Friends (1982)

After two consecutive days of sunshine and the beginnings of a pollen induced snuffle, upbeat feel good music starts to fill your head. Songs that always raise a smile, initiate an involuntary tapping foot. For me that's the sound of Shalamar's Friends album, the summer sound of S.O.L.A.R. - Sound Of Los Angles Records.

That unabridged the name of Dick Griffey's Solar label bore an uncanny resemblance to the slogan used by Motown - 'The Sound of a Young America' - is no coincidence. Griffey garnered the success Motown achieved, a proliferation of both a Black and White audience. Instigated by Don Cornelius, producer of the popular American TV programme Soul Train, Shalamar's first single Uptown Festival (1977) had been a disco medley of Motown tunes (released on Don's own label where Griffey was then president). Actually performed by session musicians, it's success caused a proper line-up to be formed with dancers from the Soul Train programme - Jody Watley, Jeffrey Daniel and Gerald Brown (later replaced by Howard Hewett). When Griffey instigated Solar shortly afterwards he was lucky enough to find the one ingredient that would epitomise it's sound - Leon Sylvers.

Leon had himself been a member of a Jackson Five-esque family teen group in the early seventies, but unlike Motown's top sellers they had been unable to repeat their success outside of the states. By the late seventies Leon had established himself as a writer and producer on the Los Angles dance music scene. Solar allowed the opportunity to create a commercial but credible sound around Disco with increasing use of synth riffs, like a later day Holland/Dozier/Holland. As writer and/or producer his hits included Take That To The Bank, I Owe You One, Make That Move and the REAL sleeper This Is For The Lover In You for Shalamar, I Don't Wanna Be A Freak for Dynasty, and It's A Love Thing and And The Beat Goes On for The Whispers. The ongoing presence of his music, sampled in rap and house by the likes of Will Smith (Miami) and Armand Van Helden, is a testament to how great it really was.

By 1982 Sylvers and the Solar team of writers, arrangers (particularly Gene Dozier) and musicians knew exactly what they were doing. Released the same week as the album the first single, co-written by Howard Hewett himself, declared I Can Make You Feel Good. They were sure right. With hooks big enough to give the Candyman a scare it's difficult NOT to get caught. It led to overwhelming success, particularly in the UK where the album spawned three top ten singles, including the much-loved A Night To Remember and There It Is, nearly a fourth in the title track and itself spent 72 weeks in the album charts - quite a feat for any soul/dance orientated act. They enjoyed a mass popularity rarely seen save for the likes of Michael Jackson, Diana Ross and Whitney Houston. Becoming fashion icons and trend setters at the time (believe it or not), where Daniel's interest in 'body-popping' helped introduce the dance to Britain¹. They even extensively toured Britain later that year.

Inevitiblely such popularity often leads to an ostracising, and the deliberate commerciality of Friends is now rather unfairly criticised. It stands as possibly the most consistent album Solar released. Songs like On Top Of The World, Help Me, Don't Try To Change Me and I Don't Wanna Be The Last To Know further maintain a standard of irresistibly catchy tunes. Upbeat and fun, even the ballads have quite a tempo, it honestly achieves what it sets out to do. An album that crosses over from soul and dance to the pop market. Yet the excellence by which it was executed has become woefully underrated since. The songs even recently survived fair and dreadful covers by Kavana and 911 respectively, again proving the longevity of Sylvers sound.

Shalamar's prominence soon waned with the next album The Look, and Hewett remained with the monicker for one more album while Daniel and Watley moved on. Daniel was later to be found performing in Starlight Express and appearing in the Michael Jackson 'Bad' video (no comment). Hewett has had a credible but not overwhelmingly successful solo career since. Only Watley has achieved anything resembling her earlier popularity. Even then the most success any of them have had since was reforming to perform on Babyface's version of This Is For The Lover In You².

2 Sadly the Solar label was also responsible for giving Babyface his big break as a writer and producer while a leading member of the group The Deele.