Mother's Finest "Another Mother Further" 1977****

Just finished watching another episode of HBO's Vinyl series. You might have guessed I'd be a fan, although I'm still not convinced by the plot. I just enjoy the music and period detail, a guaranteed highlight of any Scorsese production. His recreations of rock stars antics and live performances are absolutely top-notch. This particular episode ended with a fantastic disco rocker by Barrabas which got me in the mood for some living room DJ'ing. Out came long-forgotten LP's (the survivors of the great vinyl purge) including this mother here. I'd bet 3-to-1 that this album's "Mickey's Monkey" will appear in one of the next seasons of Vinyl - if you're willing to take my bet, talk to my bookie. It would be a slight anachronism, but it wouldn't be the first in the series. For those who've never heard of them, Mother's Finest are a predominantly black funk group augmented with white hard rock guitarist Gary Moore. Before you hit Wikipedia to see if I'm messing with you, let me rephrase: Gary "Moses Mo" Moore from the USA, not the Irish Gary Moore. This one also being a very fine guitarist, indeed.

Yep, that's Gary Moore!

The album starts off with a Sly Stone-meets-Aerosmith cover of the old Motown chestnut "Mickey's Monkey", sung by the male vocalist Glenn "Doc" Murdock. Joyce "Baby Jean" Kennedy takes the lead on the album's lead single "Baby Love", a Funkadelic-like number with powerful vocals and a smokin' moog solo. "Thank You for the Love" is a soulful ballad, while "Truth'll Set You Free", "Piece of the Rock" and "Burning Love" take the middle road between funk and southern rock. The last two tracks represent the two different sides of the band: "Dis Go Dis Way, Dis Go Dat Way" is (you guessed it) a disco piece and "Hard Rock Lover" is -let me see if you can figure this out- hard rock (right again!). Mother's Finest kept making records but have, above all, built a tremendous reputation as a live band. For anyone interested in checking them out there's a great live album out there. Better yet, catch them when they're playing somewhere near you. They're still touring the world!
**** for Mickey's Monkey, Baby Love, Thank You for the Love, Truth'll Set You Free

*** for Piece of the Rock, Burning Love, Hard Rock Lover

** for Dis Go Dis Way Dis Go Dat Way