Behold! Earth, Wind & Fire! One of the most successful and influential funk bands of the 1970s.
This was a band’s band where every member could rock out, but focus on EWF has to start with founder Maurice White. He was a veteran Chicago session musician by the time he started the band with his brother Verdine White in 1969.
Maurice had been a drummer for the jazz-pop Ramsey Lewis Trio and also played drums on such Chicago soul hits like “Rescue Me” by Fontella Bass.
That background—playing with a jazz legend while also helming the skins on short-poppy soul hits—explains a lot to come from White’s EWF. They were capable of having expansive free-flowing excursions especially during their live performances, while also crafting radio ready smashes like “Shining Star”, “Sing A Song”, and “September”.
Arising in the aftermath of the Civil Rights Movement, the band also had a message built upon Black Pride, human rights, and a deep interest in various religions and spiritualities. These interests would eventually lead them into lots of Egyptian motifs in their stage outfits and album artwork. They would also sink their teeth into Brazilian music to further spice up their melange that already included the aformentioned jazz and soul as well as psychedelic rock.
All of these influences—plus the works of other melting pot bands that found success before them like Sly & the Family Stone, War, and Santana—melded into a type of music instantly identifiable as Earth, Wind & Fire’s. Other bands like Con Funk Shun would be heavily influenced by them in turn, but during a period from roughly 1973-1976, EWF was in a space all their own before the copycats began amassing at the gates.
The multiplatinum success that defined EWF from 1973 to 1983 was preceded by a fallow period where Maurice White struggled to make all the moving parts mentioned above fit together. The struggle was so real that the first incarnation of EWF was basically blown to pieces by Maurice. From the original 10-piece band only Maurice and Verdine survived the purge of 1972 prior to the release of Last Days and Time. That album was their first to make waves after their first two albums fell flat.
After some minor reconfigurations following 1973’s Head to the Sky, the band’s classic lineup emerged in time for Open Our Eyes in 1974. Both of those albums went platinum paving the way for the blockbuster smashes of That’s the Way of the World, Gratitude, Spirit, All ‘n All, and I Am which all went multi-platinum.
The “Classic” EWF Lineup
Maurice White — vocals, kalimba, drums, percussion
Verdine White — bass
Al McKay — guitar
Philip Bailey — vocals, percussion
Ralph Johnson — percussion
Andrew Woolfolk — flute, saxophone
Larry Dunn — piano, clavinet, organ, synthesizer
Johnny Graham — guitar, percussion
Fred White — drums
Key to the band’s success in this period as well was the influence of Chicago producer and arranger Charles Stepney. He had worked around the same Chicago studios as Maurice White had in the 1960s and he helped smooth out the rough edges of EWF’s sound when he began working with them on Open Our Eyes. Although Stepney died young from heart attack at age 45 in 1976, EWF had internalized his lessons and they shared them with others from Chicagoland.
The band played a major role on Ramsey Lewis’s comeback album Sun Goddess in 1975. Then they produced a string of albums by Chicago trio The Emotions, including their blockbuster single “Best Of My Love”. Gary, Indiana, native Deniece Williams got the EWF touch on the fantastic This Is Niecy and its follow up Song Bird.
But all great things come to an end. Or at least slow down.
By the early 1980s, EWF was struggling to make hits for themselves, let alone others. Their first three albums of the ‘80s brought mixed results… for a band of EWF’s reputation. Faces only went gold, Raise! did go platinum, but then Powerlight also went merely gold. Finally the artistic and commercial light ironically went out with 1983’s Electric Universe. That album bombed something fierce with no hit singles and the band went on hiatus as their style of music (heavy on live percussion and horns, angelic vocal arrangements, positive lyrics based on love and spiritualism) just didn’t work within the confines of increasingly mechanized and programmed productions.
Earth, Wind & Fire reformed in 1987, but since then the main members of the band have been Maurice White, Verdine White, Philip Bailey, and Ralph Johnson. Saxophonist Andrew Woolfolk initially rejoined the group in ‘87 but dipped out permanently by 1993. Keyboardist Larry Dunn returned for one album in 2013. Maurice’s death from Parkinson’s disease in 2016 left the group a trio.
ALBUM GRADES and REVIEWS
I gotta say that for a band that’s been around for over 50 years and has continued to regularly release albums, Earth, Wind & Fire has managed to not embarrass themselves too much. Only three of their 21 albums I looked at would qualify as “cringe”—meaning they got below a C grade.
And as you can see below, there’s a stretch from Head to the Sky through Powerlight where nearly every album is essential (B grade or higher) for lovers of soul, funk, pop, or ‘70s music. And when you get to a Grade A album, that just means any music fan should listen to the LP, regardless of genre proclivities. You’ll find something there you like or at the very least appreciate well.
1970s LPs
Open Our Eyes: A-
Gratitude: A-
Spirit: A
All ‘n All: A
I Am: B
1980s LPs
Faces: C+
Raise!: C+
Powerlight: B+
Touch the World: C+
1990s LPs
Heritage: F
Millennium: C
2000s LPs
The Promise: C
Illumination: C-