Customer Reviews

In the Slot

5 star:		(8)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(0)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This, the last Tower of Power studio album before the disco era 1976-1979, is truly a masterpiece. Including "Ebony Jam", "On The Serious Side", "Just Enough And Too Much" and the ultimate party-disco-funk tune "Drop It In The Slot", this album shows Tower of Power from their very best side... Chester Thompson's clavinet and Hammond-solos, Lenny Picket's tenor sax... the legendary rhythm and horn sections, and the great great Hubie Tubbs on lead vocals. If I could give six stars I would.

Anyone who really knows TOP, knows, that Lenny Williams was the most incredible lead vocalist TOP has had, or will ever have. With that being said, new vocalist Hubert Tubbs had a tough act to follow, and filled the space admirably. His vocals on this album really are soulful, gruff, funky and moving. The songs here, 3 or 4 being instrumentals, are all first-rate TOP. The horn and rhythm section on this album is the BEST that TOP has ever had, period! Along with the albums "Bump City", "Tower Of Power", "Back To Oakland", "Urban Renewal" and "Live And In Living Color", this album is truly a gem among those other TOP classics!! And most important, it is funky like a mo-fo!

In 2008, WEA Japan released the entire WB Tower Of Power catalog in remastered form. All of the albums benefit from new mastering, and are worthwhile acquisitions for fans.

I found all of the remastered material to be superior to the Rhino 2CD "What Is Hip?" 1999 compilation set, except, surprisingly, for the material from the 3rd album, which sounds better on the Rhino.

Amazon does a haphazard job of stocking these remasters, so you may have to seek them from Japan-based retailers. Also, Amazon's prices are at least a third higher than buying direct from Japan, although shipping costs will cut into that percentage.

Here are the links for the `08 remasters:

East Bay Grease
Bump City
Tower Of Power
Back To Oakland
Urban Renewal
In The Slot
Live And In Living Color

Again, it's sad that American consumers have to obtain better sounding CD's from another country. WEA, and now WMG, have long maintained a corporate policy of not upgrading their catalog under the "they're-gonna-buy-it-anyway-so-why-waste-profits" philosophy, no matter that rival Sony has made a lucative business model out of remastering nearly the entire Columbia records catalog. Although this internal policy was mandated by the WEA regimes of the past, Edgar Bronfman, the current WMG chief, has maintained the status quo.

So, Tower Of Power now joins fellow WEA artists Jackson Browne, Ry Cooder, The Doobie Brothers, Tower Of Power, Neil Young, Van Dyke Parks, Little Feat, Van Morrison, America, Annie Haslam, Everything But The Girl, Roberta Flack, Todd Rundgren, Cold Blood and Paul Butterfield, just to name a few, whose catalogs either partially or wholly exist in better audio in Japan than here in the U.S.

It's a pathetic and frustrating situation.

This is a great album by the bay area band.It has a hot mix of vocal and instrumental tracks that will have you on your feet.I was lucky enough to see them at the ohio state fair a few years ago and they sounded just as good as when they started in the seventies.Thank's to amazon I can find out about band's like Tower Of Power that did'nt have many top 40 hits but were just as good.

Let's face it, the REAL reason why I gave this one 4 stars instead of five is because LENNY WILLIAMS IS NOT ON IT, LOL!!! Nothing against Hubert Tubbs or anything of the sort (he does a really admirable job here and certainly wound up having the longest tenure with the group as their frontman for that matter), but Lenny was truly one-of-a-kind and IMHO the ONLY lead vocalist the band ever needed in the first place.

With that "minor" quibble out of the way, I must say there's no real letdown from start to finish on 'In The Slot'. The grooves are as tight and muscular as anything found in TOP's previous albums. The ballads are especially well-crafted (in particular Soul Of A Child, now one of my all-time favorites from them) and really show off a side of the band that sometimes gets overlooked amid their trademark horn-driven jams.

