History
After recording an album for Capitol Records in 1968, the group had split up. Some of the members decided to take a chance once more and it led them to Armen Boladian, whose Westbound label in Detroit was the then-home of George Clinton and his band Funkadelic. The group recorded "Pain" and was released as a single. Positive feedback lead to Boladian signing them for a full contract, making the band record enough material for their Westbound debut.
The group still has some of the vocal and musical qualities found on their Capitol material, but their first work in the 1970s showed them incorporating a bit of jazz and a harder yet polished soulful sound.
A number of things were established with this album. The romantic and sexy aspects of their music started with Pain, with songs devoted to their love of women. It would become one of their trademarks throughout their career. The group would also become known for their suggestive photos on the album covers. Fans of the group in the mid-1970s may have been taken aback by ladies in various states of undress, but for those who knew of them beforehand, the music was defined by the S&M, bondage & discipline imagery on their sleeves, which can be viewed as a mixture of the sexual and perhaps cultural metaphor. The group would also present a character in the form of a grandmother who was simply known as Granny, voiced by Walter "Junie" Morrison. Granny and her stories would remain with the group until Junie left the group in 1974, the year the Ohio Players signed with Mercury.
When the album was released, the original mono mix of "Pain" was used. No known stereophonic mix is known to exist. The rest of the songs on the album are in stereo. The album was engineered by Arlen Smith who also engineered Pleasure and Funkadelic's America Eats Its Young.
Read more about this topic: Pain (Ohio Players Album)
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“We know only a single science, the science of history. One can look at history from two sides and divide it into the history of nature and the history of men. However, the two sides are not to be divided off; as long as men exist the history of nature and the history of men are mutually conditioned.”
—Karl Marx (1818–1883)
“The history of all hitherto existing society is the history of class struggles.”
—Karl Marx (1818–1883)
“The second day of July 1776, will be the most memorable epoch in the history of America. I am apt to believe that it will be celebrated by succeeding generations as the great anniversary festival. It ought to be commemorated, as the day of deliverance, by solemn acts of devotion to God Almighty. It ought to be solemnized with pomp and parade, with shows, games, sports, guns, bells, bonfires and illuminations, from one end of this continent to the other, from this time forward forever more”
—John Adams (1735–1826)