. During the `70s, Quincy Jones--composer, arranger, and conductor--emerged as a solo artist in his own right, and released several discs under his name. From 1973, YOU'VE GOT IT BAD, GIRL is something of a resume for Jones's early `70s period. There's the music he composed for films ("Love Theme From THE GETAWAY"), Quiet Storm covers of Top 40 hits ("Summer In the City"), and some swinging Latin-accented big-band jazz ("Manteca"). Perhaps it's not consistent stylistically, but fans of Q will appreciate this LP's return as it also features some rather nifty contributions from Stevie Wonder and alto sax legend Phil Woods. Quincy Jones followed up Smackwater Jack and his supervision of Donny Hathaway's Come Back Charleston Blue soundtrack with this, a mixed bag that saw him inching a little closer toward the R&B-dominated approach that reached full stride on the following Body Heat and peaked commercially with The Dude. That said, the album's most notorious cut is "The Streetbeater" -- better known as the Sanford & Son theme, a novelty for most but also one of the greasiest, grimiest instrumental fusions of jazz and funk ever laid down -- while its second most noteworthy component is a drastic recasting of "Summer in the City," as heard in the Pharcyde's "Passin' Me By," where the frantic, bug-eyed energy of the Lovin' Spoonful original is turned into a magnetically lazy drift driven by Eddie Louis' organ, Dave Grusin's electric piano, and Valerie Simpson's voice. (Simpson gives the song a "Summertime"-like treatment.) Between that, the title song (a faithfully mellow version, with Jones' limited but subdued vocal lead), a medley of Aretha Franklin's "Daydreaming" and Ewan MacColl's "First Time Ever I Saw Your Face," and a light instrumental, roughly half the album is mood music, and it's offset with not just "The Streetbeater" but a large-scale take on "Manteca," a spooky-then-overstuffed "Superstition" (where the uncredited Billy Preston, Bill Withers, and Stevie Wonder are billed as "three beautiful brothers"), and the "Streetbeater" companion "Chump Change" (co-written with Bill Cosby). The best here can be had on comps, but the album is by no means disposable. [Given a straight reissue in early 2009 via Verve's Originals series.] ~ Andy Kellman

Quincy Jones has been one of the most influential and respected figures in music since the 1950s. His gifts as an arranger and producer have brought him a great deal of success including multi-platinum albums by Michael Jackson, his own high-profile label (Qwest), and magazine (Vibe). His endeavors into straight jazz recording are relatively few, but they bore some great fruit in the late '50s and early '60s.

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