Whether you're new to the band or a longtime fan, this album is as essential as any of their classic stuff they cut during their highly productive stint on the Warner Bros. label. This being the last studio effort they released for them (a critically-acclaimed live album would follow soon after to opt out of their contract with the label), they certainly went out guns blazin'!

Good CD. There isn't a song on this CD that is just FANTASTIC! but all the songs are good. Lot of instrumentals. Good solos by Lenny Pickett. I liked this CD

This is one of their earlier albums and it's groove is heavenly. David Garibaldi is a master at the ToP groove. I've played drums for years and have tried to reproduce some of his genius in some of the ToP cover bands I've played in. Once you try that, you realize how good he really is and how much you can learn from him!

So to all the drummers and bass players out there -- this is for you. Garibaldi and Prestia make a phenomenal combination. Make sure you listen to this on headphones with good quality bass reproduction or (preferable) of some high stereo speakers.

Growing up in the SF Bay Area in the 70's, TOP was all the rage, and many of us got to see them live.

Years later, knowing something about music and hearing them again, I was knocked out at how complex and rich their tunes were. Composers Castillo and Kupka were (are) truly musical geniuses who were way ahead of their time. Who else in popular music was using those jazzy chords and licks and screaming horns? I can only think of a few - Blood, Sweat and Tears, Chicago, and Earth, Wind and Fire come to mind.

Sadly, TOP's marketing never matched their musical skill - they should have been a huge nationwide hit group as big as any of the above-named, but most of my East Coast friends have no clue about them (okay, they're mostly white people).

ANYWAY - I had thought "In the Slot" was an average TOP album, but re-listening to gems like the opener, "Just Enough and Too Much," and great ballads "As Surely As I Stand Here" and "The Soul of a Child," I want to put it up near my personal favorite, "Tower of Power" (the 3rd album). These guys just cook, and it's futile trying to describe them to those who haven't heard. I just stick the headphones on their head and let it rip.

This is so damn funky you won't believe it. I consider this to be if not the best ToP album, then certainly part of their golden period, up there with 'Urban Renewal'. There's no tighter horn section in the world, and Prestia's bass kicks the whole thing along like nothing else.
I also recommend 'East Bay Grease' for some extended, dirtier funk numbers.

It was 1975 that Tower Of Power released the album that,for all intents and purposes would end the period of the career that produced "What Is Hip","Oakland Stroke" and the like. Following up later in the year that produced their excellent and socially conscious Urban Renewal this album finds them still very much in the throws of their Lenny Williams vocal period. The vocals were tough and soulful following suit to the music which takes on it's own kind of flavors here. Songs such as "Just Enough And Too Much","On The Serious Side" and "Drop It In The Slot" are to-the-point,short funk grooves that fit perfectly into what Ricky Vincent so acurrately coined as the "united funk" era. Meaning the music is still heavily rooted in the James Brown style with everything from horns to bass being rhythm elements but also taking on the unique personalities of the musicians involved. These jams have just a bit more of an ebb and flow than some of the earlier TOP funk style but it's firmly rooted in the same type of style.

Other songs such as the near seven minute "Ebony Jam" find them working out a more jazz-funk oriented instrumental. They'd hinted at it strongly before but if TOP ever had an influence outside of the funk/R&B genre it tended to be in psychedelic rock previous to this as opposed to jazz but here it all comes out into the forefrint. Also of note are the rather Panamanian style grooves of "Vuela Por Noche" and "The Soul Of A Child",an excellent slower groove style ballad with some very humane and involving lyrics. It was amazing what funk albums like this as well as released by Earth Wind & Fire,Kool & The Gang and The Isley Brothers were achieving during this time-the culmination of what I still see as a sadly unsung musical genre that was capable of delivering unique rhythmic signitures,cosmically concious lyrics and during this period anyway deserved commercial success. This album couldn't represent that time better and,not only that offered many important guide posts for where funk could and would be taken in the decades to come.